Blogs from Moscow, Northwest, Russia, Europe - page 60

Privyet! Geland met het vliegtuig storten wij ons meteen in Russchisch onderhandelen voor beginners, nee we willen geen taxi, we gaan zelf met de bus richting centrum. Als enige backpackers vielen we natuurlijk wel een beetje op, maar via via toch bij het busstation aangekomen. Wat een chaos rond zes uur op de weg! Auto's en bussen, alles rijdt door elkaar en pogingen enige structuren in de wegen te onderscheiden laten we dan ook gauw achterwege. Na anderhalfuur bus aangekomen bij metrostation Rechnoy Vokzal. We zien een nog grotere massa mensen bij elkaar, maar iedereen staat netjes in de rij te wachten tot ze de bus mogen betreden. Via felle neonlichtreclames, kleurrijke bloemenkraampjes, groepjes mannen in grijze uniformen (wat later blijkt: immigratiepolitie) en houten klapdeuren betreden wij een metrostation in de hoop de goede weg naar ... read more

Alles voorbereid en klaar om te gaan, raast er een hevige storm over Utrecht en omstreken. Hoe kom je op Schiphol zonder treinen en taxi's?!? Gelukkig waren Lina's mamoeshka en papoeshka bereid om ons om een uur 's nachts nog uit Utrecht op te pikken (nogmaals bedankt!). Daar zaten we dan in cafe West, te genieten van de laatste Nederlandse biertjes en gesprekken met onze vrienden. Onze lieve vrienden achterlatend in de kroeg, zijn we vertrokken naar het onbekende. En Moskou...met handen en voeten gevraagd hoe naar het hostel te komen per bus en metro (werd ons totaal afgeraden door de informatiedame en heren die taxi's hadden, we zouden er echt nooit komen...) Zonder enige talenkennis toch de bus en het metrostation gevonden. Moskou ondergronds tijdens spitsuur; stromen met mensen op grote lange roltrappen waarvan je ... read more

Happy Holidays Dear Family and Friends, It has been a year of great excitement and change for the Steer Family. Brad, Betsy and Riley the golden retriever moved to the Russian Federation and after 8 weeks in a five star hotel, we now call a 7th floor flat in central Moscow our home. We have a spectacular view of the city and Brad can walk to his TNK-BP geology job in 10 minutes. Betsy’s cousin Tom lives here in Moscow which has been a blessing and we have also gotten reacquainted with many “old” expatriate friends that are now empty nesters just like us. Brad has already traveled to Tyumen in Siberia to consult with the exploration team. He finds the work there and in Moscow very challenging as all business is conducted in Russian. He ... read more

To begin with we visited Gorky Park. Already famous, however our reason for visiting was that many of the statues and symbols of the old communist regime had been thrown here once they gave up on the great expeirment. The statue park was quite impressive, old soviet stars and statues of lenin and stalin. We paid 100 roubles each to enter the park, but the entrance we left by didn't even have a ticket lady. A day previous some of friends entered and walked past the ticket lady without being bothered to pay. Like everything in Russia, it was a bit hit and miss. Back to our food court for lunch and thencely to a shopping street for some, shopping. A little more experienced with the Russian experience, we haggled rather than taking the suggested value. ... read more

Knock, knock, knock! Knock, knock, knock! All to soon, the guard was running down the hall knocking on each cabin door, waking us for our approach to Moscow. The toilets empty directly on to the track. This kind of thing is not really all that neat, when you're in a train station, so they are closed half an hour before each station. We were woken with an hour to go, in case we had to... go. All along the side of the tracks were houses, I'll be the houses that are half an hour from Moscow station are pretty cheap. Thankfully at the hotel we were told we could check in. Cheri (by virtue of not having to get her bag) was first in line, so we were soon having a proper sleep, waking at 11 ... read more