A high speed train brings us to the cultural capital of Russia, Saint Petersburg (Leningrad, Petrograd).  Peter the Great moved the Russian capital here in 1703 and this Baltic Sea port on the Gulf of Finland remained the seat of government until 1918. It feels like Venice because of its bridges and canals and rivers flowing into the sea.

THE HERMITAGE

As we stand in front of the colossal Hermitage, one of the largest museum collections in the world, I can’t help but think of my mom and dad’s trip here (now 93 yrs old) decades ago and their anecdote of my mother lost in this vast museum. Dad had more patience then I think.
The riches in this museum astound me now and my father years ago.  The building was started by Peter the Great’s daughter, Elizabeth, and many of the rooms of the baroque palace bear her initials.  It became the favorite palace of Catherine the Great and she acquired many works.  Part of this collection was nationalized from private owners by the Soviets.  During WWII two trains evacuated many works and the museum suffered some direct bomb hits. In 1995 the Winter Palace was the sight of an exhibition entitled “Hidden Treasures” showcasing German art looted (or reclaimed) by Stalins army.
The vast collection of Impressionists’ works was wonderful to see, especially a work from Picasso’s blue period.  Their Rembrandt collection may be the largest in the world. A day of eye candy for sure…don’t miss it!  We were accompanied by Elina, an Art History major who made each work come alive and tell us a story.

Today is Navy Day in Russia, a holiday, dating back to the deaths of 14 nuclear submariners.  The fleet is in St. Petersburg as well as other port cities.  It started off with a parade of these vessels in the Neva River, the drawbridges were raised and their was a flyover too. Thousands lined the waterways waving flags, dressed in navy gear or their best finery.  Speeches, music, food and drink were the order of the day.  Streets were closed and it was wall to wall people on Nevsky Prospekt.

The Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood is named so because Alexander the III commissioned this church to be built in honor of his father, Alexander II, who was assassinated.  The outward appearance reminds the viewer of St. Basil’s in Moscow and its interior is wall to wall turquoise mosaics of the Bible.  It is small and quickly viewed but not to be missed.  The exit of the church opens on to a small plaza along a canal with lots of competing vendors to add to your Russian booty.

The Mariinsky Theater was built in 1860 on Theater Square and designed by Albert Cavos to be the largest ballet and opera house in the world at the time. He named the theater Mariinsky after its patroness, Empress Maria Alexandrovna. Tchaikovsky premiered Sleeping Beauty at the Mariinsky in 1890. Today it is the home of the renowned the Mariinsky Ballet Company (or Kirov).  We thoroughly enjoyed their production of “Le Corsaire”.

After reading “A Gentleman in Moscow” a few years ago the modernist style historic Metropol Hotel in Moscow has been a place I have wanted to see and perhaps enjoy.  That time is now and we are finding the hotel delightful.  The Boyarsky (renamed Savva Restaurant in 2015)with its beautiful ceiling will open back up tomorrow for breakfast!  Meanwhile the Chaliapine Bar beckons.  Our first excursion was to the Bolshoi Theater across the street and a glimpse of Moscow revealed a modern vibrant city.

Our waiter this morning introduces himself and asks about our journey. Yuriy is a handsome young Russian who loves literature and modern art and gives us recommendations for our stay.  He has lived in South Carolina and NYC and traveled west to visit Hawaii. He says “A Gentleman in Moscow” is not a favorite of Russians and asks why we liked it.

Moscow is the Kremlin and Red Square to me.  To the world it is the seat of government and embodies Russia’s long history of monarchy, tsars, wars, the Soviets and the Russian Orthodox Church. This huge fortress is filled with magnificent onion domed churches and impossibly huge cannons and gardens. I envision Putin looking down at it all from his office.  The history of it overwhelms.  Ivan the Terrible and his triumphs and reforms and local Muscovites burning their own homes to prevent Napoleon’s conquest of the city. It is the site of Lenin’s tomb and the resting place of the Romanovs.  27 million Russians died in WWII and 20 million during the Soviet purges all in a single decade in the 1930’s and 1940’s.  But the Russians persevere and flourish and tell their stories in the Kremlin and Red Square.

Anya is 26 yrs old. She is a self-employed full time guide in Moscow.  She lives with her husband (IT guy) and young son in an apartment on the outskirts of Moscow and commutes via metro for work daily as do 9 million others in Moscow.  Her parents care for her son in the summer in their apartment also on the edge of Moscow.  Her grandfather built a 4 bedroom dacha outside the city that the family shares in the summer.  She is proud of her city and says Muscovites are living well with good salaries and the unemployment rate here is 1%.  It’s a safe clean city with lots of young people.  She and her husband save for their retirement and health insurance. She has a broad depth of knowledge of Russian art and history and worked one summer in Washington D.C. Her tour of the Tretyakov Gallery which was filled with 18th and 19th Century Russian Art was stellar and would impress my son John.

From the beautiful metro stations to the Tretyakov Gallery, it was a day for art.

We topped off our Moscow stop with a lovely dinner with an old friend from our hometown, Jennifer,  who was a caregiver for our children in Greeley, studied Russia language at UNC, was in the Peace Corps in Russia and has stayed there for 22 yrs.  Fascinating evening.

We chose to do a long run from Irkutsk to Moscow. Three and a half days… 84 hours straight with stops for an hour or so along the way. Everyone hops off to get their exercise and buy provisions…bottled water, bakery items, ice cream…ramen. The children run like mad and their parents try to keep them off the tracks. It is different than the short hauls. More Russian families. Noisier during the day quieter in the mornings. There’s a rhythm to it, chilly mornings with mist on the lands delving into warm afternoons and restlessness for me. We keep track of where we are by the mi (km) markers and referring to the very informative Lonely Planet Book, Trans-Siberian Railway, since our Cyrillic alphabet skills are modest. Mike has befriended the two Russian provodnistas who make this run from Irkutsk to Moscow, 12 hrs on 12 hrs off, back and forth in 10 days then 48hrs off. They are young friendly girls with fair English skills and we are able to communicate thanks to Ruth (bridge player/Russian language instructor from Greeley, Co) and google translate. The gentle rocking lulls you into sleeping more than usual. This is reading nirvana.

Water,water everywhere but never a drop to drink.  All along this journey water from the tap is unsafe to drink.  We have solved this problem with hot water, SteriPEN Traveler (available at REI.com) and cipro from time to time. We are well.  Hot and cold water are provided at the end of each coach.  They are somewhat primitive but we did not see any samovars. We brought our own drink mix, 3 in 1 (instant coffee cream and sugar) and we have started vodka sampling… more on that later. Yesterday the beer in the dining car was more appealing.  Of course ramen is king.  Most travelers have provisions and use the dining car sparingly. The dining car is a sanctuary and the social hub. Electricity to power devices is of the utmost importance.  The Chinese train had a plug-in per berth, the Mongolian 2 USB plugs per berth and our Russian  train only has 3 plugs in the hallway for the whole coach.

As the miles roll by we are seeing lots of small villages, fields of wheat, safflower and barley I think that gives way to birch and pine forests and now marshland. Every home has their own potato patch (1/2acre or so).  Siberians call potatoes Siberian apples since their growing season is too short for apples.  And yes mom, they still salt cabbage for the winter and add it to their soups! (I love their cabbage soup!) 

ASIA-EUROPE

We pass by Siberian towns known for their dark history of exile like Barabinsk where many Polish Jews were exiled, Omsk, where Dostoevsky was exiled in 1849 and gulag camps that Alexandr Solzhenitsyn detailed. Yekaterinburg marks the point where we pass from Asia to Europe and enter the Ural Mt area and we raise a glass of vodka (Finlandia) with our Australian acquaintances in the dining car.  This city also marks the spot where the Bolsheviks executed the Romanovs and where Boris Yeltsin was born.

My grandmother Hardt’s family came from Russia in a farming area near here, Saratov, and she was born in Huck, Russia.  Her family were descendants of those Germans brought to Russia by Catherine the Great and were recruited with promises of no taxes for 30 yrs, no consignment into the Russian army and a small parcel of land.  After years of war in Germany they were happy to have the opportunity.  The land was uninhabited and life was hard, but they prospered along the Volga until many emigrated to the United States to avoid conscription (promises rescinded) and hence my grandmother, Mary Elizabeth Hardt, was processed through Ellis Island as a girl of 12yrs. Of course I love kraut.

Daniel is a boy of 15 years and is traveling with his family.  He speaks a little English and says hello every morning and we do likewise.  He often stops in our berth just to try out his language skills…today he came to say goodbye and wants to exchange coins with us and gives us his gmail address!

When we arrived at Nicholai’s homestay in Listvyanka on the shores of Lake Baikal we were met by the most enthusiastic and likable Russian, Nicholai himself.  With very little English skills on his part and minimal Russian known to us we still managed to decide on a “banya” before dinner.  We donned swimsuits and funny felt hats to protect our heads from the heat and went into the sauna. Nicholai added water to the stones and we stayed in as long as we could, cooled off slightly then went back in for more steam. The steam room is so hot but it feels good.  Nicholai has us lay face down and he uses heated birch branches to massage our bodies vigorously.  Outside for a breather then more of the same insisting that we flog ourselves with the branches while waiting (it smells so good). Then we jump into a cold pool and do it all over  again.  We loved it! We finish with Nicholai soaping us with a rough large sponge, rinsing with warm water then cold over our heads.  Never slept better after a home cooked meal prepared by Olga and served by Nicolai.  But the best was yet to come Russian blinis for breakfast!

Fed by over 300 rivers, 1637 m (over a mile) deep, the banana shaped Lake Baikal is breathtakingly beautiful.  This is the world’s deepest and largest lake, larger than all the Great Lakes combined.  It is over 20 million years old. It’s a chilly 9 degrees C or 49 degrees F today and even the Norwegians we met say they can’t swim in it. Our guide says Siberian swimming is running in, getting wet and running out.  It freezes of course in the long Siberian winter and they actually have a marathon across it in March.  It is home to the clearest waters and over 80% of it’s species of plants and animals are endemic including its star, a freshwater seal.  The Circum-Baikal Rail we traveled on was hurriedly built to send soldiers to the Eastern Front during the Russo-Japanese war of 1904. 

MORE NEW FRIENDS….While traveling on the Circum-Baikal Railroad today we met a couple from Belgium. They are both linguists (he speaks 3 languages and she speaks 6) and he works for the EU managing translation services and she is employed by Belgium as a translator.  They are traveling the Trans Siberian Railway from Moscow to Vladivostok then taking the ferry to Japan via South Korea.  They will complete their journey in 31 days. This trip has been on their bucket list for many years.

The Paris of Siberia, Irkutsk, (perhaps coined by Chekhov) is a vibrant college town, the capital of Siberia and lies halfway between Moscow and Vladivostok. In 1960 a meeting between Khrushchev and Eisenhower was scheduled to be held in this city to discuss easing Cold War tensions. In readiness a road was built to Lake Baikal, a residence and a fountain were also constructed to honor the American president.  Then the U2 pilot, Gary Powers, was shot down and all was cancelled.  Thirty years later Irkutsk was the site of a meeting between the American Secretary of State and the Russian foreign minister to end the Afghan war.  This city served as an outpost for Russian expansion to the east and the claiming of “Russian America” (Alaska). A darker side of Irkutsk history is the home of “exiled dissidents” like the Decembrists, Trotsky and Polish scientists who flourished here after their exiles.

On to Moscow….

As we roll by the site of the Naadam horse races, we are heading toward Lake Baikal and Russia….Siberia! Grasslands give way to steppe then forests.  The Mongolian provodnitsa offers us coffee on boarding and tells us about the border crossings and bathrooms.  

Speaking of passport control, when we stop at the border both country’s agents come aboard separately. They want all the lights on (no matter the hour of the night) and they none too gently say “look at me” when checking our passports.  Their military personnel (Russia’s) checks each berth looking for what I’m not certain while we wait in the hallway.  Oh well, last border.

When we wake in the morning the provodnistas are cleaning the hallways. Bravo! Before long we are stopped at Ulan Ude, a city of 400,000 or so that became an important link on the tea caravan route from China. It was a closed city according to Lonely Planet until the 1980’s due to secret military installations that appear as “white” areas on city maps.

We have seen a few faces reappear from time to time on this journey and I introduced myself to Simon, from the UK originally, most recently moving to Berlin after 7 yrs in Australia.  He’s an IT guy he says and plans to move to Berlin (no job or lodging yet).  On his way he is taking a 2 month “walk about” which began in India, Bangladesh and Everest Base Camp and now he is on the second leg of that journey on the TSR!  He is traveling alone for now because his companion dropped out.  We talked about SIM cards and how much we both loved Mongolia!

Lake Baikal soon begins to appear through the birch trees…the largest fresh water lake in the word, larger than all the Great Lakes combined.

Let me reassure you that most Ulaanbaatar residents live just like we do, dress stylishly and have many shopping choices.  The city itself is loaded with Prius hybrids, congested traffic, and construction cranes much like a 1.3 million version of Beijing.  The air was clear during our stay and according to our guide that is because they burn wood in the summer and coal in the winter creating pollution at that time.  The streets are especially busy our first day because everyone is getting ready for Naadam.

Our guide for Naadam is 22 year old Azaa who is in her 4th year of training for acupuncture.  It is a six year program and she plans to go to China for further study after that.  She is single and lives with her parents who are college professors and she guides in the summers.  We meet her on the 11th and walk to the stadium.  The streets are deserted until we near the stadium then it is bumper to bumper. A big endorsement for mongoliatravelon.com for providing Azaa and arranging Naadam Festival for us!

The annual Naadam Festival is celebrated July 11th and 12th with smaller celebrations in other cities and towns outside Ulaanbaatar and seems to be part independence celebration, part state fair and part nomad Olympics.  We planned our rail journey around the event.  The opening ceremony ticket is as hard to get as a Super Bowl ticket and is sold out.  It is as choreographed as a Super Bowl halftime show and lasts 2hrs.  The traditional costumes light up the stadium.  However the sporting events are free to attend.  These include ankle bone shooting (a team game consisting of flicking a small flat piece of reindeer horn at a target), wrestling (no time limit first person to fall down), archery and horse racing… more about that later. Naadam is a national holiday and everyone attends or watches the events on TV. Many families attend dressed in traditional clothing. Food is everywhere along with trinkets to buy.

My favorite event is the horse racing and every Mongolian loves horses and most ride.  The event is held 28 km west of Ulaanbaatar on the open steppe.  The jockeys are boys ages 5-13 because these are long races for the horses and tradition.  There are 6 categories of races depending on the age of the horse and the distances vary.  For instance 2 yr olds race for 10-12 km (6-7.5 miles) and 7 yr old horses race 25-26 km (15.5-16 miles).  The boys that I saw had helmets on and a blanket with stirrups but not a saddle.  Children sing a special song named GIINGOO, a mantra of God of Horse-Khayankhyarvaa before and after racing.  

LAST DAY IN MONGOLIA

Lots of steps the last 3 days so we stepped it down a little with a visit to the Museum of Mongolian History which was a very informative lesson on the birth of the modern state of Mongolia. We had a nice meal at the Shangri-La Hotel buffet the previous night with every cuisine available.  The modernnomads.mn near the hotel 9 seems to be a favorite with travelers and we are on board with that choice.  We restocked at the emart (sort of a Korean Costco for the next leg of our journey). On to Russia and Lake Baikal this afternoon. Stay tuned.

After arriving in Ulaanbaatar we headed to the ger camp in Gorkhi Terelj National Park about 70 km outside of Ulaanbaatar. The area surrounding the capitol city is verdant rolling hills that is partially forested as is our camp with horses and cattle everywhere.  No fences.  The ger dates back 600 BCE and is still occupied by 61% of city dwellers and 90% of rural people in Mongolia.  They can be broken down for travel in 30 minutes and have a central stove (they dropped off wood and coal for our warmth but we didn’t need it).  The ger tourist camps replace hotels of which there are none that I have seen outside of large cities.

We met some nomads who live on this government owned land and have about 30 cattle, moving their ger twice a year.  I think Mongolia must be like Wisconsin or Ireland because of their of dairy.  They drink mare’s milk, eat dried curd and have the very best butter on biscuits with their milk tea (2/3 tea 1/3 milk).  Yogurt too! They are meat eaters  though (beef, horse, and mutton mostly).

We ended up at the Chinggis Khaan (Genghis Khan) (1162-1227) Monument after a morning of short hikes.  Out of nowhere rises his statue of gleaming stainless steel in the middle of rolling grassland as if he is invading this land. His place as ruler of the largest empire before the British empire was accomplished through brilliant military tactics and brutality.  One the inventions that allowed his armies to conquer distant lands was the stirrup.  With his mounted cavalry able to stand up in the saddle and fire both when advancing and retreating, he was unstoppable.  He married at age 16 but had many wives and concubines. A study in 2003 found that up to 16 million men, half a percent of the world’s male population, were genetic descendants of Genghis Khan (Chinngis Khaan).

All aboard! I confess I am excited to board the TSR.  This trip has been months in the planning. As we roll out of Beijing we begin to see the deep gorges formed by the Yellow River give way to rolling hills planted mostly with corn then more arid land that stretches as far as the eye can see. The Gobi Desert. It lies between Mongolia and China and is the most northern desert in the world. According to Lonely Planet the Mongolians say that there are 33 different types of Gobi, but only 2% is Lawrence of Arabia style sand dunes. Most of the land is dry gravel and sandstone cliffs.  The Great Wall can be seen in the distance near the town of Zhangjiakou where ancient tea caravans crossed the Great Wall.

The first people we meet on the train live 2 berths down and are a family including a Kiwi and an Irishman and their twelve year old daughter who is fluent in Mandarin and attends an international school in Malaysia where her parents teach.  They are on holiday and are traveling the TSR and on to London via train.  We talked of travel adventures, prejudice, Brexit and international schools.  No problem.

When we arrive at the Mongolian-Chinese border about 12 hrs after boarding in Beijing much happens…we jump out to stretch our legs and are soon herded back inside so the Chinese could check our passports and customs forms (keeping the passports for hrs).  Mongolian and Russian trains run on a 5ft (1.5m) train track in contrast to much of the rest of the world.  They actually changed the bogies (a structure underneath a coach to which axles and wheels are attached through bearings) at the border, a process that lasted 3 or so hours. Next the Mongolians checked our passports and customs forms also keeping them awhile.  All in all on our way 5 or so hours after stopping.

We wake early and watch the scenery but soon head to the dining car for exercise and conversation.  We meet Justin, a young finance guy from Singapore traveling to Moscow on business but combining that with pleasure aboard the TSR.  We talked of his country and ours, standards of living, education (Singapore leading the world) and the cost of living (Singapore is also among the highest in this category but with low taxes) and politics.

The provodnista or should I say your provodnista controls everything; the stops, the water, the cleanliness of the cabin and the bathroom.  We are traveling 2nd class and have a 4 berth sleeper to ourselves. The bathroom that is down the hall is locked more often than not by the provodnista and before and after stops. No shower! All are women on this train and let’s just say some are happier than others.