Perm

(Yekaterinburg - Perm 380km/236 Miles)
Total distance traveled = 10,177 km/6323 Miles

No hostels in Perm. Well, none that I could find in guide books or the internet anyway. I wasn't keen on forking out for a hotel, so I looked for alternatives. A few years ago I'd joined a website called 'Couchsufing'. I wasn't sure if I'd ever use it, but after reading about the site I thought i'd see what it was all about. Basically, people who join the site can offer their couch (or spare bed/mattress) to travellers for free, or look for members who are offering a place to sleep. Members are organised by city and receive references and ratings from other members who meet, or stay with them. As well as offering a place to sleep, the site also gives the option to offer to meet for a coffee. This way you can help people around your city, without having them stay in your home. When I joined, I wasn't sure if I'd ever use the service, but I filled in a profile, added a few photos, and set my status to 'meet for a coffee' and 'couch not available'.

This seemed like a good time to try the site. I mean, if someone let me stay and we didn't get along I could still just go and stay in a hotel. With this in mind, I sifted through the site when planning the trip. I'm not sure how other members decide who to make a request to stay with, but I looked at a few (mainly superficial) factors....

* Do they look like a nutter in the photo.

* Do they speak English well enough for us to communicate.

* Do they sound normal in their profile write up.

....As I said, fairly superficial. I'd probably fail a lots of screenings if the same questions were asked of my profile. After looking through a few, rejecting nutter type photos, and the guy whose hobbies were 'shooting and hunting' (again probably normal in the middle of Russia, but added another element of risk in my mind), I sent requests to two people. One said they were away/busy on the dates I suggested, the other said OK. So I was going to a city in the middle of Russia where very few travellers go, and I was staying with someone I'd never met before, for three nights!

I emailed close to the time and Lana (the girl who I was staying with) said she couldn't meet me at the station at the time my train arrived. I wasn't too concerned about this and suggested I just hang around or wander around the city on my own. She said it was no problem for her friends to come and meet me though, so I'd be met by two more strangers...who I'd never even communicated with.

The city didn't look particularly appealing as I pulled into the station. After initially wandering the wrong way (no signs!) I found the exit, and two guys holding a sign with 'Hi David' on it, a bit like those you see at the arrivals department of airports. As a kid I'd always thought this was quite cool, but never going on business trips or hiring drivers meant that until now I'd never experienced it.

Illiya introduced himself and his friend Vladimir (bit more shy, and less English). They'd been put in charge of entertaining me until Lana was free at about 9pm. As it was hot, they suggested a 'picnic' by the river. By picnic, they meant a few beers and some crisps, but I wasn't hungry so that was no biggie. We drove down to the riverside and met 3 of Vladimir's friends sat by their car smoking a shisha/hookah (those waterpipe things that I associate with the Middle East/North Africa). Illiya was the only one with a good command of English, so he set about tranlating everything that they said. This continued for a while, then in the pizza restaurant where we went for coffee after. I felt a bit bad for Illiya, but he seemed to enjoy speaking English (he teaches English) and translated everything even when I said that he didn't neccessarily need to translate what was said if it had no relevance to me. The conversations ranged from my impressions of Russia and Russians, sports, Rope jumping (like bungee but the rope doesn't stretch), and a monkey that used to live in the pizza restaurant.

When I arrived at Lana's house (actually her parents, as she's living in China now and just back for the holidays) it felt a bit strange, but she was very welcoming and made me feel comfortable. We chatted for a while before I went to sleep, and I felt a little better with the whole 'staying in a strangers house' situation.

The next day we spent most of the day walking around the city, from her home to the old part of the city, a viewpoint, a military museum, parks, an opera house, etc. Lana knew a lot about the area from her family and wandering around herself, and told me a lot about the area. That evening I met her parents (they didn't speak any English, so when we needed to communicate Lana translated). Her father works for a television company (i think) and makes documentaries. He'd recently won an award for one of them. I think he was also involved in a magazine (which I would later be interviewed for!). Her mother made dolls and figures. I saw a few of them in the home. They were really good. They kind of remind me of stop motion animation figures, the kind I'd seen in an animated adaptation of The Tempest, or maybe A Nightmare Before Christmas. A bit dark, and fairytale-like.

The next day I visited the Perm 36 museum. A former GULAG prison camp. It was a pain to get there, and Lana suggested that it wasn't that great. But as this was the only reason I'd chosen to stop in the city, I still wanted to go and see for myself. I was driven to the bus station and helped to buy the ticket, before I was sent on my way for the day. I met a French Canadian girl on the bus going to the same place, so we managed to work out the correct stop and the right direction to walk the 3km to the museum once we got off the bus.

At the museum we team up with an Italian guy for an English tour, in order to spread the cost a little. There was some confusion at the start of the tour as the English guide didn't seem to understand our simple English quesitons about the tour. He seemed very nervous, but improved as the tour continued and was able to tell us quite a lot about the palce. The camp was interesting, but it seemed that the museum was underfunded and so wasn't as good as it could have been.

That evening, Lana's father interviewed me. It was for an article about foreigners visiting Perm, and so I expected questions about my travels. It was a lot more rigourous that I expected though, and went into topics like 'why did you move to Japan?', 'Why didn't you choose a job related to your degree?', and 'Will you stay in Japan forever?'. The kind of serious probing questions that I tend not to think about and don't really have answers to! It was quite interesting though. Again, my translator was made to work hard, but Lana dida great job of translating. I wonder if i'll get to see the finished article?

Overall, it was a lot better experience than I'd expected to have. The house and people were nice, I was given a lot more attention than I expected, I got a few home cooked meals, and I didn't encounter any nutters.

A few photos...
http://s214.photobucket.com/albums/cc250/davingtonsmythe/Japan%20to%20Russia/Perm/?albumview=slideshow

Yekaterinburg

(Irkutsk - Yekaterinburg 3371km/2094 Miles)
Total distance traveled = 9797 km/6087 Miles

So, it had to happen sometime. I got a bad hostel. I suppose when you're staying in cities which only seem to have one hostel, it's going to happen eventually. Arriving at 11pm it took 45 minutes to walk to the hostel. Not the greatest start, but there was little relief when we got inside. Again it was a converted flat, but this one wasn't even big.

The kitchen was tiny, and the 'bedrooms' were tiny with no connecting door. When we arrived, there were about 8-10 people drinking in the kitchen and bedroom. In itself not a problem, but the size and layout of the place meant that there was no way of going to sleep while it continued. It did continue though. Add to this the fact that there were only actually 4 beds (2 bunk beds) and the remaining people (including me) were on fold out camper beds, meant I got very little sleep. I got to sleep at about 3am and woke up at around 7am.

I'd somehow managed to only schedule one night in Ekaterinburg. I think it was due to the train schedules and needing to have more than one night in Perm. After my night in the 'hostel' this didn't seem such a bad thing. My next train was pretty early too, about 1pm. I wandered through the town, and tried to see as many of the sights as I could.

I also grabbed some breakfast. A mystery omlettte - I could work out Russian for omlette but not the ingredients. Amazingly, although i'm in the country for almost a month, I don't have a phrasebook. I learned to read the cyrillic alphabet fairly accurately during the ferry trip from Japan, and also got a few key phrases from an blog, but that's about it. So basically, I have veery limited Russian and no way of improving it!

The city centre was actually quite nice. There were a lot more shops, cafes, and bars than anywhere I'd been so far, and there were quite a few big squares, statues, and immense soviet buildings. The 'claim to fame' of the city, if you can call it that, was that the last Tsar was killed here. There's a momument at the actual site, as well as a church as a memorial for him and his family. There's actually another church in another site, as the bodies were moved to try and avoid people making martyrs out of them. It's out of the city though and I definitely didn't have time to go there. The church was nice, as were the surrounding buildings. I seem to have spent most of my time at churches so far, but surprisingly I'm not getting bored of them yet. Guess it's just a matter of time though.

After rushing through most of the city, I was a bit disappointed that I didn't have time to explore the city a little more, but I was also quite happy that I didn't have to suffer another night at that hostel!

The next stop would be Perm. At only 8 hours from Yekaterinburg, it was the shortest train journey so far. It was a slightly strange place to stop. No-one else I had met was planning on stopping there, and I couldn't find any hostels based in the city on the internet. I'd chosen to stop there on the basis of one museum. Perm 36. It's a former Soviet GULAG, and the only site of the whole GULAG system which had some original buildings standing.

More photos here (not many though)...

http://s214.photobucket.com/albums/cc250/davingtonsmythe/Japan%20to%20Russia/Yekaterinburg/?albumview=slideshow

Irkustk (again) and the Third Train

(Olkhon - Irkutsk 300km/186 Miles)
Total distance traveled = 6426 km/3991 Miles

I had another day in Irkutsk to break up the journey. I was in the same hostel again with Crystal and Chris, so we wandered around the city together checking the places we hadn't had time to see before.

One of these places was the site of the 'Decemberist Houses' - a few houses where exiles who had tried to stage a coup again the Tsar(Alexander I) had lived. I'm not sure what the city was like in the 1800's, but the houses didn't fit my idea of 'exile'. They were large wooden houses, two stories, that looked like they had about 8 rooms. No photos I'm afraid, as my camera battery ran out. Maybe I can nick one of someone else and put it on here later.

After wasting a bit of time at the hostel, I wandered down to the station to catch my next train. More train facts coming....ready? The trains on the Trans-Siberian express are numbered, with the faster trains having a lower number. The fastest and most luxurious is number 1, also called the 'Rossiya'. I'd previously taken train number 7 (2/8) and train number 361 (6/8). I guess that in addition to the number the age of the train plays a role, as today was number 9 but it seemed nicer than 7. It was cleaner, had triple glazing, and other little points like curtains in the corridor (do you have corridors in trains? can't think of a more appropriate word at the moment though). The only negative point about these new features was the windows. While I'm sure the triple glazing is useful in the winter, the design of the windows meant they opened on a hinge rather than sliding. Fine for letting in air, but not great for taking photos out of the train.

I was sharing the compartment with a family again. This time a mother, father, and their daughter (Anya, Viktor, and Nastya). Initially they didn't seem very keen to communicate, and aside from introducing myself we didn't say much. The first 24 hours or so passed in this way, with us only communicating to say things like 'excuse me', 'do you want to use the table?' etc. Viktor seemed to know some English, but his wife and daughter didn't (or didn't let on).

It wasn't until the next night (after he'd had a beer) that Viktor asked a few questions about me. Anya didn't join in, but helped him quite a lot with vocabulary when he didn't know a word in English. So, I discovered that Viktor is an electrician from St. Petersburg and Anya is from Ulan Ude. They'd been to visit her family and had a short holiday on Lake Baikal too. The next day he surprised me again by attempting more conversation and asking for my email/facebook address too. I guess he want to practise his English. Not sure if that will actually happen, but maybe he's more comfortable writing than speaking. Nastya was friendlier too and tested me on Russian numbers (I still forget the same numbers a lot - 4, 6, 9, and 10). Other than the people in my carriage, I had a few quick chats with an Australian guy travelling with his sister, and a couple of Russians called Igor and Michael who stumbled past one evening drunk before taking a photo of me and saying any random English words they could think of.

The next stop is Yekaterinburg (also spelled without the 'y'). Chris is, again, staying at the same hostel as me. He's travelling on a different train and arrives about 20 minutes before me, so we arranged to meet at the station and search for the hostel together.

Few more photos here....
http://s214.photobucket.com/albums/cc250/davingtonsmythe/Japan%20to%20Russia/Train%20to%20Yekaterinburg/?albumview=slideshow

Olkhon Island

(Irkutsk - Olkhon 300km/186 Miles)
Total distance traveled = 6126 km/3805 Miles

Surprisingly I woke up on time without an alarm. Actually I have a theory that if you are worried enough and think about the time enough, then your subconcious will wake you up in time...unless you're drunk that is. The bus driver was late though, so I guess he doesn't know that technique.

We finally set off at 9am, in a minibus with 14 seats squeezed in. I'm pretty sure it's not the standard layout and they managed to add a few extra by moving them around. I hadn't realised just how far the lake was from Irkutsk when I'd planned my trip. It was about 300km! Travelling in an old minibus along uneven dirt roads, this took us 6 hours. I don't mind travelling by bus, but this was testing my limits. Hot cramped, and very uncomfortable. I couldn't even read, as the bus was bouncing around so much. Crystal was making the same trip, so thankfully I could chat to someone.

We arrived at about 4pm after making the crossing to the island by ferry. The scenery on and around the island was beautiful. The town itself wasn't so aesthetically pleasing. It's hard to desribe, but think of a shanty town or a medieval village and you'll be close. Aside from a few nice wooden houses, most were made from corregated iron and concrete. Stray dogs were everywhere, but there were also a few cows, and the odd cockrell around. The roads had been eroded by rain and had massive channels running through them. There was also the problem of rubbish. Although there were bins, they were all overflowing. There seemed to be plenty of people who didn't bother walking to a bin either. Later we found out that the rubbish is only collected once a week and the infrastructure isn't really set up for the massive number of visitors (Russian and foreign) who come in the summer.

The place we were staying at wasn't really a hostel. More of a.....medieval Butlins, or a commune of some kind. It was enclosed by a wooden fence and had a hodge-podge of wooden buildings, ome looking like chalets, others with an arabian vibe. The room was very nice, and I was surprised that the cheaper shared room I'd opted for wasn't a dorm, but rahter a twin room. I was sharing with a Swiss guy called Daniel who had been studying Russian in St Petersburg and was taking a break before returning home. The room was very nice and cheap too. I was paying a similar price to the other hostels, but 3 meals a day were included! The only downside was the toilet. It wasn't next to the room, it was outside. And how can I phrase this....hmmm....basically, you shat into a hole in the ground. No prceline involved, no water, just a hole. There was a wooden structure around it, but the stench was incredible and the flies loved the place too. I didn't fancy trying to find it in the dark, so toilet vists were a daytime only affair for those few days.

As I mentioned, there was a strange feel about the holiday village/compound. The set meal times, polite but sometimes lumbering zombie-like staff, and organized activities gave it a religious commune vibe. This improved as I stayed longer....but maybe that's how they get you!

In fact, the island is considered one of a very few centres of energy by shaman types. We also found a tent nearby promoting 'ethno-drive' music. Kind of traditional music and trance combined. Pretty wierd. I explored the area a little, listened to some ethno-drive, and read more of my book before calling it a night.