We caught the marshrutka from Mestia to Zugdidi after a hurried breakfast at 8am. From there, we arrived in Batumi a couple of hours later, a seaside resort town on the Black Sea near the Turkish border. Called by some the ‘Las Vegas of Georgia’, Batumi is one of the strangest cities I’ve ever visited….
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Dropped at the border with Georgia some 30km from Vladikavkaz, I approached the crossing on foot. A long, snaking line of cars and trucks backed up a few kilometres through the valley. The crossing is placed at the base of the Caucasus mountains, nestled in a deep rocky valley. Bored looking families wandered around, waiting…
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I spent the next three days in Moscow investigating various parks and museums – along with figuring out where to go next. Gorky park is Moscow’s version of Central Park; a good way to spend an afternoon, doing some reading as you watch skaters and rollerbladers zooming about. The park is excellently maintained with pagodas,…
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I spent my first few hours in Moscow wandering around in awe. After a year of skyscrapers, small apartments, ramshackle alleys, ‘Various Asian Buildings’ (from hammocks to bamboo huts), and, most recently, wooden Russian houses, I was now surrounded by impressive European architecture: carved façades, soft colours, and wide, planned streets. A Muscovite would scoff…
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This was it. The big one. Three nights, 61 hours, in third class. I arrived at the station, in front of me sat my new home/prison. It shone majestically in all its Soviet glory: a clunking, rattling metal rectangle inhabited by very bored-looking Russians, all smoking cigarettes on the platform. As you walk in, the…
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The train ride from Irkutsk to Krasnoyarsk, my first leg in 3rd class, was uneventful. Platzkartny, as it’s known in Russian, is 4-berth open compartments with two beds above the opposite window. It’s comfortable enough, and exclusively Russians. The carriage is almost empty the whole time; I’m alone in my 6-bed ‘section’. Each carriage has…
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