Well, the journey has finally come and passed. I just finished four days of straight travel on THE trans-siberian Railroad. What a neat experience, though I must say that I am very happy to be off the train (and showered).
This trip, I booked a seat/bed in the third class cabin. I had no idea what that meant when I booked it - only that it was the least expensive and that I would have a bed. Actually, it ended up being pretty neat. The third class car is very open and crammed full with as many bunks as possible.
Unfortunately, I had a top bunk and in third class the top bunk is VERY cramped. I couldn't sit up at all, so had to lie down to sleep or read when I was in my actual assigned bunk.
People tended to congrigate in the isles and on each others bunks. My particular car had about 20 young Russian army guys and they acted like they owned the place.
The first day, the lady below me was really wonderful. She was sweet and always moved over so that I could sit down there (as everyone SHOULD have done). I also met a neat girl the first evening who spoke perfect English. She was studying linguistics at the university in Irkutsk and was traveling home for a visit...with her cat! What a sight it was to see her in her bunk with the beautiful feline loungin on top of her!
The second day I wasn't as luck. The second girl was a really sour puss and felt the need to sleep and stretch out on the bottom bunk all day and night, so I had nowhere to sit.
Fortunately for me, Jasmin had booked a first class cabin, so I was able to spend quite a bit of time hanging out with her there. What a difference!
We spent a lot of time eating, reading, eating, chatting, eating and napping. I think we both gained about 2 Kg during this trip! (Boy does Russia have good chocolate - and so many kinds!)
And in between our snacking, we had some really neat views out of the train. It was especially interesting when we'd go through a village or town as the countryside got a little monotonous.
Near the end of our journey, the windows were really dirty, so sometimes there was a ghost/ added bonus in the pictures. Here's Jasmin with a grinning face.
And the dirty windows didn't keep us from seeing the Eur-Asia marker in the Ural mountains that marked the line between continents. Here it is:
Impressive, huh?
Jasmin and I also connected with three guys who were traveling the same route from Irkutsk to Moscow. Ryan, from Canada, is making a trip around the world by surface only (no flight). He's "train-ed" "bus-ed" biked and sailed for the last 18 months from Toronto to Moscow (to see his blog, click here). He, Andrew (English) and San (Korean) often came down to hang out in Jasmin's compartment
San, Ryan and Andrew join Jasmin in first class
Or we'd all head down to the dining car to get some food (of course) and chat.
San places an order with the leopard print clad waitress
Andrew got his "sandwich"
How much did you pay for that?
Of course, we didn't always hang out only with ourselves. It is such a highlight to meet local people. Fortunately, Jasmin had one compartment-mate who spoke English and was very friendly. She worked for Pepsi (a strange, but funny, coincidence is that the lady before her had worked for Coke!) and had a bunch of really fun co-workers with her. They were traveling for business, but definately had time for fun on their 24 hour train ride.
It all started when Jasmin agreed to go out for a cigarette break with a couple of them.
After that, about eight of us crammed into Jasmin and Nadia's compartment for talking joking (and, of course, translating). Jasmin and I both got a Lays potato chip pen with a slogan in Russian and we all had a great time.
What a neat trip!
Now we're in Moscow for a couple of days. More to come on that...
Stay tuned.
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