Trans-Siberian railway

As long distance train travel has a way of blending together into a seemingly continuous day, a sampling of some of the highlights in no particular order will have to suffice. After arriving at the platform with minutes to spare, we quickly made our way to our seats, finding that instead of the bunks we had reserved, we instead were placed in seats in the hallway, right next to the smoking cabin. Obviously not an ideal location, but on the bright side we had our own table and were more or less comfortable there. Our neighbors across the hallway fit the bill of the the large, intimidating Russians portrayed in movies, complete with scars and gold teeth. There were quite reserved at first, this would change very quickly. Early on, we spent our time alternating between cards, reading, napping, and watching the city quickly disappear into the Russian countryside.






Later on we met a group of people who spoke English and happened to be heading to the same place we were. We spend a good deal of time with them, as we hadn't spoken English with anyone for quite a while. We celebrated one of their birthdays along the way, complete with all the embarrassing activities we could think up.
Another entertaining part of the train ride was our trip to the restaurant car. We had not brought a whole lot of food with us, so we were looking forward to a satisfying meal. I ordered an egg and cheese sandwich, and otter a double order of fried potatoes. What arrived was something entirely different. My "sandwich" turned out to be half a slice of stale bread, a little butter, and salmon caviar. This was my first experience with caviar, it must be an acquired taste. Otter fried potatoes was a greasy, soggy pile of uncooked potatoes.
While the restaurant car left much to be desired, we found a Mecca of delicious food sold at the platforms. At every stop, there was a group of women selling smoked fish, fresh bread, and everything in between. One item we found particularly delicious was sweetbread filled with different types of meat, somewhat like a savory doughnut. Between the two of us we must have eaten 20 of these meat doughnuts along the way.
After some time, our Russian neighbors opened up after trying to figure out how our card game worked. They invited us to sit with them and shared food and drink, and we attempted conversation. Since neither spoke the others language, this involved broken Russian, broken English, and a lot of sign language. Most of the time I'm pretty sure most of the time we were having wildly different conversations, but it was very enjoyable. The only problem we ever had with them was being woken up at odd hours of the morning, asking if we wanted a smoke. Although we continually explained that we didn't smoke and both had asthma, this continued the entire trip, much to our amusement. They were also very curious about my ukulele, which let to a mini concert/lesson, which was very fun.
We each had our own way to pass the time, otter with his music, and I watched the countryside pass trying to identify the trees and plants along the way. I was only able to correctly identify a variety of birch and the same species of aspen that we have in Colorado, but it was an entertaining way to pass the time.
















- living the dream!