Dear familiy and friends,

After having spent some time in this enormous country called Russia, we are now sure we do not understand the Russians:) There are always surprises, some appreciated, others not.

It started in Moscow, when we arrived at the Sheremetyevo airport. Customs were surprisingly relaxed andin no time we stood in the arrivals hall looking for an ATM to buy some real russian roubles. This turned out to be harder than expected, after trying several times unsuccesfully to use the ATM, a cab driver was so helpful to show the exchange agency. However, we could not find anyone behind the counter. We found out being polite does not help and the cab driver started to shout and bang on the counter until finally someone arrived, but you shoud have seen her face.........!!*&&$#@.... After having travelledsome 10 days in Russia, nowwe know a grumpy face is the natural look of the majority of the russians!

After having seen the Kremlin, with its fabulous treasures of the Tsar dynastyin the Armouryand the Red Square with the so familiar colourful towers of St. Basils cathedral, my mind went to the modern history of the Soviet era and with a little imaginationI couldstill see the military parade passing by the Communist Party hotshots and the German guy (Matthias Rust...or...something?) that landed on the Red Square in his small airplanesomewhere in the eighties.

However, things are changing quickly in Moscow and it has becomea gigantic modern city where you see more (blinded) Hummers, Range Rovers, Rolls Royces, Prada, Gucci, D&G shopsthan in places like Marbella or Saint Tropez. And not to forget ...dozens of beautiful women, all wearing high heels till almost up to my knee! I almost convinced Sharda to buy a pair herself, but she bravely resisted and we are still walking on our hiking boots! We spent our last hours in Moscowon the 33th floor of the sky bar of the Swissotel where we enjoyed a miraculoussunset overthe city with in our hand symbolically a Trans-Siberian cocktail.

A bit nerveous we arrived at the Kazanskaya Vokzal (=trainstation), a bit more than 3 hours before the train would leave. The last time I took a 25 hour train trip (our first etappe)was when I was 17, from Amsterdam to Romeon aschool trip. But our worries were not correct. Checking inwent smoothly and the provotnika (our railway attendent) showed us our shared cabin. When we entered the cabin we were a bit surprised findinga 60 year old couple making up their beds already (it was around 5pm) in their as we say in Dutch so-calledcamping smoking. Although they did not speak English at all and we only 5 words Russian, this people turned to be very nice and after a 3 hour discussion using both hand and feet we finally found out that the man was an engineer and we had explained we were on a trip around the world!

As we soon discovered eating is an important topic in the train. Every Russian has at least several bags of cold and warm food with him and makes a ritual of every meal as the meals in the restaurant of the train are for an average russian too expensive and not the best ever, as people told us beforehand (we cannot confirm this as we only ate our own and our fellow cabin passengers food). The trains we travelled inwere pretty modern and with reasonably clean bathroom facilities (2 per wagon) and a large water cooker to make yourself some tea or coffeeand for us Dutchies a Cup a Soup at 4 pm.

One other peculiar thing is that in all trainstations, on the tickets and in the trainthe clockis set on Moscow time, while for instance Irkutsk, where we are now, is 5 hours ahead of Moscow time. Luckily Sharda has a nice diving watch which can show two times at once...another 'problem' solved.

After 25 hours we arrived in Ekaterinburg (aka Sverdlovsk), the place where the Romanov Tsar family was killed in the early 20th century and where good old Boris Yeltsin was born! We had decided to stay in a homestay, something like a B and B, but then different we immediately discovered. At the Sverdlovsk station we were picked up by a driver with a nice sign showing 'Mr Johannisse & Co' so we followed him and he took us in his car to the outskirts of this Ural city, where we were brought to a 70s looking soviet communist flat, where we were welcomed by a 45 year old lady named Olga anddressed up in miniskirt and accompanying top (showingher belly!!) together with her mother. Later Olga told us that the flat was only some 15 years old! Furthermore apparently these two lovely ladies (have to say they were really nice) did not like cleaning (as many do) as could be seen from all the dirt in the kitchen and living room. Luckily our room was the only one that was relatively clean, although we had to sleep on 2 not so comfy sofa beds, which were as hardas Stalin and short as Putin. After the first night I was already longing for the trainsleeper!

In Ekatarinburg we discovered something else while walking thorugh the local Kalverstreet. We all know that Russians drink al lot, especially vodka, but this drink has recently been changed for beer and it is very common for a men, when walking and shoppingwith his wife or girlfriend, to have at least a 0.6 liter bottle in the other hand. Why don't we dop this in Holland I thought immediately. The woman can shop and is happyher man is with her and the man can enjoy an honest beer while looking at the high heels:)

Day 2 we did a tour following the history of the Romanovs and visited the 2! places of memorialwere they were killed and later made Holy. Our guide explained that the orthodox church has a different view on their history than some other people, but what the heck, we visited them both.

Part two of our Transsib journey was a 50! hour trip to Irkutsk. Again only 4 or 5 other foreign tourists on the train and we were placed in cabin with 2 russian boys of around 20. Again, no english was spoken by these lads that had visited family in the west of Russia and now were returning to their girlfriend and wife in thefar east near Vladyvostok, the end of the regular Trans Siberian train. For them a 7 day journey which made us a bit humble as we only had to travel 2 days in a row. We had prepared ourselves even better now and had enough food for the whole trip. Although this not stopped me buying a delicious pancake from one of the women selling food (dried fish, bread, drinks) at one of the many stations were the train stops for 5-20 minutes. Finally we arrived in Irkustsk at 6am in the morning (3 days after we had departed!) where we were had arranged a transfer to Lake Baikal, the biggest sweet water lake in the world (20% of all melted sweet water in the world is in this lake), which is some 600 km long and approx. 60km wide and more than 1.5km deep!

The lake and surroundings are beautiful and you feel like you are in the Swiss alps, as on the other side of the lake high mountains with eternal snow are still visible. We stayed here in a nice wooden chalet with finally a propper bed! Unfortunately the weather was not that good, but after the 'lazy' traintrip our feet needed to train a bit for the Himalayas and we did a 2 hour walk up to a viewpoint. Afterwards wewalked in toour Swiss girlfriend from Ekaterinburg and also our 2 Swedish guys which we had met on the train showed up and we decided to have some drinks and to try the famous Omul fish from the lake, which was I must say delicious, both cooked and raw sushi style! During the dinner 2 English guys lads joined and we enjoyedsome moreBaltika beers. Suddenly the ladies of the restaurant thought it was enough, but luckilywe found another place to drink at a small dancing along the boulevard. To our surprise there were some russians partying on a Monday night and we joined them happily. Next day we took it easy and enjoyed the sun and views on the lake.

Now back in Irkutsk we are preparing for our last stop in Russia, the town of Ulan Ude, a real mix of Russian andmore Eastern Asian culturesandthe gateway to Mongolia!

And now it is time for dinner!

To be continued!

Jordi & Sharda

BTW: pictures will be added later