16.10.08 Km travelled 9772 I'm sitting here writing on my small notebook that Sara bought for me when she came to visit in London, and Michael is on his laptop working on Semaphore video. We're on the train to Irkutsk. Ours is only a short 2 days/2 nights trip on a train that is going from Moscow to Khabarovsk. We share the cabin with Piotr and Irina, a nice couple almost our parents' age, that is going to Novosibirsk, so we will do half the way with them. Like most of the times we had a bit of hard time this [View Full Entry]

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15.10.08 Today is time to see what Yekaterinenburg has to show, and we have plenty of time. The start of the day is amazing. When Anatolij knocks on the door saying “breakfast is ready” we can hardly believe it! You would never expect it in a hostel, imagine there! Wonderful. Coffee, juice and plate with omelette, cheese and toast are waiting for us on the table. He sits with us an is a good opportunity to have a chat. He's learning English so we can communicate and we find out he's been running the hostel only for a few months and [View Full Entry]

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14.10.08 Km travelled 6464 The night has been absolutely horrible like every one that precedes an early departure. We arranged for a taxi the night before to pick us up, so few minutes after 6.00 am a young lady was waiting for us outside the hotel door. The sun comes out late here and it was still completely dark. It started raining as we arrived to the station. For some reason unknown to us, we had first class tickets. It was good actually, we had table, room for all our bags, comfortable seats, and TV! Still, it's been very tiring. Michael [View Full Entry]

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12.10.08 Outside it's 2°. Today we've been walking under the first snow of our season. Apart from that today has been quite a failure. Thanks to the help of our receptionist we managed to get the bus to Kungur this morning. Everything in a rush as usual when it's about early morning! At the bus stop we meet Victor, an old man, very nice, that was probably curious about us and wanted to be helpful. We've been chatting for a while in this now familiar way, in different languages and with great help from gestures and mimic. When he got on [View Full Entry]

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10.10.08 Km travelled 6092 Time to leave Moscow and look forward has come. This morning we had the great news from Irkutsk that we could rearrange our booking, so we can spend more time in Mongolia! Wonderful. That's all we wanted. We get ourselves ready and pack everything in time to leave the room. After having abused of Igor twice yesterday to book our next trains, he seemed in such good mood today that when we went down to leave the key, we thought we could ask for the last ticket! We will always be grateful to Igor for being [View Full Entry]

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09.10.08 Despite the first impression, it is now quite cold in town and time to wear gloves and hat. Today we want to relax a bit and take our time to wander. We got up a bit late, it was one of those mornings you just don't want to abandon the duvet! But we absolutely had to meet Igor so he could help us buy the train tickets on-line. Having done that and ready to go we head to the Izmaylovo Market, not too far from the city centre. I must admit that the major purpose of the trip was to [View Full Entry]

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08.10.08 This is the day of the worldwide famous Moscow. We planned to spend it between the Kremlin and the Red Square. We opted for an early morning to make sure we can visit all the places we want. To balance the effort of waking up early, or I should say earlier than usual, we take the tube to go down to the Kremlin. At the Kutafya Tower we buy the tickets for the Kremlin, but we decide to go first to see Lenin's Tomb that is only open for half day. At least today is not raining and it's a [View Full Entry]

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07.10.08 The hostel name is Godzilla's. I must have found it during all that months of research on the Internet. For hostels' standards is not only very beautiful and very nicely decorated, but provides also all services you may need, including Visa registration. It rained all night, and didn't stop all day. It was a heavy autumn rain, not hard but with big, round drops. We decided as first thing to head to the Pushkin Fine Art Museum. Despite the rain we decide to walk, it's a must whenever possible, the only real way to see a place. By the time [View Full Entry]

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WARSAW - MOSCOW 05.10.08-06.10.08 POLONEZ Km traveled 4695 I simply love to open my eyes in the morning and look at the blue. It's a wonderful morning in Warsaw, despite the screaming and running of the kids in the other room. That really pissed me off! I was so stressed, I couldn't even have a shower because the kids didn't leave the toilet for more than five seconds! But outside it was beautiful. So we left the bags at the hostel and went for breakfast and walk in the park. On Sunday everyone dresses up here to go to church and [View Full Entry]

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WARSAW 04.10.08 It's getting quite chilly here, enough to have to make a stop to buy some gloves. Around 10°. Last night we had a very nice group of teenagers in the room beside that couldn't stop jumping and running. When they finally got quiet we had the terrible shock of Tony Soprano being shot by junior in the 1st episode of the 6th series! But we had a good night and this morning we were full of energy to walk our way around Warsaw. Just by the Central Station we stopped for the first sightseeing. You're thinking about the famous [View Full Entry]

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