The Trans-Mongolian Part IV - Suzdal & Moscow

On arrival in Suzdal, my first impression was how small it was! And the fact that there were next to no people anywhere to be seen. Apart from the market that was set up in the church yard oppisite our Hotel, there was honestly no other people anywhere.

But I guess you have to kind of expect that in a city with no more than 11,000 people in it!

Although small, Suzdal was yet another side to Russia I wasn't expecting to see. Suzdal is a bit of a "weekend" get away for most of the people who live in Moscow, as it's only 5 hours away. So it was quite the laid back town to walk around. No one was in a rush, there was hardly any traffic (due to the fact there were hardly any people!), so you could feel free to just wander around at your own pace.

One thing Suzdal doesn't lack in are churches. They are everywhere! Big ones, small ones, you name it - Suzdal's got it. It was here in Suzdal that I had my first chance to see a Russian Orthodox Church. You know the ones I am talking about, really REALLY big with the giant colorful domes on the top. It was amazing to finally see one in reality after seeing so many in books while researching the trip.

The insides of the church are a fantastic sight to see, unfortunately though I have no pictures! However, if you can imagine your house with every single spare piece of space painted in the most vivid colorful religious paintings, then maybe you get a small idea of what I mean. There is no spot uncovered; the floors, walls and ceilings are all painted depicting different scenes from the bible. Now, although I am not an overly religious person, it really was quite moving to see. While inside one of the churches, we were treated to a group of Russian Tenors singing a hymn, which sounded so wonderful, especially in the painted surroundings of the Church.

We spend the following day on a walking tour of the town, (which as you can imagine didn't take very long given how small Suzdal is!) which included a trip to a folk festival that was on. There was traditional russian singing, dancing and plenty of people in traditional costumes. Quite the sight to see.

We then headed to Moscow the following morning on a 5 hour bus, which me Ben and Sophie were lucky enough to sit up the back next to two severely drunk and smelly russians. It's moments like these that really paint Russia as a whole for me!!

Arriving in Moscow from Suzdal gave the system quite a shock, due to the sheer size of the city, the amount of people and the amount of cars wizzing by at 100 miles an hour. Moscow is the first European City (if you can call it that) that I had encountered so far, so as busy as asia was in its major cities, Asia has NOTHING on Moscow.

We checked into apartment which was right smack bang in the center of Moscow, and went on a walk down to the Red Square. As I said previously, the churches in Suzdal were pretty amazing to see. But in my opinion, you HAVE NOT seen a church until you have seen St Basils Cathedral in the Red Square. The best way to describe this church (aside from flipping HUGE), is as a giant ice cream. The outside is so colorful, and it stands out so much in comparison to all the communists era buildings surrounding it. The church is really the image that I think most people have of Moscow, if not the whole of Russia.

The following day we headed out on our tour of the Kremlin, which has been and still is the center point of Moscow and Russian politics. We walked past where the president resides and spent around 2 hours touring the art galleries inside.

One of the funnier things that happened on this paticular day: In order to get into the Kremlin, you must check in all of your bags (ie Handbags, Backpacks etc etc) into a locker room about a 10 minute walk from the entrance. Us being the organised tour group, had obviously done this. However, a gentleman of about 40 in the group in front us obviously thought he could slip past the Russian guards with his back pack still on......under his jacket (It wasn't one of those small packs either, he kinda looked like the hunch back of Notredam...!). After walking through the metal detector, the alarm bells going off and him insisting for at least 5 minutes that he had nothing to hide, the Russian guards eventually looked behind and saw his bag. He was promptly escorted out, and down to the lockers. What an idiot!

We then headed into one of Moscow's #1 truly bizarre sight, The Mausoleum of Lenin. Here you can bask at Lenin in all his communist glory, deader than dead, yet fully embalmed for all the world to admire. As freaky as it is to see a dead guy in a glass case, that was nothing in comparison to the 20 odd russian guards who stand in threes in all corners and walls of the Mausoleum, watching your every move. As it's quite dark in there (so as not to disturb Lenin in his sleep I presume), you actually don't see these guards until you are about 2 meters in front of them. They really do give you quite a fright!

No trip to Moscow is complete with out a tour of the underground metro system. The various metro stops dotting the center of Moscow are more like living Museums than Metro stops. Full of sculptures, chandeliers and various paintings and mosaics through out, these stations really were a highlight of any visit to Moscow.

A trip to Moscow is also incomplete if you don't make an effort to check out the legendary under ground Moscow Night Club scene. Now, by underground, I mean UNDERGROUND. Ben and I spent around an hour looking for a club one night that was supposed to be a ten minute walk from our apartment. After finding some young guys in the street who spoke English and asking for their assistance, they offered to take us to the club. After walking for about 5 minutes down a back street we are told by our new friends "there it is"....and pointed at a door. With no building behind it. They walked up to the door, knocked, the door was opened and we were greeted by 5 flights of stairs going down to a club full of people! It was absolutely bizarre! After spending around half an hour there, our Russian friends offered to take us to another club...and another...and another, until me and Ben found ourselves walking back to the Apartment at 6am the following morning! Each club was more hidden than the next..the complete opposite of anything I had ever seen before.

The next day we jumped on our last night train, heading for our last stop, St Petersburg.

Photo's from Russia

Photo's from Mongolia

Photos from Train Journey - Beijing to UB

The Party Cabin: Me, Ben, Nat and Sophie



Leaving China



Eating some quality Mongolian train food


The changing of the Bogies (wheels) on the Monlgolia/China border


Sunrise over the Gobi Desert


The Gobi

The Trans-Molgolian Part III - 3 nights on a train, Irkutsk to Vladimir & Suzdal

I'm guessing most of you just read the above heading and thought "3 nights on a train!!!!", but trust me, it was no way near as bad as it sounds!!!!!

We hopped on the train in Irkutsk at 5pm, armed with instant noodles, bags of chips, fruit and vodka, as well as our normal giant bags...the whole group looked quite the sight as we attempted to board the train.

After settling into our cabins and a having a few pre sleeping vodkas, we all fell asleep quite early getting ready for the following day which was full of.......sitting on the train!!!

It actually quite hard to write about this part of the journey, because in order to pass the time we all really just sat around talked the whole time. Thinking back on it now, I understand that it was a really long time to stay in one place, however during the actual journey, none of us really noticed.

We filled in the time chatting to each other, telling jokes, eating, drinking, listening to music and staring out the window. I dedicated a good chunk of my time to reading Nat's Russian Phrase book, trying to memorise as much as possible, however considering at that point I was having enough trouble saying Hello and Thankyou, it wasn't going as well as I planned.

Staring out the window was more interesting than it sounds, as the ever changing landscape of Siberia was amazing to look at. All the small villages, the millions of birch trees and the sheer nothingness that you sometimes see.

I made friends with some Russians from Irkutsk, Marsha and Den, who were just married and on there way to Moscow for there honey moon. Even though they spoke little english, and none of us really spoke much russian, we still all got on quite well. Mark, who was on our tour, could speak quite a few words of russian and managed to translate most of the conversations for me. One rather funny moment, was when Mark was explaining to Marsha and Den what my travel plans were and how I was going to be away for two years. Up until that point, the pair of them hadn't seen me with any shoes on, which caused them to ask (quite seriously) "Jess is travelling for 2 years with no shoes on??"!!!

On our second day on the train, the 12th of June, I did what every 22 year old in the world wanted to do. I celebrated my 23rd birthday in true Siberian style, aboard the train. Of all the birthdays I have had, this one will definitely stay in my memory for a while! I was given presents and cards from all the tour group and a neat collapsible shot glass from Marsha and Den (which considering they known me less than 24 hours was pretty generous!). After being dragged away for a birthday beer with Nat, I came back to my cabin and discovered Sophie and Ben had completely decorated it with Baloons and streamers, and decked out some food aswell! In the cabin next door we had Marg, Angela and Penny serving drinks from our make shift bar. An just when I thought it couldn't be any better, Marg pulls out a cake with candles and everything! We spent the evening listening to music, eating food and drinking vodka (suprise suprise!) and I had an amazing time....!

The following day was much of the same again, just eating drinking and staring out the window of the train, until the next day we arrived in Vladimir, and headed strait to Suzdal.

The Trans-Mongolian Part II - Ulan Baator (Mongolia) to Irkutsk (Russia)

Ok, after going back through my pictures I just remembered this leg of the train journey left in the eveining....not in the morning!

So, at around 8pm (I think!) we jumped on our second train bound for Irkutsk in Siberia, Russia. And it was here on the Monoglian station platform that I saw my first russian moustache.....however...it was on a woman. Her name Gallena, and she was our larger than life, slightly petrifying, Provanitza (carriage attendant). She knew next to no english, but after a few offeres of ciggarettes and chocolate, she was the tour groups best friend.

This train was slightly nicer than the previous. It was a lot cleaner, slightly more comfertable, and the carriage attendants were constantly walking up and down the carriage making sure everything was kept in a neat and tidy way.

This train journey was to take 2 nights, so once we sussed out that the border crossing wasn't until the following morning, we decided to have a few drinks on the train with some french guys we had met. It was here that we also met the drunkest tour leader in the world (thank god not our tour leader!), but an aussie girl leading some older folk on a Sundowner tour, which apprently cost a substantial amount more than our trip. This girl was really unbelivable, first of all she knew nothing about the trip and kept asking the F-RAT about when the train was stopping and for how long, and second, she kept leaving her group and crashing our cabin & drinking our vodka! She got so drunk on the first night we met her that we did our best to avoid her for the rest of the journey. Once we had kicked her out of our cabin as she was falling asleep, us lot continued drinking until around midnight when we all went sleep.

The following morning at about 5 am, we the first of our borders, Mongolia. Here we were stuck for around 2 and a half hours while they checked passports. 1 hour later we arrived at the russian border, where we stayed completely stationary for almost 9 hours. The first check we had was customs, where we filled out forms declaring what we did or did not have. Then our passports were taken and visas checked. We got the passports back around 5 hours later. Then they searched each and every cabin for drugs. Then they bought the sniffer dogs through, which was probably the worse part of the whole ordeal for us.

We were sitting in our cabin, patiantly waiting to leave, when all of the sudden the dogs come through sniffing around the outside of our cabin. Then the dog sat down....directly outside our door! Within 2 seconds our cabin door had been slammed shut, and the 4 of us could only sit there and listen as we heard the unhinging of bolts from the wall oppisite our door. Around 10 minutes later they re-opened our door, and we could see where they had completely dismantaled the wall. Even though nothing was found, the guard still wasn't satisfied, so he brought another dog in with 2 other guards...and this dog did the same thing! This time they didn't shut our door, so watched as they dismantaled the whole section of the wall oppisite our cabin, ripping out the lining and insulation in the wall. After around half an hour and still not finding anything, they gave up and put the wall back together again. Although none of us had a guilty conscience, having the area OUTSIDE your cabin searched at a russian border is definitely not something I would like to go through again!

So at around 3pm, the train set off to its first Russian stop, where we were able to get off the train for around half an hour. This is where we got our first taste of Siberian summer fashion, which on the girls included 5 inch high heel shoes, the tightest whitest and highest pants in the world, with a colorful often sequened top tucked in. On the guys it was black tracksuite pants, pulled up extremely high, and a black tank top. It was most bizarre, it was as if fashion in Siberia was still stuck in the early 80's!

We jumped back on the train and headed off towards Irkutsk, where we arrived the following day at around 9am, jumped on a bus, and headed strait to Lake Baikal.

The village where we stayed was called Listvyanka, a small little town right on the shores of the massive Lake Baikal. Lake Baikal is the biggest and deepest fresh water lake in the world, and during the winter months is completely frozen over creating a roadway between each side of the lake. It had only defrosted around a month prior to us arriving. It really was the most amazing thing to look at. It was as if you were looking out at the ocean, not being able to see where the sky began and the lake ended. And the water was so clear, that when we did a boat trip out on the lake, you found yourself suffereing from vertigo as you could see directly to the bottom in some parts. The water tempreture at that time was around 1 degrees, so we decided going for a swim would not be the best of ideas!

Our group stayed in a bed and breakfast run by the charming Nikolai, who without any knowledge of the english language and us with no knowledge of Russian, continued to innitiate quite indepth converstaions with us all for long periods of time! It was really quite amusing....

We stayed in Listvyanka for one night, and the following day we headed back to Irkutsk, where we spent the day wondering around before catching the next part of our trip across Siberia to Vladimir.

The Trans-Mongolian Part I - Beijing to Ulan Baator

After an emotional and sad goodbye to our friends in Beijing, Sophie, Ben and myself set off on the first leg of our Trans Mongolian journey with Intrepid Travel (http://www.intrepidtravel.com/).

Before we set off, we are all introduced to the group we would be travelling with...all up there was 12 travellers and our group leader, Efrat. When the three of us first saw the group, it was quite amusing. I was the youngest member of the group by about 10 years! In fact, the first thing Ben said to us was "Maybe we should have choosen Vodka Train instead??" (Vodka train being a tour group that appeals to most people our age, but I choose against due to the cost and the fact I did not want to be surrounded by ten 20 somethings who would be durnk 24/7!). However, our impression of the group quickly changed as we got to know everyone....!

We boarded the first train at around 9am on the 4th of June, due to arrive in Ulan Baator at around 1pm the following day. This train was a chinese train, each cabin had four beds (one up one down on either side of the cabin). It was quite comfertable and we were given tickets for 2 meals throughout the journey. In my cabin, there was myself Sophie Ben and Nat, who was from Sydney.

It was amazing to watch the scenary change as we left Beijing. After about 2 hours of travelling through the out skirts of Beijing we eventually ended up in some greener areas, quite similar to those I had seen travelling through Southern China. Lots of forests, lakes and rivers which were a welcome change from the bright smog covered neon lights of Beijing!

As the journey went on, we slowly got to know each of our fellow tour members. There was Phil and Janine from Geelong, Mark and Marie from Brunswick, Angela and Marg from New Zealand, Penny from Melbourne and Phil, who at around 70 years of age had seen almost all of the world and quickly became the hero of the trip (and also an inspiration to me, knowing that even at that age I can keep travelling the world!). Our Tour Leader Efrat, from Israel, was quickly renamed "The F Rat" as none of us could pronounce her name properly...

At around 5pm we cracked open our first bottle of Vodka, thinking that by the time we arrive at the mongolian border we will be sober enough. Unfortunately not the case...because once the three of us plus Nat had finished that, we moved onto beer from the dining cart, and then onto some extremely cheap chinese red wine, which for some reason we mixed with coke as someone in the group thought that would be a good idea to take the taste away.

Lesson one about taking the trans mongolian, or any train crossing the border, don't be drunk when crossing! As the conductor came around with our mongolian immigration cards, Sophie and I proceeded to write our birthdays instead of out entry and exit dates within Mongolia. It was amusing to us, but not so amusing to our beloved F Rat who then had to fill out our third immigration form....!

Prior to arriving at the border, the train stopped for around 3 hours to have the bogies changed. The reason for this is the rail gages between China and Mongolia and Russia are different. Someone at one point told me this was to prevent invation into China...wether there is any truth to this I am unsure.

Basically, the way these are changed is by a machine lifting each individual carriage around 3 meters off the ground. The wheels are then taken off by some big machines, put back on the track and wizzed away. Around 20 minutes later, the new wheels and gages come wizzing under the lifted train, and the same machine lifts them up and places them on the train. Lucky for us, another train pulled up along side ours so we were able to see the whole thing take place. It was quite bizarre to watch.

So after those three hours were up, we moved onto the Mongolian border, where quite possibly the scariest looking and biggest Mongolian lady in the world came into our carriage and checked our passports and visas. Considering we were half asleep when she knocked on the cabin door, it really was quite a fright to see her....! After a furthur two hours of waiting, our passports were handed back and we were on our way.

At around 4am, I woke up needing to use the lovely train toilet. When I came out, I decided to have a look out the window and see where we were....and the strangest sight I had ever seen was before me. We were nowhere. Literally! Although it was still slightly dark, I could see the sun rising over absolutely nothing but desert. When we went into our alcohol induced sleep, we were at the border, and before that in a forest region. Now, there was nothing! Once the sun had risen fully you could see just how far into the Gobi Desert we were. There was absolutely nothing for miles, nothing infront, nothing behind and nothing either side. Just sand, and the odd Mongolian Ger Camp. What was truly strange about going through the desert, is the train kept turning corners. We couldn't really understand why considering there was nothing to dodge...but you would be sitting there eating your noodle soup, and all of the sudden the train would turn quite sharply to the left or right. Very bizarre!

We arrived in Ulan Baator at around 1.30pm, and were greeted by our guides for the three days, Nemo and Mia. We went and changed some money, jumped on the bus and headed to our hotel.

The following morning we headed out to Terlj National Park, around an hour outside of the capital, to stay at Mongolian Ger Camp. A ger camp, for those of who are un aware, are basically big felt tents with loads of layers, perfect for any kind of weather. A good majority of Mongolian people live in the Ger's in the Gobi Desert and in the parks. They really were quite amazing, and quite comfertable aswell! The surroundings of the park were stunning and created a very surreal contrast between UB and the rest of Mongolia.

Myself and Ben headed out horse riding on proper Mongolian horses that after noon, which was really quite amazing. The horse were so small! As we pulled up to one of the stops, we watched as a few mongolian kids were racing there horses at full speed around Turtle Rock. The kids were only about 10. We were informed after we came back that most mongolian children out in the desert and the national parks learn to ride not long after they are able to walk. Pretty amazing stuff.

That night we had dinner with the group at the camp, and finished the evening with Ben, Soph, Nat and myself polishing off 2 bottles of Mongolian Vodka....under the watchful eye of our fearless leader F-RAT of course! We decided to sit up on one of the hills for a while so we didn't keep everyone awake...at around 12 midnight I decided I should probably carry myself off to bed. So I said goodnight, went for a bit of a tumble down the hill and headed into my ger tent. Or so I thought. It turns out that in my vodka filled state I walked strait past my ger tent and right into the one next door....which was housing a whole german family!!! Lucky they were fast asleep so once I realised I had made a rather large mistake, a shut the door and ran into my tent instead!

The following morning we headed back into UB for an afternoon sightseeing tour around the city and some of the monastries. The majority of Mongolian people are buddhists, and all the temples were very traditional. They were very simlar to that I had seen in Laos and Cambodia. After the tour, a few of us headed out to see some tradition mongolian wrestling, a big national sport in Mongolia. The monglians are hoping to win gold this year at the Beijing Olympics. It was quite strange to watch however, as these big giant masculine wrestlers would come out to the ring, wave to the audience, and then do this quite feminine bird like dance around a flag. Very odd, but still amazing to watch.

In the evening we headed out to a traditional monglian folk show, where I got to see the one thing I was dying to see (or hear rather!) in mongolia....THROAT SINGING! This was quite possibly the strangest thing I had ever seen or heard. This guy comes out with a guitar like intrument, starts playing, looking very mundane as he plays. Then all of the sudden he opens his mouth and its like satan is singing from the back of his throat in a foreign language...! Throat singing is only heard of in Mongolia, and if you get a chance to download some from the internet, give it a shot, I personally gurantee it will be the WEIRDEST thing you will ever hear! As well as throat singing there was also traditional Mongolian dancing and opera singing aswell.

The following morning we were up bright and early to get the second leg of our Train into Russia....

(PICTURES TO BE UPLOADED SOON! TO SEE PICTURES FROM THIS PART OF THE TRIP PLEASE CLICK THE LINKS TO THE RIGHT OF YOUR SCREEN)