Summary of Russia

28 augustus 2012 - Ulan-Ude, Rusland

 

Introduction
On the 16th of August we got a plane to Tallinn (Estonia). Only an hour before we left, I got my passport back from the Embassy, so luckily we could leave for Tallinn. On the plane we met the Ruben Hoeke band from the Zaanstreek. The following plane to St. Petersburg was a very small plane which could only hold 20 people.

In Russia we travelled by train along the Trans Sibirian railway
St Petersburg – Moscow; 8 hours, 800 km
Moscow – Yekaterinburg; 27 hours, 1814 km
Yekaterinburg – Irkutsk; 56 hours, 3371 km
Irkutsk – Ulan-Ude; 7 hours, 455 km

Total: 6440 km

The most special things we find about Russia are
- It was very hard to find the hostels. They were hidden behind big metal doors without any signs.
- We have to write the addresses in Russian, as otherwise we can’t find the hostel etc.
- Most people didn’t really want to help us. Not even when we wrote everything down in Russian.
- A lot of people seemed to be very rude; not holding doors, skipping the line, waiting 1 cm away from you.
- Most people here don’t speak English.
- It is very expensive.
- Trains go on Moscow time. So we have to keep the watch onto Moscow time as there are 9 different time zones in Russia.
 

St. Petersburg 16th till the 18th of August
Right on Nevski hotel. Went to the Church of spilled blood. Enjoyed the Hermitage for a couple of hours and sat on the big square to relax.

Moscow 19th and the 20th of August
We got here by night train at 5 am. People were very friendly on the train. It was hard to find out if we actually were in Moscow, as there were no signs. Also the hotel had no signs and no bell. This girl was not friendly at all. We couldn’t get in, so had to go into town (at 6 am…) We stayed at a fountain where there were lots of security and dogs. We went to see the Nutcracker the first day which was great. The second day we went to the Red Square and the Kremlin, which was not special at all.

Yekaterinburg 21st till the 23th of August
We got on a very clean/good train!  In the middle of the second night, we got to Yekaterinburg. We got a taxi to our hotel/metal door. We were surprised that the taxi driver could find the hotel straight away and that we had a whole apartment for the two of us! Walked around the town, which had a beautiful lake. We also went to a fun fair where Myles won a Teddy. That day we almost missed our train...

Irkutsk 26th of August
On the way to Irkutsk we were in a coupé for 2
days and 3 nights. We ate our favourite lunch:
bread with fish! We walked around to see the
wooden houses, which some of them looked
like the Adams Family house.

Ulan Ude 27th and the 28th of August
We had a great hostel. A bit away from the
city centre, but a very nice wooden house with
a friendly lady and a kitchen where we, like
usual, prepared great food.
In Ulan Ude is (like everywhere in Russia) a
statue of Lenin. On the 29th of August we left
on a terrible 15 hour bus journey to Ulaan
Baatar in Mongolia.
The only positive thing of this
 journey, is that we met
some nice Greek and
Israeli people.

 

Spasiba = thank you

Foto’s