This is an old blog/journal writeup of mine from my adventure on the Trans-Siberian railway. Between the end of May and the end of June 2003 myself and a friend (Ed, of the China blog fame) traversed the full length of Russia on a train. Starting in the far-eastern city of Vladivostok, we spent 3 weeks getting to St. Petersburg, and then continued the train s momentum all the way to Berlin Thus it was one of the longest train journey in the history of the universe. I will continue the story as if I was the first and only person to achieve this feat, just because it makes me feel extra cool. Like, 7% more cool than normal.
The Trans-Siberian railway (usually called TransSib in Russia) is the world s longest and the most famous train route that goes through the entire length of Russia. It crosses the whole continent: starts in Moscow, passes through the European Russia, crosses the Ural mountains (which separate Europe and Asia), continues into Siberia hotels manchester s taiga and steppes, and finishes in Vladivostok the Russian Far East coast. The Trans-Siberian is an immense route: along more than 9000 kilometres of its length you see different landscapes, meet many different people and cultures (especially, hotels manchester if you hop off the train at few points), get to see the magnificent Lake Baikal in Siberia, and just enjoy the trip in the train. hotels manchester The original Russian name for this railway hotels manchester is The Great Siberian Way , and the name Trans-Siberian was given to this route by the West, but it became very popular and wide-spread.
This railway is the backbone of Russia. It is the only overland route going through the whole country. This unique status makes the railway still quite important for the economy and safety of the country, as it was supposed to be, more than 100 years ago, when it was built. Moving non-stop, it takes more than six days to travel along the whole length of the Trans-Siberian railway. After crossing Siberia hotels manchester (soon after Irkutsk) the route divides into three different sub-routes: The Trans-Siberian Route: Moscow Vladivostok the original Trans-Siberian railway, hotels manchester which goes all along Siberia and through the Far East (to the Pacific Ocean, or more correctly, the Sea of Japan). Then there is the Trans-Mongolian Route: Moscow Ulaan-Baatar Beijing. On that stretch visitors can see the Siberian plains and forests, Mongolian steppe and even a part of Gobi desert along this route that goes through Mongolia to China. Finally the Trans-Manchurian hotels manchester Route: Moscow Beijing a direct way from Russia to China that goes around the Eastern border of Mongolia, not crossing it. It is an option for those who are not interested in going to Mongolia due to visa problems, or who can t get tickets for other trains.
Constructed hotels manchester between 1891 and 1916, the Trans-Siberian railway s function was the supply and protection of Russian Pacific Ocean territories. Russians hotels manchester call these territories Dalniy Vostok (Far East). The main route between St.Petersburg and Vladivostok was already completed in 1903, but there were many temporary structures, so for 13 more years permanent bridges, tunnels and stations were added. The construction started on the 19th of May 1891 and it was finished 5th of October 1916, when the bridge across Amur river started to operate. Prior to this, there was no steady connection between European Russia and its Asian areas. Meanwhile Japan, hotels manchester China and England all were interested in Asian territories to be out of Russian control and Russia had to play hard to secure them.
Ultimately, the construction of the Trans-Siberian railway led Russia to develop Siberia and the Pacific shore. hotels manchester Nowadays the Trans-Sib is a very important lifelink for Russia; the route is the shortest way between Europe and Asia, and Russia is cashing in big-time hotels manchester by transporting goods from China and Japan to Europe. The length of the main route is 9297 km. The largest bridge is above Amur river 2612 meters. The longest tunnel starts at 8140 km, and is 2 km long. The Trans-Siberian route crosses 10 time zones, goes through Europe (19%) and Asia (81%): the continental border is marked with small obelisk at 1777 km near town Pervouralsk. The Trans-Siberian passes by 87 cities and towns, and the route crosses 16 big rivers including the Volga, Ob, Enisey, Oka, Amur, and a bunch of others. Some 200km of the route pass Lake Baikal and 39 km of the way is along the shores of the Sea of Japan.
The guards on both sides of the Russia-China border turned out to be rather friendly and relaxed. From the border post it is about 80km to the nearest town, so everyone takes a standard cross-border bus. While on this bus I chatted with a bunch of Russians who gave us info about the next step. A Chinese man who also was traveling to Vladivostok offered his help, which made us relax a bit more.
Riding on the bus along the border, one sees the many kilometres of heavy defence lines: bunkers, tanks, radar stations, and the like dotted the landscape. Only a few years ago, the whole region was off limits to foreigners. In Ussuriisk we transferred onto another bus which brought us to Vladivostok hotels manchester at 6PM local time. In Vlad we hopped into a taxi and tried to find the hostel listed in the Lonely Planet guide. Having purchased an outdated version of the guide proved a weak decision, hotels manchester as the hostel in question had already gone out of business. Fortunately I got some help at a computer store next door, and they sent us to a similarly affordable and quite cozy hostel just a few doors down. The hostel was about 15 minutes from the downtown area. I hiked down to the train station to figure out the train ticket hotels manchester situation, as our original travel was scheduled for the 27th, and now it was the 29th While at the station I got help from some guy also shopping for train tickets. My Russian skills were not good enough at that point, and it would take some talking to get the tickets re-issued for the next day. After an hour of arguing at the window, Valeria (the friendly fella helping me) said that he will come back here in the morning and take care of everything. hotels manchester Very stark contrast to the China situation, where no one could be arsed to help. Back at the hostel we were sharing hotels manchester a room with a young Russian sailor hotels manchester named Max who entertained us for the evening (we were knackered and completely uninterested in getting hotels manchester out on the town ). After watching a Russian-dubbed episode of The Simpsons, we crashed.
In the morning I visited a pretty good internet cafe and tried to purchase my airfare from London to Toronto (this trip is not completely planned out yet). I am not sure if it worked, as there turns out to be some restriction on internet-based transactions. Later on Valeria came back and tried to sort out the tickets. Lost in the Russian bureaucracy we ended up buying new tickets, despite the promises that the ones I had were flexible. The stretch we missed hotels manchester was from Vladivostok to Irkutsk, hotels manchester but seeing that it only set us back $50 each, it was not the end of the world. The original Trans-Sib itinerary hotels manchester had us in Irkutsk for 7 days, which means we had plenty of time to catch up and to have all things normal again. Hopefully. After the train station Valeria hotels manchester and I went to the hostel to pick up Ed, and we did some touring around Vlad.
We had about 5 hours to kill before the train was leaving, so we bummed around the port area, looking at all the ships coming in from Japan loaded with cars, and visiting the Naval base (Vladivostok is the home of the Russian Pacific Fleet HQ). Because of its high strategic importance, this city of 600,000 was closed to foreigners for many years, hotels manchester but now the tourist industry had picked up and it is a starting point for many expeditions to Kamchatka hotels manchester and Kola Peninsula.
Just before we turned up at the station again we shopped hotels manchester around for bread, sausage, veggies, hotels manchester water, and toilet paper which supposedly is rather scarce on the Trans-Sib. When we got to the station our train, hotels manchester #2, Rossiya ( Russia ), was already standing at the platform. Because our tickets were purchased so late, we had different seating arrangements. Valeria came on the train with us to ask the conductor to let us sit together in the same compartment. On board we quickly found our compartment, and made friends with the other passenger, Sasha, from a small town in the Amur Region in the Far East. Built like a 7 foot grizzly, but with a very sunny disposition, he made an excellent travel companion, even if for only 2 days.
A van imported from Japan being offloaded. Vladivostok had heaps of right-hand-drive vehicles from Japan as they are only a hop across the pond away, as opposed of bringing them all the way from Europe. And no one wants Chinese vehicles here...
The train was a high-comfort unit. Painted in the white-blue-red scheme of the Russian flag, and with each car emblazoned with the twin-headed Imperial Eagle, the whole train was pulled by a high tech electrical unit built by Skoda. There were a total of 18 cars, 16 of the 2nd class, with 8 compartments each seating 4 people, one First Class car which seats two per compartment, and one 3rd class which resembled the Chinese Hard Sleeper no real compartments, just sectioned off areas each sleeping 6 people.
That last car was stuffy and unpleasant, but fortunately we bought second hotels manchester class tickets which was just fine. In addition, hotels manchester the train had a dining car, and an administration/utility car, where one could take a shower, do laundry, or store excess luggage. At the end of each car one could find a large samovar (a kettle) which provided hot water for teas and soups and whatever else was needed. At the opposite end was the lavatory, surprisingly clean, especially to someone who had just arrived from China. hotels manchester The corridors were clean and neat, and the whole train was very inviting. The provodnica , or female conductor had instructed us that Ed cannot stay in the same compartment as me because of the price difference, and she asked for 1,400 Roubles or he would have to leave. Clearly
No comments:
Post a Comment