Siberia and sakura

Moscow to Kyoto by train and ferry. Easter 2018. Read more

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Siberia and sakura Traveler
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March 29, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C
Rossia train (no.2) Moscow to Ulan Ude.

Weather: -3 - +15°C, but only really above freezing today. Coldest in the middle, warmest in the East (and the buds on the trees suggest a general trend rather than freak weather today. But Russians are *really* good at snow clearing. In populous areas paths are not just snow free but completely dry. Elsewhere snow and ice are gritted thoroughly to make them non-slip.

Fauna: no. Possibly because all the water is frozen. Around the towns there were pigeons, a few corvids, and some sparrows. Away from towns the only thing I saw was 1 possible owl in a tree (could have been a lump of snow in approximately the shape of an owl). Oh, and a small fly in the train. Platform dogs in a couple of places.

Flora: pines. The only green things are pines and, towards the eastern end, cedars. This may be why so many houses are painted shades of bright green, because in the winter you won't see that colour on anything living. Grass is under feet of snow, dead, or both. Silver birches are plentiful, but leafless they are mixed with pine at both ends of the journey, largely alone on the middle. There is an umbelliferous plant (giant hogweed?) that is absolutely enormous. The seed heads stand through the winter and play havoc with scale and perspective. Graves are brightly decorated with plastic flowers and painted fences.

People: this is a much less touristy and sociable train that train 4 (the Trans Mongolian). Just the 1 first class carriage, and until Yekaterinburg 2 each of second and plaskartni. The rest of the train is luggage, ppst and a reatarant car. Five more passenger carriages added at Yekaterinberg. Most people kept their doors (if they had them) closed the whole way. The only exceptions were Axel and Henrika in our carriage - from the Black Forest - who kept us supplied with excellent conversation until they left the train at Irkutsk, and a couple of fairly social Americans who have retired and sold up at home to travel the world. They also left at Irkutsk. The Brits in the compartment next to ours didn't say so much as hello the whole trip, and the US tour group in the carriage behind kept themselves to themselves. Olga and Pavel - our carriage attendants - spoke only slightly more English than we speak Russian, but were cheerful and friendly. And ice cream dealers.

The train: the guidebooks all said 'don't worry about travelling winter, the train is well heated'. I thought they meant 'OK with just 1 jumper'. They don't - they mean 22-27°C. Good thing someone comes along selling ice creams a couple of times a day. Beds are hard, and narrow - to turn over you have to wake up. Sleeping on top of the folded duvet helps soften them a bit, but it still takes a while to getbyour spine moving in the morning.Pillows are good. Loos are about half the size of the train 4 ones, so no chance of strip wash, but in 1st class you can use the shower compartment for 150 roubles.Read more
TravelerSo, on to new territory with your next train. Enjoy the northern route.
3/30/18Reply
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Giant head of Lenin
March 30, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 12 °C
What can I say? It's Lenin's head. And it's very big.
TravelerIs saying "Lenin" and "Big Head" in the same sentence a wise thing to say.... you could find yourself joining the expulsion list!
4/1/18Reply
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To the datsan
March 30, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 12 °C
With only one whole and two half days to see all Ulan Ude has to offer - and with 2 of the main things on our list being some way out of town - Helen suggested we hire a driver and guide. It was an excellent plan.

Alexandr, the Russian driver, is clearly a man who enjoys his work. His biggest grin of the day was when he negotiated his way into (and, to our great relief, out the other side of) a rapidly closing gap between two approaching trams. I cannot image anything that would induce me to drive in Russia. Even if being chased by a bear, I think the bear would be the safer option.

He'd learnt a little English at school 55 years ago. In those days they had no expectation of needing it to speak to anyone, so learnt only to read and translate. Still, we managed to exchange the odd word.

Not that we lacked conversation. Galtan, the Buriat guide, talked virtually non-stop at high speed for 5 hours. He's fluent in at least 4 languages (and dialects of several of those - he took great pains to point out that he'd learnt the Queen's English at school, and if he accidentally slid into American at any point that was just because he was a little rusty). He has lived all over the place - from Seattle to Malaysia - and I think could have an intelligent conversation about any subject (we didn't try him on science but I think we covered virtually everything else). And as a Buddhist Buriyat with a girlfriend who is Russian Old Order, he was the perfect person to tell us about local culture.

We started at the datsan - a Tibetan Buddhist monastery and university founded with Stalin's permission as thanks for the Buriyat service during the Great Patriotic War. The university has 4 departments - philosophy, Tibetan medicine, sacred art & magic, and fine art. It also has quite a lot of curly tailed dogs, lounging on sunny temple steps and doing regular rounds of the complex to clear up offerings of food.

After a detailed grounding in Buddhist doctrine, temple etiquette, educational systems, attitudes to gender in relation to human embodiments of deities*, history in Russia, place in pan-Mongolian culture and colour choices (Galtan is *very* thorough) we moved on to the Ethnographic museum. That was a little disappointing. It is at higher altitude, so the snow melt lags a little behind the rest of the region. Combined with a shortage of staff, this meant quite a few of the buildings were either inaccessible or closed. Tramped round what we could - with 1 drenched foot each after a snowdrift mishap - and still managed to come away much better informed, even if we hadn't seen quite as much as we would have liked.

Rounded off the day with dinner in Shashlikoff, which had an actual vegetarian menu (under the guise of 'healthy bites') as well as a few fattier veggie options scattered through the main menu. And a bill so small we both checked it twice to make sure they hadn't left off half the dishes. They hadn't. Tasty food too, so consider this a recommendation if you ever find yourself in the area.

* It makes no difference. After all, the human may not have been the same gender - or indeed species or even class of being - last time round.Read more
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New train, new territory
March 31, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 9 °C
Up to Ulan Ude, everything was ground I'd covered before. Sometimes without stopping, or while asleep, but I had been through it. Now we're into virgin territory.

This train seems more sociable than the previous one, and we've already introduced ourselves to the occupants of 3 compartments. Downside, we're stuck in a confined space with a Brexiteer for 3 days. Upside, I've just been complimented on my Swedish accent. By a Norwegian, but I'll take it (and the Swede didn't contradict him).

We've also crossed the river Brian.Read more
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Habitation
March 31, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 9 °C
The villages are still well spaced out, but there are more general signs that this is inhabited land. Herds of goats, wheel ruts, mines, a few fences around fields, and even a cat out for an evening prowl in search of something small and squeaky.

There may be other things on the hunt in this region as well - the garden fences are much sturdier and higher. Some better fit the word 'stockade' than mere 'fence'.Read more
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Travel dirt
April 1, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C
While we stopped at Ulan Ude for 48 hours of washing, the train did not. This one is noticably dirtier than the last. There's no ageing filter on the photo - that's just the window.

This provodnitsa - Olga - is a more assiduous vacuumer than Pavel on the previous train, and spends much of the time between stations polishing heating ducts and bringing us clean cups. But the paper towels in the loos ran out last night, and there's no sign of new stocks being brought on board at the stations. Still plenty of loo paper and soap, though, so I haven't needed to dig into my personal supplies yet.Read more
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More platform dogs
April 1, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 32 °C
Only the second station with a good number of platform traders offering freshly made food, rather than kiosks selling things in packets.

And where there are people buying sausages ...
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Oak trees!
April 2, 2018 in Russia ⋅ 🌬 8 °C
This may not seem very exciting to you, but for 8,000km the only deciduous trees have been silver birches. Everything else has been pine, larch and cedar.

We are also out of Siberia, and into the Far Eastern Territories. Yesterday we saw the first signs of livestock: goats, cows, chickens and - out in the Wild East with the goldmines - horses. Today I've spotted the first distant field boundaries.Read more
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Fire
April 2, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ☁️ 5 °C
9,000 km of dry grass, much of it in areas that hit 45°C in the summer. Controlled burning while the ground is still damp is essential.
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Crossing the Amur
April 2, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ☀️ 11 °C
We don't quite get to the Chinese side of it, but some of the train route runs very close. Going this way means crossing a 2.6 km bridge - better views than the 7 km tunnel that the westbound trains take.

That's not a choppy river, it's an icy one.Read more
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We've reached the ocean
April 3, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ⛅ 10 °C
Off the train at Vladivostok. Finn and James will be flying home from here. Jonas is spending a couple of days in a proper bed before heading all the way back to Moscow in 3rd class.

We will be taking to the water. Our ferry for tomorrow is already waiting. No paddling though - the ferry channel is open but a lot of the sea is still rather solid.

The hotel cat has given us a cautious welcome. The museum cat's duties do not include greeting visitors.Read more
TravelerLooks as if an icebreaker would be better than a ferry.
4/3/18Reply
TravelerIt is quite thick! Main harbour and at least some of the sea is clear though.
4/3/18Reply
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Furniculi, furnicular
April 3, 2018 in Russia ⋅ 🌙 5 °C
And other Vladivostock miscellanea.

Most of the attractions here tend to the military, and we've certainly seen a good number of monuments, war memorials and battleships. Didn't really feel the need for a military history museum as well. So once we'd tracked down the ferry ticket offfice and paid for those, we headed to the local history museum. Very interesting - concentrates on neolithic up to about 10th century, then has a special display on a local late 19thC naturalist/mapper/explorer, and 2 Lenin rooms. And a very smart museum cat (see previous post for pic). Sadly he had important business elsewhere so couldn't stop to chat.

After lunch at Coffee Company (no real veggie optiond, but splendid hot chocolates with a choice pf non-fairy milks) we walked along the non-frozen harbour for a bit then up to the furnicular railway. Excellent value at 14 roubles a trip, with a walk at the top to an observation platform. We were just trying to work put the way back down wjen we realised we were in the middle of the very small) road, with a car coming. Lept to tje sides to let it pass, only to discover it contained the only other person we know currently in the city. Quick chat with Jonas, then worked our way down to the local Arbat equivalent in search of promising places for dinner.

The guidebook promised an Italian restaurant that does 'probably the best pizza east of the Urals'. Not having tried any others this side of the Urals we weren't in a position to verify this claim, but thought it a promising recommendation. Except it wasn't there. Nor was our backup option, another branch of Shashlikoff, which we'd found good in Ulan Ude. Eventually located the latter up a rickety set of stairs. Passed a Moomintroll place that didn't look very Moomintrolly at all (turns out it is named after a local rock band, which is named after the Moomintrolls).

Where the pizza restaurant should have been there was ... well, we're not sure what it was. The sign with the name was too stylised to read and the tableau outside (last picture) really didn't help. Answers on a postcard.

Retired to 5 o'clock - an English tea room - to consider matters. Had tea under the watchful eye of her maj, and concluded a retreat to the hotel room to pack for the ferry was in order. While doing that I had a quick Google and found the pizza place had moved a block down, so we wandered back there and had quite decent Italian food.Read more
TravelerNice not to be fighting lots of tourists...
4/4/18Reply
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All aboard
April 4, 2018 in Russia ⋅ ☀️ 5 °C
Out of Russia. Pleasingly, the entry stamp in our passports has a little plane, and the exit stamp has a corresponding boat.

There is a lot of queuing involved. We paid for our tickets yesterday, but had to go back to check in today and pick up boarding passes. Looooong queue for that, but once through there were only ever one or two people waiting for each following stage.

All luggage through the scanner. Through a door with a ticket check. Then all luggage through a second scanner with a gorgeous teenage golden retriever - sniffer dog apprentice. Passport precheck. Actual immigration service passport check. And finally on board the Eastern Dream. At each stage my various documents were handed back with a quiet 'good luck', which I'm sure was meant kindly but wasn't entirely reassuring. Also, it made me worry I might have taken a wrong turn into the Great Escape.

The cabin is huge, compared with the train ones. Proper beds, a sink, a wardrobe and a window! There's also an onsen on board.Read more
TravelerGood luck........
4/4/18Reply
TravelerThank you. Er ... or should that be danke, spacebo, gomo wayo, or arigato?
4/5/18Reply
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Floating film location
April 4, 2018, Japan Sea ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C
It seems Athena was filmed aboard. There'a a display of posters and signed photos with the ferry crew.

There is also, in our cabin, a button that must not be pressed. I really want ro know what it does.Read more
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Donghae port
April 5, 2018 in South Korea ⋅ 🌫 5 °C
Docked at 11.30, and we decided to disembark and have a look around rather than staying on the boat until it left again at 6.

There is a strict order for disembarkation, but the announcements are drowned out by music in the main areas and aircon in the cabins. So rather than joining the scrum we took a viewing point on the top stair and attempted it work it out from the surges and shouts below. It felt like those bits of the olympics where you find yourself watching a demonstration sport you've never heard of, and have to extrapolate the aim and rules from the cheers and boos of the crowd.

Establishing teams was simple. Team A, in orange shirt and blue jacket - staff; Team B no uniform - passengers.

Aim of team B
Get off the boat. This is played individually, rather than as a team.

Aim of team A
I Initially made the assumption that this was also to get team B off the boat, but that was an error. It was primarily to get supplies *onto* the boat, with the secondary aim of preventing team B leaving in anything other than very small batches.

Rules.
Both teams have to play through the gangplank, which has a maximum load of 10 people at a time, and can operate in only 1 direction at once. Priority seemed to be Koreans getting onto the boat; Koreans getting off the boat; Russian workers getting off the boat; other tourists and transit passengers.

Tactics and progress of play
If you are familiar with roller derby, it may help to take as your starting point a 3-level version of that, played on foot, and with the 2 teams moving in opposite directions.

Team A makes the first move by roping off a section at disembarkation level and stationing 4 to 5 'blockers' between that and top of the gangplank.

Team B counters by forming a large scrum behind the rope and leaning until it gives way (they initially did this before the initial start of play, and carefully refastened it). The blockers run around shouting and herding everyone back behind the rope.

This contains Team B, but poor inital placement of the corral means the Team B scrum also prevents the Team A 'runners' reaching the upper levels with their resupply boxes.

Team A places a chair at the end of the stair rail, to allow their runners to climb over. Team B counters with subscrums on each side of the second set of stairs. Team A dispatches the 'long blockers', to the staircase. Whereas blockers are male, long blockers are female; they neither run nor shout, but are equipped with laminated signs. Team B is not permitted to push or challenge the long blockers.

With all players now on the pitch, the remaining play consists primarily of loops of the scrum - re-corral manoeuvre alternating with runners breaking for the top level, until all of Team B has escaped. The subscrums are released to floor level once the main scrum diminishes and is unable to block the bottom stairs.

Additional hazard.
A rap remix of Adiumus, and a too-fast bebop version of Night and Day, on a brain-melting loop.

Altogether this took 2 hours, so allowing 2 hours for getting back on board later there was not much time left to walk into Dongae proper. We attempted it, but it's a larger place than it looks on the map. And the only cafe we located didn't do food. Instead we stocked up at a local 7-11 equivalent and headed back, donating our map along the way to 2 lost Russians attempting to find the bus station.

Despite all that, I quite liked what little I saw of South Korea. Cloud pruned trees lining the streets, cheery patterns on the pavements, lots of cycle paths and pedestrian crossings, and every inch of growing space in gardens used for neat rows of garlic, onions, cabbages and beans.

And as it turned out, getring back onto the boats was very quick and easy. No queue at the check in desk, and when I peered round the corner of the security an immigration area to see whether it was open I was waved straight in. I'm not quite sure why there were hordes of people waiting and not going through - perhaps there were open for transit passengers but not those joining the boat for the first time.

The crowd for this leg is very different from yesterday's. That was clearly workers, a fairly even mix of Russian and Korean but almost exclusively men - with just a handful of holidaying Russian friends or families. This is all Korean tourists, mainly in big organised groups. Should have tried the on board onsen yesterday, it will probably be packed tonight.Read more
Travelersounds a great game to watch, not so sure about the taking part... You are certainly seeing some interesting places!
4/7/18Reply
TravelerWe watched from the safety of the top stairs.
4/8/18Reply
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Landed
April 6, 2018 in Japan ⋅ 🌬 19 °C
We're in Japan.

Getting off the boat here was a lot faster and less stressful. The tour guides assembled by the doors, the Korean tour parties assembled themselves upstairs, and the 11 foreigners (9 Russians and us) were herded to the front and whisked off the boat before we could interfere with the elaborate queuing systems that were clearly abpit to be implemented.Read more
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Delayed train!
April 6, 2018 in Japan ⋅ 🌬 17 °C
The little shuttle train from the port was spot on time. But the next one - 11.25 for Okayama (not pictured, to spare its blushes) - didn't leave until 11.36, making the connection at Okayama very tight.

Fortunately the driver put his foot down hard on the last stretch so people didn't miss their shinkansen connections. We made ours with a couple of minutes to spare.

Apologies for the blurriness of the first sakura pictures - my week of practice at photography from Russian trains hasn't equipped me for the much faster Japanese ones.Read more
TravelerLovely cherry blossom.
4/6/18Reply
TravelerIsn't it? We saw several like the front tree, with 2 or 3 colours grafted together on a single trunk. The most common cherry species has pretty much finished, but they plant about 300 types, so some are still in full bloom.
4/6/18Reply
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At the matchiya house
April 6, 2018 in Japan ⋅ 🌧 13 °C
After a long, tiring, and frequently confusing journey - which almost failed at the last step when the taxi driver from the station took us to entirely the wrong part of the city - we have finally arrived at our little house in Kyoto.

We went out to see the spring night illuminations at the local temple, and are now taking turns to bathe, and to look out at the rain falling in the tiny garden.

If you are wondering what is in the little chest of drawers in the tokonoma (scroll alcove), it's an offering to modern idols - a 4-socket plug adaptor, and a USB charger.Read more
TravelerIf everything was easy it wouldn't be so much fun and you would have loads of toutists there
4/7/18Reply
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Temple day part 1: crowds
April 8, 2018 in Japan ⋅ ⛅ 10 °C
Sunday, Buddha's birthday, and not raining. Perfect time to hit the temples. We started at Kinkaju-ji - better known as the Golden Pavillion.

It's gold. It's beautiful (better photos are on the other camera, so I won't be able to add those until I get home). It's deservedly famous. It's therefore very, very crowded. A small site, but it takes an age to shuffle slowly round. Acquired my first temple stamp (ready done on a separate piece of paper, because most won't use any book other than the official temple ones with a special type of paper)

Worth it - but glad to escape afterwards.Read more
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Temple day part 2: Daitoku-ji
April 8, 2018 in Japan ⋅ ⛅ 11 °C
This is a holding post, because there's a wonderful video to be added once I'm home, and I'll do a proper write up then.

For now I'll just say don't tell anyone about this place - it's a huge temple complex that has somehow been missed off most maps. It is therefore blissfully quiet, even on a festival weekend in peak season. Unlike the carefully chosen camera angles of the Golden Pavillion, this one really did have space to breathe and take in the details - we often had rooms or gardens entirely to ourselves.

Also, second stamp. Hand written in the book this time. I can see why most scribes insist on the special paper - it takes an age to dry otherwise.Read more
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Temple day part 3: hanami
April 8, 2018 in Japan ⋅ 🌙 9 °C
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Day at a theme park
April 9, 2018 in Japan ⋅ ⛅ 13 °C
Not usually my sort of thing, but this one is part of a working film studio, where you can walk around the sets and see actors doing traditional Edo street performances. That"s the woman holding the sticks. She had what looked like a 60s bamboo table mat, but with cunning knots that allow the sticks to slide in one directions but not the other. So with a quick twist or two, or a flick of the wrist, she could transform the mat into a temple gate, bridge, crane, boat, hula hoop or firework display. I could have happily sat and watched that all day, deapite not understanding a word of the quick-fire Japanese rhyming that accompanied it.Read more
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Magnificent dinner
April 9, 2018 in Japan ⋅ ☀️ 14 °C
Kyoto is famous for its food - but mainly for hugely elaborate and beautiful multi-course dinners (with a menu that cannot be varied at all), or octopus balls on sticks. Neither particularly veggie friendly, and the former are exceedingly expensive and have to be booked days in advance.

But we discovered Kyotofu Fujino. None of the set meals are vegetarian (so we missed out on the mini tea ceremony that is included with those), but with some assistance from the staff we put together this wonderful spread from the individual dishes lurking at the end of the menu. The paper-lined basket is on a hot plate. It is brought to the table assembled but uncooked, and must be left to simmer for 10 minutes before eating.

There is always a queue and it's on the 11th floor with tremendous views over the city, so you'll wait longer if you want a window seat. But it's well worth it. The food tasted as good as it looked and we had as much as we could comfortably eat for a grand total of £32. Not each - that's the total price for 2, including drinks.Read more
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Bowing deer
April 10, 2018 in Japan ⋅ 🌙 16 °C
Nara is famous for its bowing deer, so we went to see them. They do bow, if they think you have biscuits. And if they don't think biting you will get the biscuits handed over faster.

It also has a rather large Buddha.Read more
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I know why the caged floor sings
April 11, 2018 in Japan ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C
If you know anything about Japanese historical architecture, there's a fair chance it will be that the risk of sneak ninja attacks led to the development of nightingale floors. These are cunningly constructed so they make an attractive but unavoidable bird-like chirrup when walked on, thus alerting the family to intruders.

Everybody knows this - it's in all the guidebooks, and countless novels. And like most things everybody knows, it's not true.

When we went around the first monastery here I noted that the floors around the outside made a quite musical squeaking noise, while those in internal corridors did not. Listening to the sound, I wondered aloud whether these were the famous nightingale floors. Derek was unconvinced, because why would a monastery expect surprise attacks?

Today on our tour of Nijo castle I spotted a small sign with some pictures of joist fixings. Most people walked straight past it - why look at a diagram of pegs and brackets when you could be admiring golden panels painted with hawks or majestic pines? But I like little details* and having just come through Russia I'm all gold-leafed out, so I read it. It explained how the floorboards are joined, and how pressure on them results in the characteristic squeak. A short sentence right at the end said the noise wasn't designed in - and wouldn't have been there when first built - it's simply a result of wear.

Even if it had been true, a couple of minutes experimentation in a deserted stretch of corridor showed that it's perfectly possible to walk on a nightingale floor without making a sound. If I can do it, a ninja would have no problem.

Having learnt about floors we went for a stroll round the gardens and found a cherry blossom viewing area that didn't have very much blossom left, but did have a stall selling cherry blossom mochi. We shared a sakura daifuku (after a brief discussion of whether or not to eat the leaf**) and a stick of hanami dango. The former is a large bun of textured, cherry blossom flavoured rice dough, stuffed with red bean paste and wrapped in a brined cherry leaf. The latter 3 small balls of smooth rice dough - 1 matcha flavoured, 1 plain and one sakura.

After lunch we wandered up to the Imperial palace. You need to apply in advance to go into the buildings but we were quite happy to just wander through the park admiring the trees and roof decorations. A parliament of rooks had descended on the lawns there to enjoy a dandelion banquet, delicately plucking the petals from the flowers.

* A few years ago I went on a trip to a famous waterfall. I came away without a single photo of it, because on the other side of the path the spray had resulted in some really interesting moss growth.

** Yes. But there's a similar one for children's day that is wrapped in an oak leaf, which is NOT edible. There is a tale of a former emperor who made himself quite ill when given one of the oak versions because - as a well brought up emperor - he'd always been taught not to leave anything on his plate.Read more
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