5 October. Next stop Beijing

Today was our last day in Ulaanbaatar, and our initial superficial view has been modified and informed by a little understanding of what drives this country and the forces which have forcibly and dramatically moulded the country over three centuries.

Leaving Ulanbataar - the suburbs.

Tomorrow morning very early we board the train to Beijing. The 2 day trip will give me time to try and put my thoughts in some order. A fascinating place.

Crossing the Mongolian desert

Heading South again. Next stop Beijing

So the next post from Beijing - when I can find a wifi zone.

2 October. Ulaan Baatar first impressions

Sunday October 2.
Sunday morning we arrived in Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia.. First impressions? Absolute chaos in an urban renewal area/war zone. Let me explain.

We arrived at 6.30 am. Made our way through the guys who really wanted us to get in their cars so they could show us their city in detail on the way to our destination, so proud were they of the beauty
of the city. We declined their kind offers and walked. A lovely morning - cold- clear sky and sun coming up.

The walk was longer than we has estimated, and what we hadn't factored in was the state of the streets, specifically the pavements. Strewn with rubble , concrete waste, glass, rubbish. Open sewers where the manhole covers  were missing. Where there had been an attempt to pave, the paving stones were in places missing, or had been pulled up and left in piles.

We passed a park where a couple of people were exercising in the dawn light amidst piles of dumped concrete and steel from I assume a demolished building.


We made it to our hotel. A haven amongst chaos - we had to climb over a pile of concrete blocks and rubble on the pavement to get into the hotel "compound". Clean robes, hot shower, lovely breakfast. Below our 4th floor window a guy is living under a sheet of tin, on a derelict site, boiling water on a fire - but he is reading a newspaper.


After a rest, in the afternoon we go for a walk. Remember we are on the heart of the capital city. There is traffic chaos as cars vie for a space on gridlocked roads, horns blaring pointlessly. People everywhere making their way over the broken pavements. Tiny stalls on the side of the pavements selling cigarettes and drinks, books, videos, fruit.

Don't want to be blind and out for a walk in Ub. Was it all live? 

Oops!

There are shoddily built concrete flats everywhere. There are new office buildings (I assume) going up everywhere.

There are a few elderly people in traditional dress, sitting at the side of the road sharing something out of plastic drink bottles. They also sit alongside a brand new building housing Louis Vuitton, Hugo Boss, etc.Lots of young people, in the main dressed well in western fashions.

There is such a dramatic transition going on here. There is a dynamism about the place. We have 2 more days here. We will see how our initial impressions develop.

I imagine this is how the Yukon or San Francisco was in the early days of gold rushes etc. Here it is oil and minerals.
Observation - the British Embassy, around the corner from the hotel, has loops of razor wire on the top of high concrete walls, although they have a new wheelchair ramp! Heaven knows how you get to the ramp in a wheelchair over Ub pavements!! The French Embassy, further along the road, has no razor wire, and a normal "embassy" wall, and a patisserie called Michels around the corner, which does
seriously good coffee.

Best roadside stall - put an old bathroom scale on the roadside and charge to weigh people. Must work, there are a few of them.

Saturday 1 October. We leave Russia (filed Ub Mongolia)

Today is the last day in Russia. We cross the border this evening in what apparently can be a protracted process.

Dawn brought Lake Baikal on one side and mountains on the other, the lake going on for several hours. Very beautiful and blue with a cloudless sky and edged with the gold of Autumn. Even from the train it was possible to see through the water.

An interesting smell is permeating this end of the carriage. Our carriage attendant is cooking a stew for lunch on the coal fire and although this is Russia, tis a Chinese train so we can listen to the latest hits from Beijing as he cooks.

We are back in a mix of forests and hills and the train is climbing. 

In a couple of hours we reach Ulan Ude where we leave the main Trans Siberian line and branch off onto the Trans Mongolian line heading south. The line was built after WW2. Until then it was still a camel track.

Now in Ulan Ude. This is the kind of "frontier" town you expect. A glitzy city centre with new buildings and roads, and the worst third world outskirts. Piles of rubbish at the end of each dusty dirty street. The houses nothing more than shacks. Even the newer areas, while clearly more affluent with new houses being built still have piles of rubbish. Even outside the town the rubbish is strewn everywhere.

At Ulan Ude we became a diesel train. No electricity on the Trans Mongolian. The coal was re-bunkered and the mail and freight unloaded/loaded including some steel roofing for someone along the line. This a twice weekly working train.

Had early lunch/dinner as we lose the Russian dining car at the border, and we had been told there was no more food till we reach Ulaanbaatar, where we get off. So noodles tonight.

Countryside here is very dry, flat grassy plain with high hills surrounding. Occasional herds of horses and near towns some cows and sheep. This all interspersed with industrial sites, mines etc. appearing in the distance.

Heading south to the border.

At 6pm we reached the Russian border station, which is still several kms inside Russia. Passports taken, engine taken away and restaurant car also gone, so now we sit, a collection of carriages in an otherwise deserted station, as the sun sets.

A walk along the platform, visit the only shop in town opposite the station - we only buy
chocolate - (we already have wine to ease down the noodles), and we wait for the authorities to let us go.
 
We are now in Mongolia, through the customs etc. It has taken us nearly 6 hours since we arrived at the Russian border - 4 hours in Russia. They searched the roof, climbed underneath, brought dogs through twice, and checked the train with troops along the line as we crossed through the electrified barbed wire border fence which came right up to the rail line!

Didn't seem appropriate to take photos!

The Mongolians much easier, gave the train a cursory search, probably figured that if the Russians didm't find it then they wouldn't. Still took two hours though. Six hours to cross 20 kms.

The loos are locked during all this, except for the 15 mins or so it took between the Russian fence and the Mongolian border post. The "healthy option" salad eaters were queing in the isles.

We bought a beer from our friendly carriage attendant for aperitif during this time, and were rewarded with a jug of boiling water for our later noodles from his special stash. The coal bunkers had been sealed during the border crossing, so no hot water for the less favoured.

A large man in colourful costume marched along the train, announcing in English "the Mongolian dining car is now open". Had we known! Our Chinese guard didn't tell the whole truth ..... Too late we cried, already satiated on pot noodles .......

To bed, and up at 5 am. Ulaan Baator at 6.30.

Friday 30 September. Eastern Siberia

Bit of a rough night again, I reckon it might be because I am on the top bunk, so subject to a greater "sway" factor. Anyway the day dawned bright and sunny as we arrived in Krasnoyarsk quite a large industrial city. The suburbs as I guess they can be called are small townships of, in the main, smart wooden houses many with barn style steep snow roofs, and all with about 1 acre gardens, cultivated and now bare waiting for the winter.

The townships look quite attractive being set in birch woodland. I never would have guessed there were so many birch trees on this earth, let alone Russia!

It is now 10 to 1 local time, 8.52 Moscow time, which is the time the railway operates on. I assume you get used to going into a station and seeing the station clock set at the time 3000 kms away to the West.
Our carriage attendant has just offered us the first beer of the day! We tried to explain we hadn't had lunch yet!! He is keen to sell, I assume it supplements his wages.

He charges 100 roubles for a beer, the restaurant car is 80, but he reckons his Chinese beer is in bigger bottles, and better than the Russian?

This part of the line is supposedly the most trafficked in the world. The marshalling yards at each major town are enormous, and what I assume are ore or coal wagons, some oil tankers, and increasingly timber which form seemingly endless trains, the like of which I have only seen in outback Australia. They seem to pass us every few minutes. One yesterday with 4 enormous locos, took 5 minutes to pass, and we were both moving (in opposite directions).

Dinner in the diner again. Red wine tonight because the dining car operator had been shopping along the line. Apart from the ladies with trolleys and baskets there are also kiosks with wine, beer, vodka etc.

The shopping trip

The alternative

So what fine vintage did we enjoy? Well it was Russian and Merryn reckoned it reminded her of something she used to drink as a child?! Blackcurrent flavour I presume! And why is red wine served straight from the fridge?

I have to say that while not exactly gourmet, what we had was at least more than edible, although not entirely sure what it was. Getting tired of two minute noodles.

We weren't the only diners who were a little confused!

What you mustn't do is drink the water on the train, only boiled or bottled. The train water is pumped into the tanks from underground tanks at each stop. So no salad. Some of the diners who chose the "healthy option" meals seemed to be spending a lot of time going to the end of the carriage!

So our third day on the train ended.

Thursday 29 September (filed Ub Mongolia)

Siberia Thursday 29 September. 2nd day on the train.

Last night was not a good night for sleeping. We crossed the Urals and the train was heaving about, at one point nearly throwing me put of bed. We don't seem to have brakes on this carriage, consequently when the train slows down on a downhill section we slow down by hitting the carriage in front. Can be
quite dramatic! So with going round tight bends and slowing/speeding it was quite a night.

Also stopped at a couple of stations. Quite why public address announcements preceded by a tuneful attention grabber have to be played continually to an empty station at 3 in the morning, with only a train-full of poor souls who only want to sleep, heaven knows!

Dawn came up on Siberia with a golden glow and a huge deep blue sky, the birches looking as though they were on fire.

I saw this stunning dawn only because the condition of the track was such that it threw the train all over the place, like running over the corrugated concrete test tracks vehicle makers use.

We passed the test - just.

This bit of Siberia is so different from the central republics we passed through yesterday. Whereas yesterday the country looked poor, the houses in the villages looked like hovels, rotting black timber, small, dilapidated and situated on muddy potholed tracks . The people did not look happy! Perhaps the grey sky made it appear worse than it was, but I suspect not!

Today the villages although clearly not wealthy show a care about them. The stations are well kept.

We are now 2000+ kms from Moscow, another 4000 to go to Ulaanbataar.

20 minutes in Omsk, while the train was re-coaled (re-bunkered?) from a small tractor pulled trailer. The re-coaling is for the carriage hot water and heating.

On the station 60 roubles for a coke and just 27 roubles for a packet of cigarettes?! Not sure what that says?

Tonight we had dinner in the restaurant car. Full of noisy Swedes. Table set with brandy glasses and a plastic flower in a plastic soft drink bottle. Flags still draped across the ceiling. They look a little like bizarre bikini bottoms!? Had a meat dish with pasta and some salad, washed down with a cheeky little Spanish semi sweet white wine called El Toro. "That is all we have".

The Orient Express this isn't!

Bought a bar of chocolate and a beer to take "home".

We know how to live the high life .....

Wednesday 28 September. (filed Ub Mongolia)

Wednesday 28 September
Our first full day on the train. We have spent the night and most of the morning running through thick birch forest, with the occasional town and village, all very poor looking. The towns dilapidated and the villages with rundown small wooden houses and dirt roads, very muddy. Most of the houses have patches of ground all cultivated, no flower gardens. The villagers all wrapped up against the cold and damp. God knows what the houses must be like inside.

The carriage doors are kept locked except when we stop and can walk the platform and savour the local delights being offered. Today it was dried fish and soft cheesy  looking stuff wrapped in plastic, plus Coke and beer. As Merryn pointed out "that was made in those hovels!" Presumably someone must buy them, otherwise...? When we are let onto the platform the uniformed Chinese carriage conductors stand by the doors, and eventually shout "get on", so we can be locked up safe for the next stretch.

Our conductor has offered (to sell) us beer/tea etc. and last night wanted to know if we could change US dollars for him. He does it all with a pleasant smile.

After 15 hours on board we have past the 1057 km marker from Moscow. The country is opening up and we are passing through the town called Zuyevka. In few minutes we will cross into the Udmurtia Republic. The people here are mainly an ethnic minority. It seems a very poor country. Grey wet and dismal.

For breakfast we had coffee, followed by dried miso soup, then lunch a couple of warm pasty like cakes with meat and cabbage. Quite tasty.

Dinner noodles and the last of our French wine.

The dining car is at the end of the train and a quick recce doesn't inspire confidence .... not too sure of the coloured flags adorning the roof.... we will see.

After a greyish day we were treated to a firework display. With the cabin lights out we watched what seemed like fireflies shooting past the window. But no - sparks
from our coal fire flying everywhere - very pretty. Ahh these small things .....

Tuesday 27 September. Last day in Moscow (filed from Ub Mongolia)

Tuesday 27 September. Moscow Update.

My first impressions of Moscow were not incorrect, but just that - first impressions.
Our final day was spent out of the touristy centre and visiting some fascinating, and in one case rather sad place. We had checked out of the hotel and left the bags to collect later on the way to the train, which left at 21.35, and we decided to first walk along the Moscow River to the Sculpture Park, passing Moscow's "bridge of sighs".

At least that's what I think it should be called. It is lined with steel wire trees, to which lovers lock padlocks engraved with their names - Ahhhhh. The idea comes from Italian author Federico Moccia's bestseller Ho Voglia di Te (I Want You), which features a young couple attaching a lock to Rome's Milvian Bridge as a sign of eternal love.

The novel was published in 2006, and has spawned a global outbreak of engraved padlocks. The book is now published in several languages, but not English (at this point), with some 2 and a half million copies sold. Great concern in Venice, and I believe Florence, where they are attached to bridges and monuments, the inevitable rust staining all and sundry.

I think the Moscow authorities have got it right.

Then further along the river to visit the Sculpture Park. A wonderful collection of art placed around a well tended garden on the banks of the Moscow River. Main reason for the visit was because this is the last resting place for the statues of some of the luminaries of the Soviet era. Initially it was a dumping ground, now the statues of Stalin and the rest, including Soviet worker heroes, sit on concrete blocks or on the ground, but at least they are upright!

Lenin's bust is delightfully placed next to a couple of blue plastic toilets.

Some of the souls trapped by the communist regime

Our next visit of the day was the State Museum of Gulag History. A very sobering place. The Trans Siberian railway came in very handy for shipping the unfortunates out to their exiles.

At one time there were 20 million in the camps around Siberia. Intellectuals, politicians, artists, housewives, they had plenty of time to wonder why.

This is the English language overview of the museum. http://www.gmig.ru/state-gulag-museum/

The museum reminded me of the Holocaust museum in Prague. The pitiful possessions, the stories, and conditions they had to endure. At least at the beginning (of the Holocaust) some of the Jews wanted to believe they were just being relocated, but these people had no illusions. After the torture and beatings and sentencing, they knew their fate. A charming old lady tried to explain the inexplicable to us in broken English, and then shrugged her shoulders.

It didn't seem right to take any photos inside. This is the entrance courtyard (photo Gulag Museum)

Our day ended at a monastery just a few minutes from the museum. We were recommended to visit it by a young woman who saw us looking at the map. A chance encounter worth gold.

Through an enormous pair of anonymous iron gates, in a high wall off the street, you enter the Upper Monastery of Saint Peter. Emerging from under a large bell tower, you find yourself in a courtyard lined with churches, all in various states of repair. The church in the most complete stage (the Refectory) was unremarkable outside, but inside filled with gold and ikons.

The Refectory Church.

The oldest chapel, dating from the 15th century, the single domed Church of Metropolitan Peter,  sits in the middle of the courtyard.

The monastery was handed back to the church after the fall of communism and is gradually being restored by community volunteers. They have a lot of work ahead. During the communist years it was used as various factories and engineering workshops. It seems like a dedicated community, several people including young people came in to light candles - in the middle of a workday.

So back to the hotel via the local version of Starbucks, to pick up the bags and head for the station via the Metro. Having taken the Metro to get back to the hotel we knew what we were in for. And we weren't disappointed. Apparently several million people use it every day, all of them it seemed while we were trying to find our way to the station. Suffice to say they do not take prisoners!

No opportunity to admire the stunning architecture this time. My favourite is a stunning arte deco station of polished chrome, marble and glass. If ever you go to Moscow, spend a few hours riding the trains (28 rubles), but do so on a Sunday if you can.

Eventually we made it through the crowds, then had to work our way through several security barriers which it turned out we didn't need to navigate because we had our tickets, and the trains are outside.

With 10 minutes to spare we boarded our train (number 4) to the East which sat in the dark and the cold on platform 3, a Chinese train with a Russian restaurant car at the end.

Walking along the platform in the dark, I smelled something that took me back to the old days on station platforms - coal smoke. More on that in a moment.

Our compartment was very swish, 2 bunks and all wood panelling, with a table and a fan. We were in carriage number 9. Between us and the next compartment was a shower room, which we share. The
same between each pair of compartments. This is the luxury part of the train, although we all shared a rather smelly loo at the end of the carriage.

There are 2 luxury carriages, then on either side there are "soft seat" carriages, 10 in all. In "soft seat" there are 4 bunks to a compartment and one shower/loo at the end of each carriage. I'm pleased we chose to pay a bit extra.

Now back to the coal smoke, at the end of each carriage is an open coal fire which supplied our hot water, and boiling water for drinks etc. Also warm to stand next to!

And so to bed after a very well earned glass (or two) of Bordeaux, brought all the way for the occasion!