Blogs from Krasnoyarsk, Siberia, Russia, Europe - page 2

In order to get back up from Kyzyl to Krasnoyarsk I was told to take a minibus – apparently it is way faster than the normal bus. Yes, that might be true, but it meant leaving Kyzyl at 5pm for a roughly 12h drive until 5am the next day. The little hiccup with that – there is no chance you can sleep in the full minibus for more than like 20min without knocking your head to the window or not feeling your legs anymore… so honestly, I might even suggest taking the regular slow bus if someone asks me to avoid a sleepless night! After being dropped off in the center of Krasnoyarsk, I made my way to Ksenya’s apartment somewhere around 6am – she was so sweet to let me in that early in the ... read more

14th August 2010 Krasnoyarsk The train got into Krasnoyarsk at 11.30am. We jumped on a public bus which brought us into town. We popped into a posh hotel and used their WIFI to find a hostel for the night. Unfortunately there are no hostels in Krasnoyarsk (I don’t think it’s on the tourist trail yet) so we ended up renting a ‘luxury’ apartment for $60 a night. The office to pick up the keys was only round the corner from where we were and the apartment was in the centre of town. The entrances to Russian apartments are appalling, akin to Ballymun flats. The stairs and landings stink- this one smelt like cat pee and all the doors look like fort knocks, but once you are inside, they are basic, functional and clean. We had a ... read more

The people who got on the bus at Cheremshanka airport had hard, weathered, humourless faces. The small planes and helicopters there irregularly serve a range of settlements in the Extreme North, many of them closed Arctic towns and cities inaccessible by road and off limits to anyone who doesn't live there, places where the extreme weather and pollution from industry keep life expectancy as low as the forties. The people who got on the bus at the main Krasnoyarsk airport, its grimey windows, torn seats and faded paint worlds away from the sleek, shiney silver, luxury coach pictured in a poster at the bus stop, appeared to be a different kettle of fish altogether. I was amazed by how familiar and normal they looked; there, 4000km east of Moscow in the middle of Siberia, the middle ... read more

The scenery has become more rugged, it is starting to get more mountainous and a lot colder. Ive been talking to the Chinese girls in our Carriage and have found that they had gone to Moscow to work and were now heading home to China, they had been there 5 months and the one I spoke with had about £350 to take home after the cost of living in Moscow.... read more

Hello all, We've arrived in Krasnoyarsk yesterday. Having spent the night in a very dodgy location, we have relocated to a nice hotel today and explored town. We are leaving for Yekaterinburg tomorrow. As some of you will know I lived in Moscow for 5 months back in 1995 and have been to Russia twice before that spending three weeks at a time in Kirov (Vyatka as it is now known) to do a summer course. The stories are coming back slowly and am managing to bore Vicky to death with them. My Russian is very rusty - during our trip to Krasnoyarsk we shared our cabin with a Russian; to his credit he kept trying and we managed a conversation between my Russian, his rusty English and sign language from all three of us. Having ... read more