The Restaurant at the End of the Trans-Manchurian Express

I woke this morning without any real expectations of the day ahead and have been rewarded with an amazing few hours staring out over Lake Baikal whilst drinking reasonable coffee in the restaurant. I chat to Valerie whilst Mrs Chef organises my blinis. This is my favourite place on the train. I feel very welcome here. Something between a Russian version of “Fawlty Towers” and “Robin’s Nest”. There are not too many customers today, just a thick set Russian chap eating a bowl of Solyanka accompanied with a small carafe of vodka. A range of officials and paramilitary pass by, […]

Ice Cold in Barabinsk

It is perhaps a bit of an obvious subject, but I feel I have mention the temperature. It has been getting progressively colder at each stop for the last couple of days, and it has now reached the point where I can confirm to you that it is “proper cold”. This isn’t a technical term or an absolute temperature, but based on the fact that I can feel the air being sucked out of my lungs as I cough and splutter when making the perilous jump between carriages. Over the last 24 hours on average I would use Sergei’s carriage […]

Krasnoyarsk

I woke to the smell of ham and fried eggs in my compartment. Unless I can now smell things like cooked breakfasts in my dreams, I think that Sergei must prepare his breakfast in the fire of our carriage samovar in the morning – well before I rise. I had to work quite hard to get up today, but we were due to stop in Krasnoyarsk at around 09.00am Moscow time. A 22 minute window for resupply of my onboard larder and to take some exercise. People often remark that they don’t sleep well on trains, but I think this […]

Deeper into Siberia – Ishim to Omsk

I meet Sergei in the outer compartment at the end of the carriage as we approach Ishim. Depending on your choice of time zone, it was a bright and sunny start to the day. Sergei can be a man of few words, but his English is excellent. He breaks it down into two words for me today – “Cold, problem”. I’m not sure at first of the nature of the problem, but I think it is that the carriage outer door has frozen closed. Its clearly not insurmountable though, as he has a range of heavy metal implements to beat […]

Towards the Ural Mountains and Siberia

I need to get the map out and calculate our actual progress, but roughly the train covers about 1000 km every 24 hours. It’s not going particularly fast, but it’s nearly always moving, so it really crunches through some serious distance. Despite being only a day east of Moscow, the temperature has started to fall. At our first stop in the morning in Kirov the temperature is -9C. The fresh snow covers black ice, and I manage to fall over and make a fool of myself in front of some very tough looking soldiers. They would look even tougher if […]

"Vostok" – the Midnight Express to Manchuria

The “Vostok” leaves Moscow’s Yaraslovsky station every Saturday night at close to midnight. Yaraslovsky is not a particularly sophisticated place, and once through security there are really just a few seats, a ticket office and departure board inside. Outside, a few drunks and mad men are on the streets looking for people to accost and share their stories with. I give them a wide berth. I had stocked up on supplies earlier in the day at my local Sokolniki supermarket, and now had an extra three bags to carry containing assorted noodles, biscuits, and porridge, not to mention a stash […]

The D10 "Schnellzug" to Moscow

My time in Warsaw passed far too quickly. After a day out with a local chap called Mariosh whizzing round the Praga district in a converted police van (that’s another story) I got back to my hotel to prepare for the journey to Moscow. Rather touchingly the general manager was there to wish me a safe trip and she kindly said that she would never ever forget me. I could pretend to you that this was because I had inspired her with my love of Warsaw, but the truth was rather more comical. When I checked in had to change […]

The Berlin-Warszawa Express

Well I’m having an interesting day in the office. Things started out well, I managed to get myself onto platform 11 of Berlin Hbf with plenty of time to spare. The temperature is just warm enough to sit outside without getting too cold. Today I’m on the EC 43 service, destination Warsaw. The train is run by PKP – the Polish state owned railway company. Right on cue a weirdly pink locomotive pulled in to the platform. At the front of the train was carriage 272, my first class home for the day. I had a “fenster” again, thanks to the usual […]

Probably the Best Railway Station in the World

If I ever had to vote in a competition for the best railway station in the world, I would almost certainly choose Berlin Hauptbahnhof (Hbf). I would have thought for a moment about Shinjuku, Beijing South and maybe even the new Kings Cross, but none really come close to Berlin Hbf. If you have never been, it’s an ultra modern multi level station which at times feels like a shopping centre. That’s because it is in part a shopping centre. As you approach the station on the inter city tracks you climb up and enter the very top deck of […]

City to City

I have to tell you that if you have never heard a Dutch station announcer say the words “Inter City” in English you have missed a minor treat of schoolboy humour. I have been trying to learn a few words of local train lingo for this trip. I’m pretty good in Russian, and even know a few things in Chinese, but so far I have rather neglected my Dutch and German. So I’m pleased to learn that today I’m on a train that’s a “zug”, and I’m sitting in what I think is a “fenster”. Not a nice guitar, but […]