The Trans-Siberian Railway goes online
It’s one of the great train journeys: the Trans-Siberian Railway. The train makes tracks from Europe on one end to Asia on the other.
If you can’t make it out to Russia anytime soon, you can get a sample of the trip from the comfort of your computer. Here’s the NY Times article: Trans-Siberian Railway Views, a Click Away. For more information, check out this website: The Guide to Trans-Siberian Railway.
Have you ever ridden on the Trans-Siberian? Please share your stories in the comments.
February 26th, 2010 at 12:36 am
Trains are my favorite transport mode and I read about Trans-Siberian train in The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux. Since it passes through two continents and more than one country, is there a single visa option for travelers wishing to cover entire length of the train journey without break?
February 26th, 2010 at 1:10 am
If you take the traditional Moscow-Vladivostok (or reverse) route you can do it all on a Russian visa. Other routes will require visas for China or Mongolia — but those visas aren’t really all that hard to acquire. I’d recommend the Trans-Mongolian route, which I took from Beijing to Moscow in 1999. I used a booking service called Monkey Business:
https://www.monkeyshrine.com/
…and I was pleased with the service. Their website contains visa as well as route and booking information.
February 27th, 2010 at 12:56 am
If you are planning to ” just ride the train ” ( especially in ” plazkartniy vagon “) – don’t ! It’s plain horrible…
The best way to do it is to brake your Trans-Siberian train journey in sevaral smaller ones, with stops at Lake Baikal, beautiful old towns like Omsk, Ekaterinburg, Nizhniy Novgorod… side trips to China and Mongolia. It will take you about 3 weeks to a month +
August 10th, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Paul, I agree with your thinking. Want to take a month to 5 weeks to travel possibly both ways, stopping off along the route. Is that feasible? And what of learning a bit of the language? I have read a bit about it and I have to say, having walked the Camino in Spain some years ago, I can’t do “normal” travel anymore.