In Siberia tonight
Trip Start
Feb 14, 2009
1
3
8
Trip End
Mar 06, 2009
Irkutsk,
Siberia,
Russian Federation
Saturday, February 21, 2009
12.00pm 20th feb.
Mr Kim from UB guesthouse suggests we get
in the car and go now to the train station, due to the horrible traffic
situation in UB. So many cars + no snow wheels or chains = mass chaos. I'm
concerned as I was looking after the other Aussie couple's computer (read:
swapping movies and tv shows from our hard drives) and they were due back an
hour ago; they are on the same train as us. Mr Kim says he will look after it
until they get back. I think Mr Kim just scored himself a new laptop. He looks
very pleased.
2:50pm. We've been on the road (or the
rails, if you will) for about an hour now. I'm just tucking into my first bowl
of 2 minute noodles for the trip. You'd think I'd be sick of them by now but I
think the MSG agrees with me. Otherwise it's taking over my brain and is making
me think it agrees with me. Maybe it's like Mad Cow, but in spicy oriental
flavour.
4:50pm. More snow on the mountains and the
sun is starting to go down. We will be near the border in a few hours, where we
will have the pleasure of going through all that rig moral again. Goodie. The
laptop battery has gone flat and I haven't even got to work on my rock opera
version of Eleanor Rigby. Thank god I have my iPod and my trusty note pad.
11:00pm
Another night border crossing, another
surly immigration official confiscates our passports for a few hours.
The Mongolian border crossing was ok, then
the scary Russian guards came on. We had to pull all our bags down from the
overhead compartment then leave so they could search every nook and cranny for
stow-aways. Again I'm hearting my Australian passport as the didn't even look
in our bags and I've read on blogs about the trans Siberian how some American
backpackers have had every inch of their bags searched, their contents just
tipped on the beds and the floors.
11:00am 21st Feb.
It surprised me that it was snowing in
Mongolia while we were there. Everyday for 2 months while I was at work I would
check the weather for each city I was visiting on this trip (it conveniently
looked a lot like work as it involved typing and me cursing). Each day It would
say sunny and -40 degrees. But the day before we arrived it said -40 and
snowing. I had never seen so much snow. But now, looking outside the window at
lake Baikal I realise that the snow I saw in Mongolia was comparatively like a
freezer overdue for a defrosting. I have never imagined so much snow. This is
amazing. 1 hour to go
1:00pm This train trip was fairly
uneventful. Snowy deserts morphed into snowy pine forests once we reached
Siberia. On the platforms at train station stops, both local hawkers and people
from on the train would sell everything from jeans, beanies, beer and omul (a
local smoked fish delicacy). 1 hour to go.
Milli says:
Grabbed some earrings and a croissant
before leaving that morning, as you do, and then we were off. As we pulled out
people waved goodbye (not to us, we hadn't made friends with the city in 5
days), men peeing against walls and dogs trotting around quite chilly but happy.
One station we stopped at had an ice sculpture just standing there. And yes it
could have done more, it could have been melting but in that temperature it was
just standing there. Ha.
No wheel changing but it took ages to get
through immigration and customs. Minimal time for us which we were very
thankful for, though they did search all spaces in our berth for stowaways. The
head lady had a short bob and strong fringe and everyone had big boots. The men
had crew cuts and were clean shaven except for one man who had quite a beard.
We were so tired sitting up nicely and waiting for the train to roll on. I
didn't want to be asleep incase something happened or it looked rude to the
officials. Hours later we were off.
I woke up to Siberia - a blanket of thick snow,
quite different trees to Mongolia, and just such a lot of snow!!!!! Most little
houses and towns were wooden, some falling apart and others quite tidy and with
bright coloured paint and decorated awnings. Most houses have a car bomb or
skeleton in their yard. Saw one English ad but that was it. I thought we'd
passed Lake Baikal while I was sleeping and was quite upset but then the image
through the window changed and the landscape had an eerie white background
behind the trees whipping past. We hadn't missed it.
It was a magnificent sight, sometimes we
passed it right in front of us as the tracks went right past the lake. It went
off right to the horizon with snow piled on the surface - if you looked closely
you could see a strange wind whipping the snow across it. From here is was just
silent and white. There were bumps and furrows across the lake as the water
froze in motion and the snow fell and heaped up against it. The view melded
with the cloudy grey/white sky and it became like a dream. You could tell the
depth of the lake was deep and it looked like the sea. It was just so mystical
and pure white as we continued to travel around and passed it. Sometimes we
came along some lovely houses and abandoned buildings. I'm so glad we came at
this time during winter! I saw a teeny tiny bird and some silent tractors, then
we rounded a bend and more white came into sight. A bright white light at the
horizon shows me where the sky begins, and the whole place reminds me of what
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe would be like!! This lake is so vast, and
I just realised the white light is the sun coming through far in the distance.
Some areas the lake is very close to the train tracks which is strange! Saw two
little cemeteries which were very sweet in the snow. Boats have been washed
ashore a wave of snow and peoples yards are partially flooded with snow. Just
saw some Christmas trees go past - with the obligatory snow laden branches!
Frozen jetties go past and we can see some people out on the lake ice fishing!
Close up I can see some bright blue ice just like my pendant at home. As the
sun comes up higher the lake becomes darker white and it swaps with the sky.
We rounded the tip of the lake having
briefly stopped where lots of people on and off the train started up a little
black market on the tracks. Lots of jeans and smoked fish for sale and people
were buying like it was the last train to come round these parts!
The tracks then rose up and we travelled
past looking down on the lake. Though we can see little bits of liquid water
around, there are cars driving on the lake. The houses we pass look like
gingerbread houses as they have a heap of snow on each roof. We got to the
station and found Leonid who was to take us to the lake. Hurrah!
