Trans-Siberian Railway

For 4 days and 5 nights I took the train from Moscow to Ulaanbaatar. I traveled 2nd class, four people to a room with two sets of bunk beds. In my room were two girls from France, Anne and Jihane, and a Mongol student, Gumtuya, who had just completed her first year at Moscow State University and was on her way home for the summer. There were about 10 rooms to a car, and about 15 cars in the train, including one dining car and one baggage car for oversized items. Each car had one toilet and sink at one end and a small hot water boiler (powered by burning cardboard or pretty much anything else) at the other. Next to the “boiler” was the room of the produnistra, basically a stewardess for the car and responsible for cleaning everything at least once a day – ours did a pretty good job of keeping the bathroom sparkling, I’m happy to report.

I suppose because the train was going through Russia I naively figured that the passengers would be mostly Russian and we’d chat away the long hours. In hindsight, I see this would be like taking a plane from Japan to India and expecting everyone on board to be flapping away in Mandarin since we’d fly over China to reach our destination. Our train was practically all Mongolians, and most of them didn’t understand, or at least couldn’t speak, Russian. [Actually, when a Mongolian passed our open room door as he walked down the hallway, he would say something in Mongolian to Gumtuya, who would then say it in Russian to me, then I’d speak in English to Anne and Jihane, then they’d discuss it amongst themselves in French, and then we’d go back the way we came with the answer.]

Most of my days were spent reading, playing slap jack with the Frenchies, sleeping, or strumming my guitar. And of course, looking out the window. One night we had an impromptu concert in the dining car between me and a drunk Mongolia who knew a few songs. FYI, if ever playing for a multi-national audience, go with the Beatles. Everyone knows it.

About every 4 hours the train stops somewhere for 20-30 minutes and all Hell breaks loose. You see, the Mongol passengers are not merely passive travelers; they’re on a mission to sell, sell, sell! Almost every passenger brought not only their own personal suitcase or two, but also bags of jeans, skirts, blouses, shoes, and other items to sell along the way. As there is not enough room in a typical 4-person room for all these items, some complete with torso-mannequins, Mongols ask to stow extra baggage in other’s rooms. During the course of the trip we probably had 5-6 other peoples’ boxes stashed somewhere in our room.

Anyway, when the train stops our Mongol horde jumped out to hock their goods through a window to crowds of anticipating Russian women looking for the latest fashions from Moscow. It reminded me of those game shows where people raced through a supermarket, grabbing the highest dollar total of products before their 60-second time limit expired. So too were both buyers and sellers looking to complete as much business as possible before the train started moving again.


For my part, stations were an opportunity to walk around a bit take a break from looking out the window at scenery. There were also usually small shops that sold water and packets of noodle soup and similar products along the way. Sometimes local Russians would turn up to sell freshly baked potatoes, fruit, or once some very delicious roasted chicken. Though the dining car does a few dishes well enough and is cheap by American standards, its relatively expensive when compared to these other options. Thus, I only at there a couple times and always availed myself to the local goods. Then I and the French girls would devour our packets of noodles, they’d give me some tea, and I’d give them some peanut butter.

I should also mention that passing through the border between Russia and Mongolia takes forever. It was about 3.5 hours on the Russian side, then a 20 minute ride through a kind of no-man’s land, and then another 2 hours on the Mongolian end. And during this whole time period the bathrooms are locked. So as my parents used to tell me before a long car ride, it’s a good idea to at least “try” before reaching the border. And you might want to have an empty bottle on hand, too…

If I had it to do over again, I’d try to skip the train from Moscow to Irkukst and take a cheap flight instead. The scenery between these two cities is pretty monotonous forests – maybe prettier in the fall. It also would have been nice to spend a few days hiking around Itrkukst’s neighbor, Lake Baikal, the deepest lake in the world containing almost one-fifth of the earth’s fresh water. But between Lake Baikal/Irkurkst and UB the landscape is quite gorgeous.

Also, if you're looking to do this kind of trip yourself and don't have access to the train station in Moscow to buy your tickets, I'd recommend visiting ConnectRussia. They were the best help I found in purchasing a ticket online.