The Trans-Siberian Railway

Well here I am, about to write about the Trans-Siberian railway - the journey defining what route we would take to Australia - and I'll start by saying we nearly missed the train!

Before I get into that, let me talk about the Moscow underground... From the map in our guide book, it looks like any other underground that you'd find in any other city. However, many of the stations are superbly decorated with chandeliers ...as if you're entering a huge concert hall or something. More people use the Moscow subway each day that those who use the London and New York subway systems combined. When we first went to use it, we bought our ticket and walked through the barrier. We followed the signs for our train line (quite difficult when you don't understand russian) and before we got to the track, we met another barrier which wouldn't accept our tickets. We showed them to the attendant who laughed and shrugged it off, as if to say: well of course that ticket isn't gonna work, you foreigner! We were then directed to another queue (the russians love to queue) where we would buy another ticket for THIS barrier. Don't ask me why! We have put this on a list which we call: 'That's something that only the russians know', and this list is getting longer each day!

Anyway, after buying our second ticket we made it on to our train. We had 4 stops to go... Strangely, the train skipped the 3 in between stations and stopped at our one! Were they expecting us? Is this the norm? (only the russians know), but we were very thankful that we didn't want to get off at one of the stations in between! We found our hostel and settled in well, happy to finish a long day of travelling.

The next morning, we had a quick run through the main areas of Moscow before our lunchtime train to Irkutsk. We were slightly behind time and after getting some supplies for the upcoming journey we were leaving it a little tight. Lets just get a taxi, we decided. The staff at the hostel told us that a reasonable price would be EUR 5 and that we should definately pay no more than EUR 6.

With our bags on our backs, we set out again at 12noon - hoping we'd be there long before the train left at 1pm, and before the looming grey clouds emptied water on us! We walked to the local underground & suburban train station where we had spotted a load of taxis the day before.

Today however, there was only one taxi. We walked up to the driver and asked him how much to Kazan station (in perfect russian, of course). He sat there for a few seconds, eyeing us up and down, no doubt wondering to himself "how much can I get away with here?". "Tirr-tee dollars" he replies! We decided we'd rather risk the underground than be shafted by this guy for a journey the equivalent of going from Drumcondra to O'Connell Bridge.

Thankfully, our underground experience second time around was a lot smoother (ie. the train didn't skip any of the in between stations!). Unfortunately, the time spent navigating the subways meant it was now 30 minutes before our train left. On top of this, it had started to lash rain and so the lobby of the subway station was jam packed with people trying to keep out of the rain.

We managed to push through and into the downpour. This was the one time we needed our waterproof coats and covers for our rucksacks - and the one time we didn't have time to put them on! I had read in the lonely planet guide book that the trains can sometimes leave early and after 15 more minutes of running around in the downpour and still no sign of our station I finally thought we were gonna miss our train. Other thoughts going through our heads was that the tickets in our bag will be wet and will not be accepted by the conductor!

Amazingly we met one of the few nice russians in Moscow who ran with us to the station, and then found our train for us too. As a bonus, the conductor even accepted our wet tickets! The train left 20 mins late :-)

I had planned on writing about the train journey itself but that will have to wait till my next post (at which point, I hope to have found another internet cafe which will allow me to upload photo's).

Mother Russia

We have just spent the last two days seeing the sights of St. Petersburg. We are now at 60 deg latitude - the most northerly point of our journey. We are staying at a very laid back hostel called 'Hotel California'. Apparently it is run by a bunch of musicians from a rock band, and when you press the doorbell an electronic voice in a THICK russian accent sings out 'Welcome to the Hotel California' :-) It's so laid back in fact that shortly after we arrived, the receptionist had to pop out, and asked if we would mind greeting anyone who called! Also, there's a moneyjar sitting by the computer next to me here - use of the internet costs about EUR 1.80 per hour, but payment is completely by the honour system!

Tomorrow we will travel to Moscow and then onto a 5-day train journey to Irkutsk! We had planned on only travelling a day or two at a time on the train but after booking a ticket to Yekaterinburg (only 26 hours) we realised that there were NO trains out of Yekaterinburg for about 5-6 days! In the morning, we will have to cancel our original ticket and get the longer one.If I survive the 5 day journey, I'll let you know how it went :-)

An unexpected stop over

The alternative to passing through Belarus was an unplanned stopover in Vilnius (Lithuania). The downside to this was that the train left Warsaw at 7am :-( ...and I thought I was finished with early mornings! This was our first major train journey, lasting about 13 hours.

All was going smoothly until we had to change trains in Lithuania. We planned to buy a new ticket in the station, but when the first train arrived in the changeover station the second was just about to pull out! With no cash, we just jumped on the train anyway... better to be on the train explaining that we had no ticket than off the train in the middle of nowhere we thought! When the ticket collector arrived, we showed her a Visa card and were met with a look ofshock. She said something to us in Lithuanian/Polish/etc. but it didn't sound good! She disappeared and came back to us with the cleaner (who spoke pigeon english) and politely informed us that we'd have to get off at the next stop! When we suggested that we could pay when we got to Vilnius, they seemed to settle for that. When we pulled into the station, we were frog marched to the ATM by no less than 2 staff, to withdraw the train fee :-)

Poland

We found our hostel fairly quickly but since it was only 6:30am our rooms were not yet available to us, So we decided to walk the streets looking for somewhere nice to have brekkie. It didn't take long to realise that Krakow doesn't wake up till a little later, so we had to settle for a coffee in a 24 hour internet cafe :-)

We settled into Krakow fairly quickly, mainly because it's a cheerful little town and the hostel we stayed in was very cosy. It was good to meet some of the other guests too, and have a bit of a conversation! On one particular evening, we were talking away when we realised it was 3am! During our time in Krakow, we also made a visit to another Concentration Camp in nearby Auchwitz/Birkenau. There's probably not much I can say that you have not heard in history class already, but what really stood out was the scale of the camp, and to see with my own eyes the extent to which the Nazi's went to, to kill people.

After 3 days in Krakow, we headed north (a little) to Warsaw. There was almost non-stop rain for our time here... some of it was like being in a rain forest... which meant we were restricted to our hostel for a much of the time :-( Our plan was to travel from Warsaw straight to Russia (St. Petersburg), but little did we know (until the last minute!) that the direct train passed through Belarus - which requires a transit visa to pass through!

Vienna to Budapest and onwards...

Before I start, I should point out that my phone mysteriously disappeared from my bedside in the hostel in Munich (the joys of a bed in a dormatory, eh?). The phone wasn't worth much, and had very little credit left in it. However, it did have all my numbers in it - so don't be surprised if you get an email from me when I get to Australia, asking for your number again...
Also, if you happened to send me any texts on or after July 29th then I probably didn't get them.

The train journey from Munich to Vienna was only about 3-4 hours long and travelled through some spectacular countryside. It was like watching heidi or something... with rolling hills and picturesque little houses.

We spent 3 days in Vienna altogether but nothing really stood out about it. This could be because the weather was deteriorating or that we were comparing it to Munich, but either way, I don't have much to say about it. We spent the time walking around the city, and also went to a concert playing Mozart music - there was a city wide festival on celebrating 200 years of Mozart, so every way we looked we saw wigs!

Bratislava was on our itinirary, but we decided to give it a miss since we had both been there before, and the train journeys onwards from there would have been more awkward (we were in for a surprise!). So straight to Budapest we went.

Budapest was the first time that we had to wear our jumpers and raincoats on the trip. When we found our hostel, we were greeted to a 1900's soviet era orphanage (or similar!). All the tiles were cracked, the paint on the walls was peeling and the shower was nothing more than a spout (think 'tap'). Perhaps these are the reasons why there was still room in this hostel despite the hungarian grand prix on and all other placed booked out :-)
Budapest was nice, but the intermitted torrential rain stopped us from making the most of it. We spent 2 days walking around, dodging the showers but were ready for a change when the time arrived.

Oh, I should say that we got to try out the Thermal Baths while there :-) These are basically outdoor swimming pools, but with less emphasis on swimming, and more on just floating around. This is all the more relaxing given that the outdoor temp was about 15 deg C and the water temp was 37C :-) There were signs up telling people not to spend more than 20 mins at a time. Ever since I saw these pics of old men playing chess in the baths, I wanted to have a go. However, when I actually went to play, I was quickly told where to go (by the old men). Looks like in order to play, you need to be a grumpy old man with nothing better to do on a weekday afternoon... well I'm half way there :-)

Getting the night train from Budapest to Krakow seemed like a good idea at the time, but we hadn't fully expected the whole eastern european border crossing scenario. This is where you get passport officials dressed in full military atire - camoflage suit, boots, shaved head (and yes, guns too!) walking though each compartment on the train checking passports. And if there are 3-4 guys checking passports, then this means your passport will be checked 3-4 times. It seems the word 'delegation' has not made it this far east (?).

To add to this, the train route in question travels through two borders (Hungary/Slovakia and Slovakia/Poland) so there's twice the fun... especially when the second crossing happens around 2am and you're standing there in your pj's and bare feet, only half awake, while this big guy with a gun (x4!) eyes you up and down looking for any reason to 'make his day' (perhaps my sleepful state was playing tricks on me at this point!).

We arrived in one piece (and no holes) in Krakow at about 6am the next morning ready for bed!

Paris & Munich

We stayed in Paris for 3 days altogether. For those of you who went on the ski-trip to Saint-Francois-Longchamp, it was the same hostel that we stayed in all those years ago, and yes, the pac-man mural was still on the wall opposite the hostel entrance although I declined on eating any raw eggs :-)

I had been to Paris a few times before, but never got around to doing the usual touristy things such as going up the Eiffel tower or visiting the Louve museum, so we decided that we'd do those things on this visit. We also went to a star wars exhibition that was on, which had a lots of props and stuff that were used in all the star wars films - including Darth Vadar's suit from the original 3 films.

However, one of the more exciting parts of this visit was getting engaged to Kate :-)

After our third day in Paris, we made our way to Gare de l'Est (I think!) for our first sleeper train of the trip. It was going to be the first of many so I was very interested to see what the living conditions were like! There were 6 beds in a compartment smaller than most people's box rooms! Having said that, the beds were quite comfortable.

The next morning we arrived in Munich (9 hours later) where we would stay for 2 nights.

Munich is a lovely city, made even nicer by the plentyful supply of Bratwurst (german hot dog)and 1l glasses of beer :-) I hadn't had a bratwurst since I worked as a golf caddie in America (of all places) many years ago and I wasn't disappointed when I got to sample them again.

We also made a trip to the concentration camp in nearby Dachau. On our way out there, we overheard an Irish accent (Kerry, in fact) on the bus. As it turned out, the guy was living in Munich and worked as a tour guide, so we joined his small group. I had heard before about the attrocities which took place there, but seeing the place for real was an eye-opener. Our guide (sorry, but I can't remember his name) did an excellent job of showing us around ('guiding' us, you could say).

We left Munich for Vienna on 31st July. Goodbye bratwurst, goodbye nice german beer!

The Journey Begins

Ok, well over a week into the trip now and it's time to start making some proper entries to this page I suppose :-)

The countdown of the days finally got to zero! My mother dropped Kate, Fearghal and I to the airport on Tuesday 25th July (Fearghal was off to Boston for a week). It was good to say hello (and goodbye) to Caoimhe who was also in the airport, on her way to Portland.

We had a coffee and a bun but while I was hungry from missing breakfast, I couldn't eat a thing. It felt very strange knowing that when I left Ireland this time, I would not be back in a week, or a month, or 6 months... After we said our goodbyes, Kate and I made our way to the gate in realative silence.

Our first and only flight was to London and we were greeted to a scorching day! We dropped our bags off at Kings Cross Left Luggage and went wandering. It wasn't long before we came across Platform 9 3/4 (for all you Harry Potter fans), so we decided to make the most of the photo opportunity :-)

Our afternoon in London was uneventful except for being ripped off by paying about EUR 8 for two ice-creams! Lesson learned... don't buy ice-cream in Picadilly Circus! We met up with Sinead (an old friend of Kate's) once she finished work, and she looked after us for the rest of the evening.

The following day we made our way to Waterloo station to board the Eurostar train to Paris.

Photos

Uploaded some photos of the journey so far onto Google's picasaweb...
http://picasaweb.google.com/kingjjj/TheAdventuresOfJohnAndKate