British writer took a train across Russia and spoke about her adventures

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

At the end of last year, the Russian part of Twitter was literally blown up by a thread launched by British writer and journalist Katie Glass. Together with her boyfriend, she decided to “run away somewhere for Christmas,” and fled to Russia. Together they boarded the Trans-Siberian Express across Russia, and Katy began to talk online about her impressions of the trip.

“I wanted to run away somewhere for Christmas, and my best friend wanted to ride the Trans-Siberian Express. And so we landed in Moscow on December 21st and spent the next two weeks crossing Russia by train,”Katie Glass tells Katie Glass about starting her trip with showman Rob Rinder.

The couple's trip was fully organized by a special British company, so Katie did not have to buy tickets in Russia or book a hotel - everything was already ready even before the trip began. As the writer later admitted, it was a lot of fun in the reserved seat cars and there were definitely more opportunities to communicate with other people, but since it was still Christmas, they decided to pamper themselves and ordered a private compartment for two.

The pair's route began in Moscow, and then went through Omsk, Irkutsk, Mongolia - and ended in Beijing - for a total of 7,622 km. “In summer, there are a lot of backpackers who have such a trip on their wishlist, but in winter, when the temperature drops below -30C, gentle tourists somehow disappear,” says Katie. - Even Muscovites were stunned when they found out about our trip during our shopping in Moscow for the trip. Vodka, wine … well, you know, it's Christmas after all."

Indeed, during the entire trip, Katie never once mentioned any other foreign couple that they would have met on the train - it may not have been there - but she praised the local people without stopping. She was delighted by the guys who went out to smoke on the platform in Novosibirsk at -31 in T-shirts and shorts. She was admired by the conductor Elena, who worked on the train with her husband Igor and regularly offered her ice cream, tea in beautiful cup holders, or even treated her with gingerbread and apples.

But most of all, of course, the writer was conquered by Russia itself. The couple went on the trip prepared - with a pack of books about Russia: Anna Karenina, Fathers and Sons, and on Christmas Day Katie presented Rob with the novel Doctor Zhivago. But it's one thing to read, and another thing to see with your own eyes.

“People here constantly ask me if I like it - yes, this is the best thing I have done in my life! Please call the British Railways and ask them to hire Igor and Elena - they are wonderful. And yes, we have WiFi here, it's clean, everything is well equipped. We are watching War and Peace on iPad. This is when we are not looking out the window and enjoying the view."

Winter nature especially delighted Katie. Endless forests with snow caps, knee-deep snow in every city, and when they stopped for two days in Irkutsk and decided to climb the mountain, the writer's admiration simply knew no bounds. And, of course, the couple's intentions were not just to go and contemplate, they happily tried local "chips" on themselves.

So, for example, in one of the cities Rob also decided to go to the winter platform at -31C in some shorts. Cold, but not deadly, as it seemed to him before. Therefore, in Irkutsk, he already grew bolder, and after the hike, they went together to a real bathhouse to warm up. And from the bathhouse Rob jumped straight into the icy waters of Lake Baikal. Definitely, there will be something to remember. “Here the locals advised us to buy beer,” said Katie, showing a photo of Baltika-9. However, in the dining car, the couple also tried local cuisine, and absolutely everything deserved praise - from borscht to herring.

The only thing the British woman complained about was that they were very heavily drowned in the carriages: compared to the severe cold outside the window, +24 in the carriage was too much for her. "You can just cook in a compartment here - I die at night in my pajamas, and the windows don't open."

Stops at the stations lasted from 5 to 30 minutes, so the couple managed to see only a few cities - and then, mainly, in the area of the station square. They surveyed Irkutsk more thoroughly, and in this city the Twitter thread ends, although the couple got on the train again and continued their journey through Mongolia to Beijing. “Wow,” says one of the commentators under her posts. - I am Russian, but I never looked at my homeland like that. Probably, we are too used to all this to see beauty. But it is really beautiful."

In 1973, British singer David Bowie also traveled on the Trans-Siberian Railway - due to his fear of flights, he thus crossed the distance from Japan to Europe. How he saw Russia can be seen in our article about this trip.