Blogs from Siberia, Russia, Europe - page 45

I arrived in Tomsk yesterday at 2:30pm, and my friend Artyom was waiting for me at the train station. It was very nice not to have to avoid the nagging taxi drivers (who charge an insane rate!) or to navigate my way around another strange city. I have been spoiled with the royal treatment since I got here. By the way, I met Art and his mother on the train from Beijing to Ulaanbaatar where we shared a compartment. They were very kind to me, and invited me to stay with them in Tomsk. Yesterday, Art drove me around to all the sights of the city. We had some lunch with his girlfriend Natasha and then saw more sights. In the evening we went to the sauna with Natasha and some friends of theirs. It was ... read more

So I went to Listvyanka yesterday and spent a good 3 hours walking around searching for accommodation. It seemed like it was a ghost town. I was the only tourist in sight and all the suggested accommodations in the Lonely Planet were closed or out of sight. This 60 year old Russian man stopped his van as I was reading the only sign in the town with English (which was advertising a shop and rooms) and said to me: "This is my sign, stay my rooms" Then pointed up the hill, so I was thinking this looks hopeful and walked up the hill. To say the least the area was not tourist friendly. I found his shop, but the woman in it pointed me further up the hill away from the lake. There were only shanties ... read more

So, as we pondered the connection between our two new 'cabin buddies', the train sped on through Siberia. By this time we had reached Lake Baikal, a huge body of water in the region of Irkutsk. We spent most of the second day passing the expanse of frozen, snow-covered water to the north, projecting far beyond the white horizon. On the other side- in the the direction of the Northern borders of Mongolia, North West China and Kazakstan- a long range of snowy mountains, met the sky. It was an impressive sight. We passed the day then by playing cards, taking naps, reading and writing. Together with our Canadian friend Steve, we sat for a few hours playing cards in the empty, smoke-soaked restaurant carriage, which was patrolled by a surly, lethargic waiter, whose right ... read more

Part 2: Juke box in Siberia The train journey from Ulan Ude was another overnighter - only about 10 hours though and we were expecting to arrive at around 8am at our destination: Irkutsk (pron: ear-kootsk - and don't forget to roll your R's). No smugglers on this train that we were aware of but we gave the provodnista a good laugh when we told her we didn't need bed linen as we had sleeping bags. She found this quite hilarious and threw the linen onto one of the bunks and marched off to the next cabin. Back-packers are funny! This train was probably what you'd expect a Russian train to be. A bit noisy, a bit daggy, a bit uncomfortable, a lot wood paneled - basically rather past it's 'best before' date. At one stage ... read more

Ulan-Ude is the last city I visit in Russia, it is located near the border of Mongolia. After been here several hours this place is still weird to me. More than half of population here is Buryats, a mongolian people that been divided into the Sovjet. Now centuries later, every asian-looking person on the street speaks russian. The other half are white peobple and mixed with exotic/weird looks. I don't know why I am fascinated of a such a mixed society of whites and asians, I could just watch them all day long. There are not many foreign tourists in this town, I actually think I am the only one don't speak russian, at least at this holiday low-season, and as usual I drew some attention with my enormous 30kg backpack walking around the town. Otherwise ... read more