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Published: September 21st 2006
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We spent almost 6 full days on the Transsiberian Railway going from Beijing to Moscow. We boarded fully prepared with plenty of food and drinks (plenty of pot noodles - the selection in China was vast!), and were pleasantly surprised to find that the ticket included a free lunch and dinner on the first day from the Chinese restaurant car. This was good since there was a significant lack of people selling food on the platforms on most of the rest of the journey, probably due to the rather cold weather and the fact that we seemed to be about an hour late arriving at the stations.
The trip back was very different from the one we did out just four weeks earlier. The temperature had dropped markedly, and on the Siberian plains it was just above freezing and actually snowing. The first few days the heating system was not on in our carriage (although it was in the 1st class carriages) and we were very cold despite sleeping under two woollen blankets. The last two nights the heating came on and the last night was actually nice and warm.
We met some very interesting and nice people on
the journey, mainly Westerners but also several Mongolians who were also travelling to Moscow. One middle aged married couple we met were very strict Christians and were in the middle of a 2 year Bible school in Moscow (paid for by an American Church). This was a bit surprising as apparently only 1% of Mongolians are currently Christians. As we talked to them we were slightly concerned to hear that this American Church is aiming to convert many more Mongolians so 10% of the population there will be strict Christians by 2020.
Most other non-Asian travellers had chosen to go first class (with heating, showers and private double rooms) which we turned our noses up at - trying to be genuine backpackers for at least a bit of the trip! We stupidly refused their kind offers of using their showers - something we later regretted as washing in the toilets in our carriage was a mammoth undertaking.
Another interesting aspect of this trip which we had missed out on during the outbound trip was the experience with Chinese/Mongolian traders. Our carriage was full of traders with a staggering amount of goods being loaded into their room. When they
had finished loading boxes there was simply no room at all for the traders themselves to even sit down. We had no idea how all this would escape the attention of the border staff but to our amazement we later saw the same room almost empty of goods and we realised that they had somehow distributed everything throughout the train to avoid the attention of the border and customs people. Once we were through both borders all the goods were somehow reclaimed and placed back in the room for offloading at Moscow.
Originally we had planned to spend another 3 days in Moscow before leaving Russia altogether. However, after hearing great things about St Petersburg and Tallinn from people on the train, we decided to go to St Petersburg that night and only use our Moscow hotel for a shower - desperately needed! So, after arriving in Moscow dead on time, we transferred to our hotel then had a quick shower and a meal before checking out again (to the surprise of both the hotel staff and our travel agent) to catch an overnight train the same evening to St. Petersburg. We shared our room with two incredibly loudly
snoring Russian officers and arrived less than rested in St. Petersburg the next morning at 8am.
Despite liking the very centre of Moscow, we definitely liked St. Petersburg much more. It seemed much more European that Moscow and much easier to stroll around and explore. The large tree lined boulevards with beautiful old buildings resembled Paris and the canals and bridges like Amsterdam. It was full of lovely parks and shady squares and the people seemed almost friendly, a great relief after the cold and busy people of Moscow.
We spent a good few hours just walking around enjoying the sites, after which we decided to have lunch at the house of the Stroganoff family and the origin of the dish with the same name. We had Beef Stroganoff, of course, and it was truly a great meal, both because of the high quality of the meal itself, but also as this was the first real food we had had for 7 days...
Ambitiously, we had booked a bus leaving St. Petersburg at 6pm the same evening going to Tallinn in Estonia. The bus arrived at its destination just before midnight and we thankfully checked into a
The Great Wall
An unrestored section room with a nice, soft and clean bed after 7 days without...zzz
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