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Published: October 4th 2006
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Hello Everyone!
After
leaving England on the 4th of September I
spent 3 days in Moscow
seeing the sites.
I arrived quite late at night and the passport control at Moscow airport was really strict.
I was met at the airport by a taxi driver
organised by the hostel
where I was staying which was a relief as my flight was a couple of hours delayed and passport control at Moscow was really strict and it was dark when I arrived.
It was a
pleasant drive into the city as all the buildings were lit up.
Everyone at the hostel was really friendly and it was really well organised.
Most people there were europeans also heading for Asia on the Trans-Siberian.
They had a common room where everyone gathered in the evening to chat and watch tv.
I spent the first day walking around the city visiting the main sites.
The Kremlin an Red Square were pretty impressive buildings.
I didn't find the russian people particularly friendly on first impressions though.
When I was waiting in line to get a ticket into the Kremlin there was no system of queueing and when
I finally did reach the window I was shoved out of the way by a russian tour guide and had to wait in line again!
I found Moscow to be quite expensive so on the second day I went to Moscow Zoo which was free for students.
It was nice to escape the hustle and bustle of the city for a day and walk around the park and see the animals.
On the third day I met two english girls who were doing a similar route around to world to me and we walked around the city and had lunch together before I had to go to the train station in the evening.
I was really excited about getting on the train, what it would look like and who I would be sharing my compartment with
but when I found my compartment there were 3 elderly russians there who didn't speak a word of english and didn't look very impressed to be sharing with me.
I smiled at them and said hello but
they didn't smile back.
Once I had settled in I got out a bag of sweets and offered
them around but they just shook their heads.
At that point I thought this was going to be a long 5 days.
I found the train really comfortable.
Each compartment had 4 beds and there was lots of storage space.
There were about 30 people in my carriage.
Each carriage also had a hot water boiler for drinks and pot noodles.
Each carriage had a conductor who helped with any problems and cleaned the carriage regularly.
Ours was really friendly and always smiled as he worked.
He couldn't speak any english but was fantastic at improvising by pointing at things and using sign language.
He
seemed to really enjoy being around the foreign travellers.
We nicknamed him 'Mario' because he looked justed like one the Mario Brothers.
On the first night I found several groups of swedes in my carriage and it wasn't long before there were about 10 of us
all sqaushed into one compartment sharing food and cheap vodka at $2 per litre.
They were a real laugh and I ended up spending most of my time on the train partying with them.
There wasn't much else to do but get drunk,
play cards and games and take stupid pictures of ourselves on our digital cameras so that it mainly what we did.
It was like being back at school again!
The scenery for the first 3 days
was mainly lots of open fields and woodlands.
It looked very similar to sweden.
We stopped several times a day and could buy food from the stations.
On the last day we woke to the most spectacular sunrise over Lake Bikal and the closer we came to the Mongolian border the more varied and beautiful the landscape became.
The border crossing was fine and didn't take too long.
We were allowed off the train for 90 minutes on the russian side and there was only a brief stop on the mongolian side.
We crossed the border in the evening and then stayed up all night and watched another great sunrise in Mongolia before arriving in Ulan Bataar at 7am on day 6.
The train was so much fun and by the end of it I had even bonded with my russian family who shared their food with me and I showed them the photos I had taken with
my camera.
They were on the train for 4 days and for the last night I was joined by two mongolians who were really chatty and friendly.
They were surgeons who had been teaching in Russia and one of them had won the Mongolian State Prize for distiguished work in the medical field.
The time on the train when really quickly and I made some really good friends who are here with me now in Mongolia.
I will be in touch in a week or so and tell you about my travels in Mongolia.
Love Hannah
xxx
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Danielle -USA
non-member comment
Hey you
This is awesome!!! I'm so jelous!!!