The Long Trip Back Home, day I-XII: United Kingdom to Russia
I said my final goodbyes to my adopted country on the morning of Friday 15th, taking my last tube ride across London with a bulging rucksack and daypack to St. Pancras International, checking onto the Eurostar for the last high-speed rail ride out of south-eastern England, departing the United Kingdom 45min after departing London, through the Eurotunnel, and via Lille to the capital of Belgium, two hours later (plus an extra hour to timezones).
After a quick ride on the Brussels metro, I arrived at my cousin's house for a joyful hello, before joining a large group of my Belgian extended family and went out to dinner in a restaurant in Anderlecht. It was a great evening - with marvellous beer, naturally - but it was a bit sad because it was to be the last time I would be seeing them in quite a long time: this is the extended family of my mothers who we didn't even know existed until 2004, and who were kind and gracious enough to take me in when I arrived, green and barely remembering any of my school-boy French, for a month in Brussels into their homes and lives before I moved across the Channel to London later afterwards. With them I had finally developed a discriminating taste for beer, vastly improved my French until I was back to fluent after so many years of disuse, considered Brussels my second European city (and still do) after London, and who always kind and interested to host me when I visited over the last near-decade. On Saturday afternoon, I made a specific effort to visit my Belgian grandfather (which sadly fell through due to crossed wires) but afterwards spend a lovely evening with Oncle Clement in central Brussels over fries with mayonnaise and beers - where else? - at the Best Damn Beerhall in All the World: A La Mote Subite, naturally. Oncle Clement and Tante Yvette looked after me for the month in Brussels and I've always been close to them, so I couldn't consider leaving Europe without at least visiting them one last time.
Sunday evening appeared far too quickly, so with one last goodbye to my cousins, I shouldered my rucksack and returned to Brussels Gare du Midi railway station, catching an intercity train around 1800hrs out of Belgium north, over the border into Den Haag (The Hague) in Netherlands, taking a little effort to find my hotel after disembarking at Den Haag Centraal station.
Monday and Tuesday I took the time to finally explore The Hague, a Dutch city I had constantly travelled through in past Dutch travels but never stopped in. The Hague was the home of the Dutch royal family and its parliament, not to mention all the international courts and arbitration palaces dedicated to world peace processes. I walked all over the town - frequently having to carefully time my photos, as gray clouds and constant patchy rain washed through the city - to visit the historic Binnenhof (the political heart of the Netherlands), churches, palaces and parks. I liked The Hague: nowhere near as frenetic and busy as Amsterdam, it had its own atmosphere and sense of importance.
Wednesday I dashed over to Amsterdam: one last visit to the first European city I ever set down in when I arrived in Europe all those years ago - and only having been there just two months ago as well - so I thought it was fitting it would be the last European city I stayed in. I was happy to walk along Damrak one last time and visit my last coffeehouse for a pre-rolled joint of White Widow marijuana, along with plates of hot chips downed in mayonnaise.
Thursday was the beginning of my epic journey eastwards, out of Europe and into Russia. After a lengthy stop-over in Deventer in the eastern Netherlands late into the morning, I caught another international train around 1400hrs east over the border into Germany, arriving at the capital Berlin around 1930hrs. I really couldn't do that much loaded down with my bags, but I was able to take a quick hike from Berlin Hauptbahnhof station down quickly to Brandenburg Tor, central Berlin's western gateway, via the Reichstag along the way. Although I really shouldn't have rushed back: the Russian Railways sleeper train service due to arrive in Berlin for Moscow arrived nearly an hour late.
I had already pre-paid a sole occupancy fare for a compartment occupied solely by me (I figured it would be a long while since I would sleep on a train just by myself in the future), and so after finally pulling out of Berlin at 2200hrs, I was able to convert my seats into a semi-comfortable bed as we crossed into Poland about an hour or so later, and hitting the Polish/Belarusian border at 0745hrs Friday morning, shunting around Brest railway station to individually elevate each train carriage to change the bogies from European to Russian gauge, and clear the European Union to get stamped into Belarus by border guards after a lengthy luggage inspection and a few questions. I spent a total of 32hrs on the train: visiting the dining car for the occasional beer as we rolled through Belarus, dozing occasionally when the same old scenery flashing by the window got too boring, or getting online (the service had mobile wi-fi! Naturally quite slow, except when we were in major cities, but it was quite unexpected to get a functional wifi service on a Russian train, so I was thankful for it), or politely asking for hot water from the carriage attendant (the provodnitsa, an gray-haired battle-hardened lady who ran her carriage to near-military rules, but was friendlier when I attempted to talk to her in my extremely broken Russian.
The train finally rolled into Moscow Byelorusskaya station at 0300hrs Saturday morning, over 2.5hrs late at this stage. I spent the next hour walking through northern inner Moscow trying to find my hostel, attempting to remember my Cyrillic reading skills for street-signs and not getting killed my maniacal drivers screaming down main roads even at this desolate hour. I was eventually to find it around 0400hrs, gratefully checked in with the 24hr desk, and crash quite quickly after crawling into my hostel bed.
After only getting six hours of sleep before everyone else in the hostel woke up, I spent most of Saturday just relaxing, getting online to check details, news, and generally taking it easy. I wasn't too eager to race outside and explore Moscow: I needed a day to chill and I'd already been in Moscow before (about 5 years ago in 2009). By the time Saturday afternoon arrived, I had discovered my travel group for the Trans-Mongolian Railway: we were a group of 10, mostly British or Australian, with an American and two Swiss, all between 28-35. We spent that evening dining in our first Russian restaurant, where I very quickly realised I was the sole person in the group apart from our guide who could read and write Cyrillic, and with even a basic grasp of the Russian language (which immediately got me volunteered as semi-official interpreter and translator, which to be honest I am getting quite used to these days!).
Sunday was the day I used to rediscover Moscow. While most of the rest of the group visited Red Square, walked through the Kremlin and said hello to the preserved body of Comrade Lenin, I walked around instead, passing Gorky Park and the Lubyanka, and along the river Moskva for a bit. A group of us went to spend the evening at the Russian ballet: the rest of us visited the gastronom in GUM department store (which I remembered dining at when I was last in Moscow and was delighted to find was still there). Later we hooked up with some other backpackers at the hostel we were staying at (but who weren't travelling with us) for a night-time stroll of Red Square and the Kremlin walls, before a late retiring to bed.
Yestreday had us ride the Moscow metro for a bit, visiting the ornate and beautifully decorated Soviet-style stations along the network, before getting a private transfer by mini-bus onwards, east eventually to the Golden Ring town of Vladimir - picking up our next guide - and onwards shortly to the historic pre-Russian capital city of Suzdal, where we spent the evening in another hostel within walking distance of the city centre, spending today walking along and through the old Kremlin and many churches, some around 1000 years old, and then all partook in a banya (Russian sauna, following by a light beating by birch branches, then quickly submerged in ice-cold water, rinse and repeat) this afternoon.
So far it's been a fairly laid-back re-introduction to Russia, but the excitement begins properly when after an exploration of Vladimir tomorrow, we transfer onwards to the train and spend Thursday in the Tatar capital of Kazan....before spending another three days trundling east towards Irkutsk and Lake Baikal!
This entry was originally posted at http://mnemonia.dreamwidth.org/338954.html. Comments may be left on either entry.
After a quick ride on the Brussels metro, I arrived at my cousin's house for a joyful hello, before joining a large group of my Belgian extended family and went out to dinner in a restaurant in Anderlecht. It was a great evening - with marvellous beer, naturally - but it was a bit sad because it was to be the last time I would be seeing them in quite a long time: this is the extended family of my mothers who we didn't even know existed until 2004, and who were kind and gracious enough to take me in when I arrived, green and barely remembering any of my school-boy French, for a month in Brussels into their homes and lives before I moved across the Channel to London later afterwards. With them I had finally developed a discriminating taste for beer, vastly improved my French until I was back to fluent after so many years of disuse, considered Brussels my second European city (and still do) after London, and who always kind and interested to host me when I visited over the last near-decade. On Saturday afternoon, I made a specific effort to visit my Belgian grandfather (which sadly fell through due to crossed wires) but afterwards spend a lovely evening with Oncle Clement in central Brussels over fries with mayonnaise and beers - where else? - at the Best Damn Beerhall in All the World: A La Mote Subite, naturally. Oncle Clement and Tante Yvette looked after me for the month in Brussels and I've always been close to them, so I couldn't consider leaving Europe without at least visiting them one last time.
Sunday evening appeared far too quickly, so with one last goodbye to my cousins, I shouldered my rucksack and returned to Brussels Gare du Midi railway station, catching an intercity train around 1800hrs out of Belgium north, over the border into Den Haag (The Hague) in Netherlands, taking a little effort to find my hotel after disembarking at Den Haag Centraal station.
Monday and Tuesday I took the time to finally explore The Hague, a Dutch city I had constantly travelled through in past Dutch travels but never stopped in. The Hague was the home of the Dutch royal family and its parliament, not to mention all the international courts and arbitration palaces dedicated to world peace processes. I walked all over the town - frequently having to carefully time my photos, as gray clouds and constant patchy rain washed through the city - to visit the historic Binnenhof (the political heart of the Netherlands), churches, palaces and parks. I liked The Hague: nowhere near as frenetic and busy as Amsterdam, it had its own atmosphere and sense of importance.
Wednesday I dashed over to Amsterdam: one last visit to the first European city I ever set down in when I arrived in Europe all those years ago - and only having been there just two months ago as well - so I thought it was fitting it would be the last European city I stayed in. I was happy to walk along Damrak one last time and visit my last coffeehouse for a pre-rolled joint of White Widow marijuana, along with plates of hot chips downed in mayonnaise.
Thursday was the beginning of my epic journey eastwards, out of Europe and into Russia. After a lengthy stop-over in Deventer in the eastern Netherlands late into the morning, I caught another international train around 1400hrs east over the border into Germany, arriving at the capital Berlin around 1930hrs. I really couldn't do that much loaded down with my bags, but I was able to take a quick hike from Berlin Hauptbahnhof station down quickly to Brandenburg Tor, central Berlin's western gateway, via the Reichstag along the way. Although I really shouldn't have rushed back: the Russian Railways sleeper train service due to arrive in Berlin for Moscow arrived nearly an hour late.
I had already pre-paid a sole occupancy fare for a compartment occupied solely by me (I figured it would be a long while since I would sleep on a train just by myself in the future), and so after finally pulling out of Berlin at 2200hrs, I was able to convert my seats into a semi-comfortable bed as we crossed into Poland about an hour or so later, and hitting the Polish/Belarusian border at 0745hrs Friday morning, shunting around Brest railway station to individually elevate each train carriage to change the bogies from European to Russian gauge, and clear the European Union to get stamped into Belarus by border guards after a lengthy luggage inspection and a few questions. I spent a total of 32hrs on the train: visiting the dining car for the occasional beer as we rolled through Belarus, dozing occasionally when the same old scenery flashing by the window got too boring, or getting online (the service had mobile wi-fi! Naturally quite slow, except when we were in major cities, but it was quite unexpected to get a functional wifi service on a Russian train, so I was thankful for it), or politely asking for hot water from the carriage attendant (the provodnitsa, an gray-haired battle-hardened lady who ran her carriage to near-military rules, but was friendlier when I attempted to talk to her in my extremely broken Russian.
The train finally rolled into Moscow Byelorusskaya station at 0300hrs Saturday morning, over 2.5hrs late at this stage. I spent the next hour walking through northern inner Moscow trying to find my hostel, attempting to remember my Cyrillic reading skills for street-signs and not getting killed my maniacal drivers screaming down main roads even at this desolate hour. I was eventually to find it around 0400hrs, gratefully checked in with the 24hr desk, and crash quite quickly after crawling into my hostel bed.
After only getting six hours of sleep before everyone else in the hostel woke up, I spent most of Saturday just relaxing, getting online to check details, news, and generally taking it easy. I wasn't too eager to race outside and explore Moscow: I needed a day to chill and I'd already been in Moscow before (about 5 years ago in 2009). By the time Saturday afternoon arrived, I had discovered my travel group for the Trans-Mongolian Railway: we were a group of 10, mostly British or Australian, with an American and two Swiss, all between 28-35. We spent that evening dining in our first Russian restaurant, where I very quickly realised I was the sole person in the group apart from our guide who could read and write Cyrillic, and with even a basic grasp of the Russian language (which immediately got me volunteered as semi-official interpreter and translator, which to be honest I am getting quite used to these days!).
Sunday was the day I used to rediscover Moscow. While most of the rest of the group visited Red Square, walked through the Kremlin and said hello to the preserved body of Comrade Lenin, I walked around instead, passing Gorky Park and the Lubyanka, and along the river Moskva for a bit. A group of us went to spend the evening at the Russian ballet: the rest of us visited the gastronom in GUM department store (which I remembered dining at when I was last in Moscow and was delighted to find was still there). Later we hooked up with some other backpackers at the hostel we were staying at (but who weren't travelling with us) for a night-time stroll of Red Square and the Kremlin walls, before a late retiring to bed.
Yestreday had us ride the Moscow metro for a bit, visiting the ornate and beautifully decorated Soviet-style stations along the network, before getting a private transfer by mini-bus onwards, east eventually to the Golden Ring town of Vladimir - picking up our next guide - and onwards shortly to the historic pre-Russian capital city of Suzdal, where we spent the evening in another hostel within walking distance of the city centre, spending today walking along and through the old Kremlin and many churches, some around 1000 years old, and then all partook in a banya (Russian sauna, following by a light beating by birch branches, then quickly submerged in ice-cold water, rinse and repeat) this afternoon.
So far it's been a fairly laid-back re-introduction to Russia, but the excitement begins properly when after an exploration of Vladimir tomorrow, we transfer onwards to the train and spend Thursday in the Tatar capital of Kazan....before spending another three days trundling east towards Irkutsk and Lake Baikal!
This entry was originally posted at http://mnemonia.dreamwidth.org/338954.html. Comments may be left on either entry.