What an adventure! Crazy from the off! Yuri drove us to the train station in the typical Russian manner (ie a journey that should take 30 mins takes only 10!) and led us to the platform. Here we waited for a while, as the train arrived at the time it was supposedly going to depart. Even before it had come to a stop in the station, Mongolians were jumping into the carriages and throwing huge boxes of stuff on - this was our first glimpse of what was to come! Thank goodness we had Yuri (he is an ex-body guard and built like a tank!) He pushed us onto the train and physically removed the items that had already been placed onto our allocated beds. When the Mongolians came to complain, they took one look at him and decided to leave us alone! My first impression was that the cabins were pretty small but quite sweet and there was actually a fair amount of storage space (little did we know...) We had booked a second class carriage and were therefore sharing with 2 other people. These turned out to be Nate and Corrie, an English couple travelling together for 7 months who had, like us, begun their adventures in Moscow - phew!
About 5 minutes after the train left the station, a Mongolian woman came into our cabin and began gesturing to where we had put our luggage. We thought that she wanted to put some of her random goods in there and therefore told her in no uncertain terms that this was not possible (we had all read the lonely planet guide that is full of horror stories about people who say yes and get done for smuggling at the Mongolian border) but she jumped onto the bed anyway and began removing all of our things. Once all of our bags were on the bed and despite our fairly loud protests, she took out what was soon to be known as a magic key and took down the ceiling. She then hoisted herself into the roof and began throwing down bags full of fake branded goods (shoes, jumpers, bags) as well as blankets, fake leather jackets, clocks - basically all sorts! Having emptied the roof, she then moved over to the main light fitting, which she again removed with the magic key to reveal yet more items! The same was apparently done in all cabins, and then under the floorboards in the corridor! Incredible! We were pondering where they were planning to keep all of this stuff now, when it was time for the first stop and our questions were answered - they sell it all on route. They jumped out of the train, again before it had stopped and began throwing the stuff onto the platforms, where it was jumped upon by hords of people who were clearly awaiting this moment with anticipation - it was crazy! In the space of about 5 minutes (it was a very short stop) people had bought all kinds of things, without even trying them on!
We had a variety of nationalities in our carriage - New Zealand, Dutch, Scottish, English, German and there was a great atmosphere. At the beginning, many conversations along the 'what the hell...' lines were held, then discussions over the toilets! In our cabin we were really dismayed on the first day to find that there was no running water in the toilets - you had to wash your hands using mineral water, or in boiling water left to cool from the urn. Crazy! And what about washing our hair.... We were especially miffed as we kept seeing Mongolian women leaving the toilet with wet hands and faces and yet we couldn't work it out at all! Luckily, after almost 3 days the attendant in our cabin got so annoyed with us using all the hot water and taking water from her cabin into the bathroom that she showed us how it worked (pretty simple actually - we were suitably embarrased) and we were able to wash ourselves and our hands at our leisure! Still no washing of the hair though.
The food on board was pretty average, and, as we had decided that the 'budget' travelling was now to begin, we had brought noodles and cup-a-soups and other dry culinery delights that we were going to live off for the five days - yeah right! After about 24 hours we were all starving and at the next stop got off and bought fruit and crisps from the babushkas on the platform! We refrained from buying beer (we decided to check out the dining car and purchase one there instead) qnd scoffed happily for a few minutes. Although we did eat soups, noodles and rice every day, we ate more than that - potentially because every time someone else ate anything, we decided it was clearly time for us to eat and consequently spent a lot of time eating!
When we weren't eating we were playing a variety of games, including Uno (I am now an expert!), cards, celebrity trivial pursuit and guess-timate with all the people in our carriage. We also read and wrote a lot and looked out of the window at the pretty amazing scenery. Its crazy really, as we had nothing to do but did not get bored. A highlight in terms of scenery was definitely the Lake Baikal, which we reached at about 3.30am, in time to watch the sun rising over it - spectacular! It was so peaceful, and we later saw a full rainbow that was beautiful too.
The beds in the train were fairly uncomfortable, but the worst part was the noise and jerking movements that the train made the whole time! Awake, we didn't really notice it but as soon as the lights were out it was like we were doing some kind of obstacle course with sound effects! Having said this, we actually slept fairly well most of the time (clearly tired from all the eating!) and during the day the beds became our living area so I was forced to be fairly tidy...
The border crossing was also fairly interesting - on the Russian side we had to leave the train for 2 hours and only when we got back on did they begin looking at passports and searching for smuggled goods (little did they know it had all been offloaded just beforehand). It took ages and was pretty dull, except for the fact that the toilets were closed for the entiry process (about 6/7 hours) and by the end we were all ready to kill to be first in the queue! On the Mongolian side it was almost comic - all of the Mongolian women put make-up, jewellry and dressy clothes on and when the customs officers arrived they were treated like royalty! I went for a walk at one point and found 2 or 3 of them sitting in a carriage with 4/5 mongolian women being fed alcohol and cakes! They left without a fuss, taking with them a very large bottle of what looked like whiskey.....
The overall experience was fantastic - great atmosphere, really relaxing and fantastic scenery - definitely one to do if you are ever in this part of the world... |
Photos Russie
Carnets de voyage Russie
Vidéos Russie
Carte Russie
Guide de voyage Russie
Santé Russie
Billets d'avion Russie
