The Scottish Lemon 2.0

Our train doesn’t depart until 21:52 so we’ve got the whole day to explore.  Check out is at noon, but we can extend that to 14:00 for no extra charge plus they have a left luggage room so we are fine to leave our bags for the day.

The plan is to find the train station, a grocery store then the rest of the day is left to wander the city.  It’s Sunday so not sure what all is going to be open.  M wants to do some writing, C wants to sleep so F and I wander over to the abandoned play park and explore.

It seems like such a strange place.  I can see the remains of a BBQ stand, change rooms, picnic tables and a stage and outdoor dance floor.  It’s seen better days and everything is rusted and in some need of TLC.  Yet it is still in use as a public space even if no one is taking care of it.

There are 2 men doing some kick-boxing sparring, a young couple comes with their little girl to play on the rusty slide, an elderly Grandmother comes later with her infant granddaughter to play on the merry-go-round.

There is a small concrete dock that you can walk onto and listen to the ice.  Depending on the tide the ice floes will come right up to shore as they did this morning with the fog.  It’s bright, clear and with the sun shining it’s not nearly as cold as I initially thought so I already need to take off a layer.  And mud, did I mention the mud?  It’s everywhere and on everything, including my sneakers.

We circle back to the hotel and pick up the other two and head off to find the train station.  It’s just a quick 10 min walk and the grocery store is right across the street so that’s simple enough.  The station is right down at the harbour and there are lots of boats and ships in the area as well as lots of sailors.  Can I just say at this moment, how sexy the Russian Sailor uniform is, just sayin J

In our wanders we were approached by 2 young men that ended up being 1^st year students at the Mariners college.  I think they just wanted to practise their English as there didn’t seem to be a purpose other than to say a friendly hello.  They were nice enough to pose for a photo as well which was appreciated.  It wasn’t until after we left that I realized we didn’t get their names.

There is a main square down by the water with a large statue commemorating some military conquest I’m sure.  There are also a number of military vehicles and guys in fatigues so I’m thinking now is not a good time to take a photo.  We find the GUM shopping centre which is the old Soviet style mall.  Kind of like a House of Fraser but with kiosks and lots of empty space.  All I know is it’s incredibly hot in here and I last all of about 10 min before I need to go outside.

In our wanders of the day I come across a submarine, a military memorial, some onion dome thing that looks more like a tourist place than a church and a fancy Arch.  There is music that is being piped in from the museum across from it playing a waltz\z and there are some little kids dancing.

We take a tram ride up the side of a hill to a viewpoint called the Eagles Nest.  I suppose it would be beautiful if there wasn’t so much smog in the air and the city wasn’t so industrial looking.  I hesitate to call Vladivostok ugly, but it certainly doesn’t have much going for it aesthetically from what I’ve seen so far.  Everything is dusty, gray and extremely tired looking, especially our hotel.  At one point in time I’m sure it was a gleaming white concrete structure.  But in looking at it today it looks forgotten with peeling paint and no landscaping just brown weeds and mud surrounding it.

Claire and I head back to the hotel before the others and find the little snack shop above reception and purchase a bottle of local brew and a large bag of crips.  It is a nice view overlooking the water and the ice floes have wandered further out to sea again.  There is no wind so the sea is like glass.

Down in reception there is a little girl dancing and leaping around the large space in a tutu.

We stop for dinner enroute to the train station.  Just a wee little place where you order from the counter and we get 4 different kinds of perogies (cabbage, potato, sweetened cheese (kind of like ricotta) and one that has some kind of meat (not my fav).  There is a wee little girl that keeps walking past our table, maybe 3 yrs old?  There is also a small gift shop attached to the cafe and when looking around I spot my opportunity to snap her picture (her mom is behind me).  I take it then show the little girl and she bursts into a giggle.  Then keeps following me around tugging on my trouser leg and pointing at my camera so I show her the photo again.  Adorable :)

Dinner finished we make our way down to the station and I do guard duty with the bags as the other 3 head to the market across the street to pick up some food to take on our 3 day journey on the train.

When the time comes we make our way to the platform, find our carriage and board.  They really should adopt the ‘mind the gap’ campaign here as the gap is ridiculous.  I have to pass my bags to M as I haul myself up onto the train (no steps) using both handrails.

We are staying in 2^nd class with a 4 berth sleeper (think bunk beds). A mattress roll, feather pillow, sheets, wool blanket and what looks like a tea towel are supplied.

We are ready to begin the first leg of our train journey across Siberia from Vladivostok to Irkutsk (3 nights/3 days).  Not sure just what I’ve got myself into here.

Well the airport isn’t anything special.  We get off the plane and are put on a bus to take us to the terminal.  We walk in and are greeted by a wall of people.  It seems they won’t open the door to the baggage room until everyone is in from off the bus (fire hazard anyone?).  The baggage room is tiny with only 2 carousels.  What I notice is that as people pick up their bags they are not allowed back into the terminal but must exit to outside.  Another bottle neck is created due to just one person at the door checking that the baggage tag on your suitcase matches the tag on the back of your passport/boarding pass.  I suppose this not having a suitcase is a bit of a blessing at this point.

I just stand off to the side with the girls stuff as they go to pick up their luggage.  F & C had already seen our taxi driver that had been prearranged for us so he is now waiting outside.  All bags collected (except for my missing one of course) we head to the mini-van that is to take us to our hotel in Vladivostok.

It’s just before we’re about to all pile into the van that we notice one of our party is looking a wee bit panicked and she informs us that she can’t find her passport.  Between the 4 of us we check all her bags 4 times but no luck.  2 head back to the terminal to try and find some assistance as the thinking is either it was left on the plane or she’s been pick pocketed in either the queue to get into the baggage claim area or the queue to get out the door. 

What I find a bit annoying/strange is that at no point did our driver offer any assistance to help out.  I mean he does speak English so I’m sure an interpreter would have been appreciated but he just sat there looking bored.3 hrs later they both finally immerge after having survived the ordeal with the police & airport security with a police report of the incident which we hope will be enough along with the photocopy of her passport until she can reach the UK consulate to get a replacement issued. 

The drive to our hotel takes about an hour.  This is a strange place, everything is gray and muddy yet so many people seem to have chosen white as the colour for their car.  The architecture reminds me of a mixture of Caribbean (plain concrete block walls with corrugated tin roof) and frontier town with very weathered wooden buildings.  In general everything looks tired.

The driver stops to add some petrol yet keeps the vehicle running which doesn’t seem like a safe option.  There don’t seem to be any lines painted on the roads that I can see so I’m unclear as to if this is actually a 4 lane highway or just a make it up as you go along kind of road.  And the pot holes!  I swear some of them were big enough to swallow a VW Beetle. 

We arrive in our hotel and the lobby looks like your typical generic hotel lobby.  A young guy is behind the counter and his English is very good.  When he finds out that the girls are from Scotland right away he mentions football and his favourite player is a Mc something and he was Scottish.  Being that none of us are football aficionados we weren’t of much help to narrow it down any more.

Our rooms were what you would expect for a circa 1970ish hotel in the communist bloc.  Very dated, small, the bathroom was a bit on the creepy side.  But fresh sheets and towels and a surprisingly very comfy mattress.  There is a balcony that opens up to the bay and you can see the remains of what looks like a play park.

I grab a nap (it has been 48 hrs since I last slept) while the others go for a short walk to get their bearings.  Once back we hit the restaurant attached to the hotel as one of the guide books mention it so figure it can’t be that bad. 

As Vladivostok is so close to China it’s not surprising that Chinese food here is supposed to be good and tonight is our chance to see if it’s true.  Our feast consisted of fried eggplant in oyster sauce, sweet and sour chicken, a Halibut dish and scheuzean pork. It was all amazing and really flavourful.  We also ordered a bottle of red wine that wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t anything to write home about either.  We pretty much ate everything and were too full for dessert.

We get back to our rooms to find the bar below is playing loud thumping music but to be honest I’m so tired I really don’t care.  I nip down to the lobby to attempt to log into the internet to see if I can find any more information about my lost bag but no luck.  The signal is far too weak and slow to be of any use.  I’m able to borrow some PJ’s and an assortment of clothes from the girls since it will be 4 days until we arrive in Irkutsk where I hope to be reunited with my bag.

 April 9, Time Zone GMT, Airline 1 - KLM

It starts with a 6AM flight from Edinburgh to Amsterdam.  I’ve never taken the city bus out to the airport before, and taking one at 04:00 is interesting to say the least.  The regular airporter bus links up with the N22 ( night bus) off hours.  It’s a cheap ride at  £3.00 compared to a £25 taxi ride, and the entertainment (inebriated wanna be passengers arguing over cost with the driver) is thrown in for free.

I had tried to pre-order my Roubles the week before my trip but I wasn’t able to make an online order unless I was purchasing £500 or more.  My decision to risk it and just pick them up at the airport was a bust as they didn’t have any.  We’ll come back to this a bit later…

Flight to Amsterdam was uneventful, had an interesting seat companion who managed to chat for pretty much the whole 1.25 hrs.  He was an older gentlemen that works in Oil & Gas and was enroute to Saudi Arabia for his next contract.    

Time Zone 1 : GMT +1

We touch down at Schipol and I look at the time and my connecting flight is supposed to be boarding in the next 20 min.  But I REALLY need to use the loo.  I rush to find the toilets and there is a line up outside the door.  I go back to my gate and give the sign the once over and figure I’ve got 15 min before they do a final boarding call so  I should be ok.

I’ll stop at this point to say “no Mother, I did NOT miss my flight”.

I join the queue for the ladies room and while standing there a janitor just walks right in and starts emptying all the garbage receptacles in all the stalls.  Maybe it’s the Dutch way of life but isn’t the normal protocol to close the loo down while a person of the opposite sex is doing maintenance?  It was just kinda weird.

Boarded my flight to Moscow with no troubles even managed to catch some shut eye since I never did go to bed last night.   The flight is under 3 hrs so no onboard entertainment which is fine by me.  I’ve got my iPod to drown out the engines.

Time Zone 2: GMT + 3 or Moscow Time

We come into land at Moscow and I’ve got a window seat.  It’s a clear sunny day but once our altitude drops I’m noticing how heavy the smog is.  There are trees everywhere but no leaves budding yet so it just looks brown and gray.  There seems to be a lot of rivers and waterways down below that are in some combination of frozen solid or the beginnings of a spring melt.  The Pilot announces that it’s +13 C outside so at least that sounds pleasant.

 Because I’m arriving international, but departing domestic I have to go through passport control, collect my bags, change terminals and check in again.  I’m one of the last to get through passport control and I wander over to the baggage carousel.  There aren’t that many bags left and I don’t see mine anywhere.  I then begin to think of that tight connection time in Amsterdam and I realize that although I caught the flight, my bags did not.  I stand in the queue at lost luggage and start the process. Over the course of the next 2 hrs I deal with at least 4 different people one of which thought I spoke French and thankfully a very nice young man who spoke a little English .

Normally if you’re bag is delayed it’s not really a big deal.  They just ship it out on the next flight and deliver it to your hotel.  Except I’m not staying in Moscow, but travelling on to Vladivostok and only staying for one night when we then board our train.  It’s all very confusing to them, I haul out my travel documents to show the dates/times of my arrivals/departures and I just see a lot of furrowed brows and shaking heads.  The nice man explains that my bag won’t arrive in Moscow until some time between midnight and 2AM.  Then it will need to get on the next flight to Vladivostok (which is a 7.5 hr flight).  By the time the bag gets there I will already be on the train.  Hmmm not good.

Its decided my best chance is for my bag to be sent from Moscow to Irkutsk.  Except a small snag there as although our train is stopping in Irkutsk we are being driven out to a small town on Lake Baikal called Listvyanka.  To make it even more complicated, because there is no KLM agent in Irkutsk my bag will need to be picked up at the airport.  I’ll come back to this later.

So once all the paperwork is done, I need to find my way to Terminal D for the domestic flights and that is also where I will hook up with the girls.  But first I still need to purchase some Roubles.  I see a Travelex counter off to the right so I wander over and say I’d like to exchange some pound stirling.  No problem they say until they see me pull out my cash and notice that it’s Scottish pounds.  No, no no, they say.  Apparently they will only exchange British Pounds and refuse my Scottish pounds.  ARGH!!!  As luck would have it I find a Barclay’s ATM and thank goodness it accepts my Bank of Scotland ATM card and I take out some money, phew!

In all the airports I’ve been in (and I’ve been in quite a few) the signage is usually fairly universal.  Bright yellow signs with black lettering pointing out where the taxis are, the train into Moscow, check in, departure desks etc.  What I am NOT seeing is where the heck terminal D is.  I’m assuming if it’s not walking distance or attached then they should have an inter-terminal shuttle bus.  But you’d never know it as there is no signage and a plethora of slightly sleezy looking men trying to flog their taxi services. 

Being a woman I’m not afraid to ask for directions, but I can’t even seem to find the information desk (there is signage for it, but can’t find the actual desk).  So I settle for the Air Italia counter and they inform me that yes there is a bus and the stop is just outside.  So out I go, more taxi drivers wanting to offer me a ride but I still can’t see the bus stop.  I ask the traffic warden and he points me in the right direction and I wait in the queue.  The bus comes about ever 15 min so I don’t have to wait too long and it’s literally a 5 min ride.  I’m sure I could have walked it had I known what direction it was (next time). Makes me glad I held my ground and didn’t believe the guy that told me I must take a taxi and it would cost 1000 roubles to get me there (approx £25).

I’m not sure if it is due to the recent bombings in Moscow but I need to once more go through security.  Hand luggage is x-rayed for the third time today, I am instructed to walk through a metal detector and even though I’ve not set it off I’m still frisked.  Did I mention this was just to get inside the building????

I do the self serve kiosk check in and get my boarding pass.  No line up as I have no bag now.  Go through my final security for the day (4^th time now). At this one we are all instructed to take off our footwear and we are to put on these oh so attractive blue slippers.  I get to the other side find a seat and attempt to stay awake and upright for the next 2 hrs waiting for the girls.  The insistence at keeping the departure lounge I was in at what felt like 0 degrees helped a bit.

From what I can gather this terminal is fairly new as it still looks kinda shiny and fresh.  The downside is not many services are actually open yet other than a handbag/lingerie shop, an Irish pub (they’re everywhere) and small cafe.  I was wanting to find a book shop so as to purchase a phrase book but there isn’t one to be found.  I eventually run into the girls and it’s not too long before we are called to board the flight

Airline 2 - Aeroflot

I’ve never flown Aeroflot before so not exactly sure what to expect.  But on first impression it looks pretty much like any other big plane.  It’s got the in seat monitors for movies, a pillow and blanket waiting as it’s an overnight flight.  As luck would have it I’ve got 2 seats to myself so I am able to stretch out a bit for the long flight.  I won’t kid myself with the illusion of being able to sleep (I never do) but it is nice to give the knees a chance to stretch out straight for a change.

The flight is 7.5 hrs and skies look clear and calm so should be fine.  Even with room to stretch out it’s still a long time to be sitting in a confined space even if you’re only 5’ 2.5”  We are served 2 full meals (one dinner, the other breakfast) and it’s fairly healthy and not half bad for airline food.  

One thing I’ve not seen before is the under the fuselage cam.  As the plane taxis the runway the camera is on right through take off, then again on landing.  Not sure that’s such a great idea so I turn my monitor off until the on-board entertainment is available.

April 10, Time Zone 3: GMT + 10 or Moscow Time + 7

By the time we land in Vladivostok I figure I have been travelling for a little over 22 hrs since I left my flat Friday April 9^th at 03:15. It’s been one incredibly looooong day.