Moscow - Vladivostok:
Every second day, the 'Rossiya' ('Russia', train number 2
eastbound, train 1 westbound) leaves Moscow on its 7-day
journey to Vladivostok. This is
almost the longest train ride
of them all, 9,258 km or 6,152 miles. This train has 1st class 2-berth
compartments called spalny wagon or 'SV', 2nd class 4-berth
compartments called kupé, open-plan bunks called 'platskartny' & a restaurant car,
see the
photos below or
virtual tour. One-way fares in the summer
months cost around 18,629
rubles ($630 or £423) in kupé or 31,175 rubles ($1062 or £708) in
spalny vagon, a bit more if booked through an agency. See a brief account
of the journey. From Vladivostok there is a
weekly ferry to Japan, taking 36 hours (2 nights).
Moscow - Beijing (China):
The main Trans-Siberian line runs from Moscow to Vladivostok,
but most western travellers head for China on one of two
branches, the Trans-Mongolian line (completed in the 1950s) or
the Trans-Manchurian line (built around 1900),
see the route map below. There are two direct trains a week
between
Moscow & Beijing (Peking), train 3/4 via Mongolia using Chinese
rolling stock and train 19/20 via Manchuria using Russian rolling
stock.
Moscow - Beijing via
Mongolia: This is arguably the most
interesting Trans-Siberian route to take. The weekly
Trans-Mongolian train (train 4 eastbound, train 3 westbound)
leaves Moscow for Beijing every Tuesday night. The 7,621
km (4,735 mile) journey takes 6 days. This train crosses
Siberia, cuts across Mongolia and the Gobi desert, then enters
China. This train uses Chinese rolling stock and has
deluxe 2-berth compartments (with shared shower), 1st class
4-berth compartments & 2nd class 4-berth compartments.
Booked through a local Russian agency, journey costs around $805 or £555 one-way in 2nd class 4-berth
or $1130 or £780 in 1st class 2-berth.
See a brief account of the journey.
If you want to stop off on the way, there are lots of Russian
internal trains between Moscow, Yekaterinburg & Irkutsk
including the 'Rossiya' & 'Baikal', then there's a daily train
(number 362/363) between Irkutsk & Ulan Bator. There's
also a second weekly direct train between Moscow & Ulan Bator, train 6 eastbound, train 5 westbound.
Then are at least 2 trains a week between Ulan Bator & Beijing.
For a summary timetable,
see the Trans-Siberian timetable page.
Moscow - Beijing via Manchuria:
The weekly Trans-Manchurian train (the 'Vostok', train 20
eastbound, train 19 westbound, using Russian rolling stock)
leaves Moscow on Friday nights for Beijing via Manchuria, taking
just over six days to cover the 8,986km (5,623 miles).
There are 2-berth 1st class compartments (spalny vagon) and
4-berth 2nd class compartments (kupé). Prices are similar
to the Chinese train.
Other Trans-Siberian trains:
These aren't the only Trans-Siberian trains. Far from it!
Many other trains run over parts of these routes, including the
excellent 'Baikal' (train 9/10) every second day from Moscow* to
Irkutsk, and some slower, lower quality trains. There's
even a daily Moscow-Vladivostok slow lower-quality train, train
904, not one you'd like to get on by mistake...
See the Trans-Siberian timetable page. * The Baikal is
diverted to start in St Petersburg from June 2010.
Don't fly to Moscow!
London to Moscow
by train...
Flying to Moscow
to pick up the Trans-Siberian Railway is like entering a
marathon then accepting a lift in someone's car for the first
mile... Don't cheat! If you're going to go
overland to the far East, do it properly, starting at London
St Pancras and staying firmly on the ground. It's easy
to travel from London to Moscow by train,
click here for train times, fares & how to buy tickets.
Other European
cities to Moscow...
You can also
travel to Moscow by direct sleeping-car from Berlin, Vienna,
Prague, Helsinki, Amsterdam and many other places. To
find train times, use
http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de.
You can travel from London to Tokyo via the Trans-Siberian Railway
in about 14 days. There are two basic options:
Option 1 is to travel to Vladivostok
and take the weekly ferry to Korea & Japan. Option 2 is
to travel to Beijing in China, take an onward train to
Shanghai then one of two weekly ferries to Osaka or Kobe in
Japan. The route via China is more interesting, although
of course it requires yet another visa. It's your call!
Ferry from Vladivostok to Korea & Japan:
DBS Ferry's 1993-built passenger ship 'Eastern Dream'
sails from Vladivostok to Donghae (South Korea) and Sakaiminato
(Japan) once a week all
year round, taking 1 night to Korea, 2 nights and a day to
Japan. Vladivostok to Japan starts at US$235 one-way in
a shared sleeping room or $485 in a 2-berth cabin.
See the Trans-Siberian timetable page for
her sailing schedule & how to buy tickets. For the record, the
time-honoured Far East Shipping Company ferry service from
Vladivostok to Fushiki went out of business in late 2009.
Ferries from
China to Korea & Japan: Several weekly ferries link China with
both South Korea & Japan, including two good ferries
sailing from Shanghai to Japan. This is the more interesting route as you
get to see China and maybe Mongolia on the way, but it
requires an extra visa or two. See the China page
for ferry sailing dates, fares & how to buy tickets, also
trains between Beijing & Shanghai.
Above: Crossing the sea of Japan from Vladivostok
to Japan takes 36 hours.
The
crossing to Japan was the most enjoyable and relaxing part of
the 14-day London to Tokyo journey.
1. Decide on your final
destination. Vladivostok? Beijing?
Shanghai? Hong Kong? Tokyo? Tibet? It's even
possible to reach Saigon,
Bangkok or Singapore overland from London.
See the route map below and read the overview of the three
Trans-Siberian routes on the right. Vladivostok is an
interesting place for a day or two, but not worth a 7
day journey from Moscow unless you're catching the ferry
to
Japan. But Beijing is a wonderful destination, with
Shanghai or Xian just an overnight train ride away. How
about Japan? There are ferries from both
Vladivostok to Japan &
Shanghai to Japan.
You can even reach Vietnam by twice-weekly train from
Beijing to Hanoi (see the
Vietnam page), then travel onwards
by train and the occasional bus to Saigon, Bangkok & Singapore
(see the
Cambodia &
Thailand pages).
2.
Do you want to make the whole trip in one go, or to
stop off on the way? Travelling to
Vladivostok in 7 days without stopovers can be tedious, and it
is better the break up the journey and see something of
Siberia. On the other hand, the more varied scenery and
camaraderie on board the direct Moscow-Beijing trains makes
non-stop travel on these trains a very enjoyable option
and maximises your time in China. If you'd like to stop
off, the best stopovers are Irkutsk in Siberia and Ulan
Bator in Mongolia. Ekaterinberg & Ulan Ude are also
worth a stop.
To
help decide if and where to stop off, buy a copy of Bryn
Thomas' truly excellent Trans-Siberian
Handbook, with journey planning information, town guides,
the history of the line, and best of all, a mile-by-mile guide
to the sights you can see from the train, to help you get the
most from your trip. The Lonely Planet
Trans-Siberian Railways guide is also good.
4. Plan your Trans-Siberian
trains: There is no such train as the
'Trans-Siberian Express' but a whole range of trains across
Siberia, including many Russian domestic trains plus a handful
of direct international trains to Mongolia and China.
Plan your trains using the
Trans-Siberian Timetable page or
the Real Russia
Trans-Siberian trip planner. Within Russia, there are both
faster quality 'firmeny' trains & slower cheaper trains,
it's your call. Fares
are shown in the
fares section.
5. Plan your itinerary and
budget. How much will a trip like this cost?
Do I need a 6 month sabbatical or is 2 weeks off work enough?
It all depends on what you want to do. The only way to
know is to plan out your trip and work out a budget.
How to plan an itinerary & budget.
6. Buy your Trans-Siberian
train tickets. When you have planned your journey,
the first thing to arrange are your Trans-Siberian train
tickets.
There are several ways to buy tickets, some cheaper but more
effort, others easier but more expensive. The
how to buy tickets section below explains
all the options, but the
the Real Russia
Trans-Siberian trip planner is perhaps the best compromise
between cheapness & simplicity for arranging tickets.
8. Arrange visas.
Once you have booked the Trans-Sib train, you need to arrange
your visas. See the visa section below.
You can usually only get visas within 3 months of travel.
9. Book your train from
London to Moscow. Finally, arrange train
travel from London to Moscow to connect with the
Trans-Siberian, see the London to Russia
page. Bookings for European trains open 60 days before
departure, you cant book until reservations open, so do this
bit last.
The coaches on the Rossiya were replaced in the early 2000s and the
new interiors are shown here, courtesy of traveller Daniel
Brewster. Other Russian
'firmeny' quality trains on the Trans-Siberian Railway, such as the
St Petersburg-Irkutsk 'Baikal', are
similar.
Above:
Each carriage of the Moscow-Vladivostok 'Rossiya' carries a
nameboard... Photo
courtesy of Daniel Brewster.
Above:
A 2-berth spalny vagon (1st class) compartment on the Rossiya.
Photo courtesy of
Daniel Brewster.
Above:
A 'with services' meal served in the compartment. Courtesy
of Daniel Brewster.
Above:
Restaurant car on the Rossiya - note the Xmas decorations! Photo
courtesy of Daniel Brewster.
Above:
The restaurant car also has a bar area.
Photo
courtesy of Daniel Brewster.
Photo
courtesy of Daniel Brewster.
Virtual tour of the 'Rossiya':
Click here
for a virtual tour inside the 'Rossiya' train from Moscow to
Vladivostok. The this nifty virtual tour on the Russian
Railways website shows the 4-berth & 2-berth sleepers and restaurant
car.
Virtual journey on the 'Rossiya':
Google Maps have posted a complete
real-time video of the view from the window on the
Moscow-Vladivostok 'Rossiya', see
www.google.ru/intl/ru/landing/transsib/en.html. Though it
will take 7 days to watch!
to check train times
between any two main stops on the Trans-Siberian
Railway and to buy tickets online
This links
directly to the RZD (Russian Railways) database, and gives
current train times between main stations anywhere in
Russia & the other ex-Soviet States, as well as on the
Trans-Siberian Railway.
The good news is
that a Trans-Siberian journey needn't be expensive if you
travel independently rather than with an inclusive tour.
It's a real railway with regular fares, not an expensive
'tourist experience'. For over 5,000 miles of travel, a bed for
5 to 7 nights and a world-class travel experience, it's a bargain!
However, what you pay will varyenormously,
depending on:
Which class you
choose. Most western travellers go 2nd class 4-berth
(kupé). 1st class 2-berth (spalny vagon ) is
nice if you can afford it, but twice as expensive as kupé so only worth it if
money is not an issue. 3rd class (platskartny open-plan bunks) is a bit
basic for most western travellers and not available on every
train, but some adventurous low-budget travellers enjoy it.
Whether you travel
independently (cheaper) or book an all-inclusive tour (more
expensive).
If travelling
independently, whether you buy your ticket through a Russian
travel agency like Svezhy Veter or Real Russia (cheaper, recommended), a western travel agency (more
expensive), or at the ticket
office (cheapest, but not always practical).
If booking through
an agency, which agency you use. Demand for the two
weekly Moscow-Beijing trains exceeds supply, and Russian Railways
sells off tickets to travel agencies before bookings
open to the public. These agencies then sell tickets for whatever price they can get for them. So
shop around!
For journeys
wholly within Russia, whether you travel on a 'firmeny' fast
quality train (recommended) such as train 2 'Rossiya' and
train 10
'Baikal', or a slow unnamed lower-quality train such
as trains 240, 340 or 904 which have cheaper fares. As a general rule, low train
numbers are quality trains, slower low-quality trains have
three-digit train numbers. When you contact an agency, make
sure you know what specific train number you're being quoted a fare
for!
Some quality
trains within Russia, such as the Baikal & Rossiya allow you
to buy tickets 'with services' or 'without services'.
'With services' means that a light breakfast and cooked dinner
with beer are served in your compartment (or sometimes in the
restaurant car),
like
the meal shown in these photos. Buying a ticket
'with services' is often a good idea.
If you buy tickets
at the ticket office in Moscow...
Typical fares
charged at the ticket office are shown below, taken from the
Russian Railways website
www.rzd.ru (their journey planner is in Russian
only). Russian
fares vary by season, higher in summer, lower in winter, the
ones below are for June. Higher fares are charged
for fast high-quality 'firmeny' trains, lower fares for slower
low-quality trains, I recommend firmeny trains unless you are
on a very tight budget. How to buy tickets yourself at the ticket office in Moscow. Buying tickets at
the ticket office is a practical option for most Russian
domestic journeys, such as Moscow-Irkutsk or
Irkutsk-Vladivostok or even Moscow-Vladivostok, assuming that
it wouldn't upset your plans to have to take a different train
or travel a day later than planned if your first choice of
train was fully booked. But if you have limited time and
a definite itinerary, pre-booking your trains via an agency is
a better option, see the next section.
One way, per
person, in roubles:
Platskartny
3rd class bunks
Kupé
2nd class 4-berth
Spalny vagon
1st class 2-berth
Moscow - Vladivostok
(firmeny train 2 'Rossiya')
7,574
(£172 )
18,629 (£423)
31,175 (£708)
Moscow - Irkutsk (firmeny train
2 'Rossiya')
5,917
(£134)
14,533 (£330)
24,336 (£553)
Moscow - Irkutsk (slow train
640 or 340)
3,594
(£81)
8,859 (£201)
17,660 (£401)
St Petersburg - Irkutsk (firmeny
train 10 'Baikal')
The price charged at the
ticket office for trains 3, 4, 5, 6, 19 or 20 is virtually
irrelevant. Demand exceeds supply and tickets are bought in bulk by
Russian travel agencies before booking opens to the
public, so the ticket office will usually tell you they
are full. You should
buy through an agency
if you want to travel on these trains.
On the best
trains you can buy tickets 'without services' meaning without
any meals, or
'with services' meaning with all your meals included, either served in the
restaurant or in your compartment. All the fares shown
above and below are
'without services'. Expect to pay an extra 1,336 rubles
(£31) in kupé or 2,211 rubles (£50) in spalny vagon for a
'with services' ticket on train 2 from Moscow to Irkutsk
for example, not bad value for a 4-day trip! You can see
an example of the food in the 'Rossiya' photos above.
If you buy
tickets from a Russian travel agency...
Unless you have
lots of time and can afford to take pot luck when you get to
Moscow, you'll probably want to book your trains in advance.
You can't book online with Russian Railways
(certainly not in English), so most westerners buy tickets
through a travel agency, either a
local Russian agency (the cheapest way, recommended) or a
specialist western agency
(sometimes less hassle, but significantly more
expensive). Different agencies charge completely
different prices for the same journey, so shop around for the
best deal. However, to give you a rough idea,
here are the prices charged by Real Russia in 2010,
including their agency mark-up. 'Shopping around' means
emailing each agency for a specific quote, not just looking at
their website, as some agencies don't update their
sites when prices rise - and Russian & Chinese railways have
imposed some big fare
rises in recent years. When emailing an agency, be specific about
which train you want, and remember to ask about their delivery
charges & credit card fees. I've seen websites quote very
competitive prices for (say) Moscow-Irkutsk which turn out to
be for a low-quality slow train, the price they charge for a
fast 'firmeny' quality train such as the 'Baikal' or 'Rossiya'
is higher and less competitive. And some agencies charge
credit card fees of up to 12% on top of their advertised fares (Real Russia
charge 2.5%).
How to buy tickets from Russian
travel agencies.
One way, per
person:
Platskartny
3rd class bunks
Kupé
2nd class 4-berth
Spalny vagon
1st class 2-berth
Moscow to Beijing
(Trans-Mongolian, train 4)
-
£555
($804)
£780
($1131)
Moscow to Beijing
(Trans-Manchurian, train 20)
-
£564
($817)
£857
($1242)
Moscow to Vladivostok
(firmeny train 2, 'Rossiya')
If you buy
tickets from a western travel agency...
There are various
western agencies who specialise in Trans-Siberian travel.
They can sell you a package tour or arrange a tailor-made tour
for you, but they can also sell just a train ticket if you like. Their prices vary enormously, so shop around.
More information about
arranging your trip through a western tour agency.
In Russia, children under 5 sharing
a berth with an adult go free, children 5 to 10 travel at half
the adult fare.
On the Trans-Manchurian and
Trans-Mongolian international trains (trains 3, 4, 19, 20),
children under 4 go free if they share a berth, children 4 to
11 (inclusive) travel at 75% of the adult fare.
For journeys wholly within China,
children under 110cm tall travel free, 110-140cm tall travel
for half fare, over 140cm tall pay full fare.
You can
walk up to the ticket office at any Russian station and buy a
ticket for any journey in Russia, including the
Trans-Siberian Railway. This is the cheapest way to book because you
pay
the real Russian Railways price. It's not usually difficult to
get a ticket for internal
Russian journeys a day or two before departure, for
example Moscow-Ekaterinberg, Moscow-Irkutsk or even
Moscow-Vladivostok, especially if you can be flexible about
your exact departure date, time or class of travel. The daily
Irkutsk-Ulan Bator train is not too difficult to book at the
ticket office, either. To avoid language problems, it's
a good idea to learn the Russian alphabet so you can write
down your requirements to show to the ticket office staff.
When writing dates, use roman numerals for the month, or
example for '3 June 2010' write '3 VI 2010'. Many big
Russian stations now have a 'servis tsentr' (service centre)
where you pay a small fee (about 100 rubles) to book your
ticket in a relaxed air-conditioned environment. Russian railway reservations are
computerised, so you can arrange any journey from any station,
as long as the journey starts in Russia or one of the
ex-Soviet states. For information on buying train
tickets at the station in Ulan Bator (Mongolia),
see below.
If you know the
Russian alphabet, you can check Russian train fares and
availability online at the Russian Railways website
using
this step-by-step guide for non-Russian speakers. So
for example, you could see how many tickets are left today for
tomorrow's train to Irkutsk. That might give you a good
idea of how easy it is to get tickets at short notice.
Just remember that summer will be busier than winter, and
Fridays busier than mid-week.
However,
demand exceeds supply for the two weekly Moscow-Beijing Trans-Mongolian
& Trans-Manchurian trains (trains 4 & 20), also the weekly
Moscow-Ulan Bator train (train 6), especially in the busy May-September peak season. Here's how the system works: Russian Railways
open up bookings to travel agencies for these and other trains
60 days before departure, before bookings open to the public
45 days before departure. Knowing that demand for these
particular trains exceeds
supply, the Russian agencies buy up blocks of tickets, leaving
few or none for sale at the ticket office when public bookings
open. The agencies then re-sell these tickets for
whatever price they can get, which often bears no relation to
the face value of the ticket. Trans-Mongolian
Moscow-Beijing train number 4 is particularly popular, and 1st
class deluxe 2-berth on this train can sell out very quickly
indeed, with more travel agencies trying to fulfil orders from
rich privacy-loving westerners for deluxe berths than there
are deluxe berths on the train. So these particular trains should be
booked through an agency, see the next section. Ulan
Bator to Beijing is also a pinch-point, as there are only 2
trains a week, so this too is best booked in advance through
an agency.
Unless you're on a six-month sabbatical with time no object,
you'll probably want to arrange your Trans-Siberian tickets in
advance before you leave home, rather than take pot luck at
the ticket office. The best option is to buy tickets
over the internet through a reputable local Russian travel
agency such as Real Russia or Svezhy Veter.
Real Russia
(www.realrussia.co.uk)
deserve a special mention, as they've developed an online trip
planner that makes planning a Trans-Siberian journey &
ordering tickets remarkably easy, even with several stopovers
on the way. In terms of price,
simplicity & reputation, they're one of the best Russian
agencies to use. The company was started by a Brit who now
lives in Russia, hence the '.co.uk'. The prices shown on
the Real Russia system are the actual Russian railways price
plus a small (15%-23%) mark-up (all agencies mark up the basic
price, naturally). Their system is linked to the actual
Russian Railways timetable & fares database.
The Trans-Siberian
trip planner...
This is one of
the easiest & cheapest ways to arrange a
Trans-Siberian train journey, even one with several
stopovers.
How it works: Choose your route
(Trans-Siberian to/from Vladivostok,
Trans-Mongolian or Trans-Manchurian to/from
Beijing), pick your end points (Moscow,
Beijing, Vladivostok, eastbound or westbound) &
enter your date of departure.
On the next page
you can choose where you want to stop off, and
select how many days to spend in each place.
Then it'll give you
a choice of trains & prices for each leg of your
trip, and let you order all the tickets in one go.
Booking tips:
On the
train results pages, 1st class = 2-berth.
2nd class = 4-berth, the recommended option for most
travellers. 3rd class = platskartny
open-plan bunks.
The Chinese classify sleeper types differently from
the Russians, so westbound trains 3 & 19 from Beijing
to Moscow are shown as having '3rd class', but this
is in fact the same 4-berth sleepers shown on
eastbound trains as 2nd class. '2nd class' on
train 3 is what other agencies call 1st class 4-berth. There is
no platskartny or Chinese-style hard class on trains
3/4 or 19/20, so any mention of 3rd class or hard
class on these trains actually means 4-berth
sleepers.
Trains
marked 'Firm' are Firmeny high-quality
trains, with higher fares than other
trains. Firmeny trains are recommended unless you're
on a tight budget.
On the
best trains you can book tickets with or without
meals. 'With meals' is often a good idea.
Can
anyone buy tickets using this system? Yes,
you can buy tickets online with a credit card
whether you live in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia,
or wherever.
How
are tickets delivered? Tickets are
collected free of charge at Real Russia's offices in
Moscow or St Petersburg, or sent to UK or
EU addresses for a £12-£15 fee, or couriered to
any address worldwide, also for an extra charge.
Who runs this
service & is it reliable? This service
is provided by Real Russia, a reputable joint
UK-Russian company which gets good reports from
users.
Is
this the cheapest way to buy tickets? Real
Russia charge the regular Russian Railways fare plus
a 15-23% mark-up to cover their costs. All agencies
charge a mark-up, but Real Russia is usually one of the
cheapest. There's
a 2.5% charge for credit card payments, but
you can avoid this by calling their UK office to pay
by debit card when your tickets are confirmed.
The fares shown include the mark-up, but not the
credit card charge. By all means shop around
other agencies. Seat61 gets some commission if
you book through this system.
Option 3: Other reputable Russian agencies who can
arrange tickets...
Real Russia are just one of several reputable Russian
agencies who can arrange Trans-Siberian train tickets, see
below for the best of the rest... Booking through a
Russian agency is much cheaper than booking a package tour or
tailor-made tour through a western
travel agency.
Naturally, these Russian agencies charge more than you'd pay at the ticket
office, but not usually that much more. However, prices vary
enormously from agency to agency, so shop around. Make sure that any quote you
get is inclusive of any credit card fees, and that you know
whether it's for a slow low-quality train (3-digit train
numbers) or one of the fast quality trains such as the
'Baikal' or 'Rossiya' (one or two-digit train numbers &
usually a name). Travel agencies keep their own waiting
lists and will take Trans-Siberian bookings months ahead, well
before the 60 day point when they can buy up the actual
ticket, so contact a booking agency as far
ahead as you can. If you're booking closer to the
departure date, you may find that one travel agency says the
train is full, but another agency has bought a block of
tickets speculatively and has some left, or knows a rival
agency that it can buy tickets from. So again, shop around!
Svezhy Veter,
G&R International, Ost-West & Real Russia have all been highly recommended by Seat61 correspondents
and are all reputable companies, although further feedback
is always welcome. Tickets can be picked up at their
offices in Moscow or
sent to you for a courier fee. Some agencies (but not
Real Russia) may
ask you to fax them a photocopy of your credit card and/or
passport, which sounds dodgy, but for some reason seems quite
usual
when dealing with Russian companies.
Be prepared for a 7%-12% credit card fee (Real Russia charge
only 2.5%), but using a credit card is still a
safer way to buy tickets than using a money transfer. These Russian agencies can also book hotels in Moscow and
other Russian cities, and they can arrange a visa support
letter for Russia (or use the recommended visa
service at
www.realrussia.co.uk).
Remember that
Russian Railways opens its reservation system to the public 45
days before departure, and to Russian travel agencies 60 days ahead.
Whatever they promise you, an agency cannot 101% confirm your train
reservation until then. However, travel agencies will
still take your booking (and money) several months ahead
as they keep their own internal waiting lists for the most
popular trains such as the Moscow-Beijing Trans-Mongolian &
Trans-Manchurian trains. They will make
your reservation with Russian Railways the moment bookings
open for agencies, 60 days before departure.
99.9% of the time there's no problem, but very occasionally
there are more tourists wanting berths than there are berths, especially
for the deluxe
2-berth 1st class on Trans-Mongolian trains 3/4 as this is
very popular with rich shower-loving westerners. If you're trying
for the deluxe 1st class, tell your agency in advance that
you'll accept a 1st or 2nd class 4-berth ticket (or that
you're willing to pay for
dual occupancy of a 4-berth compartment) if the deluxe
2-berth is sold out.
Most of these
Russian agencies can arrange hotels or train bookings in
Mongolia or China through their contacts there.
Otherwise, you can arrange these separately. A good starting point for Mongolia is the
official Mongolia tourist board website, www.mongoliatourism.gov.mn, also try
www.discovermongolia.mn. You can make onwards train reservations within China (for
example, Beijing to
Shanghai, Hong Kong, Xian, or even
Hanoi) through
www.chinatripadvisor.com,
or book yourself at the ticket office when you get to China.
The
most hassle-free way of arranging a Trans-Siberian trip,
but the most expensive, is to arrange a tailor-made
itinerary through one of the western travel agencies
who specialise in independent travel to Russia. There
are various agencies in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, New
Zealand, and so on. They can arrange your
Russian visa, your hotel in Moscow, your Trans-Siberian train
reservation, stop-overs and tours if you want them in places like
Irkutsk or Mongolia, connecting trains in China and even
the ship to Japan.
Real
Russia,
www.realrussia.co.uk. This is a joint UK-Russian
company, originally doing just visas, then Russian train
tickets, and now they've started doing inclusive
Trans-Siberian tours as well. They really know what
they're doing, and have tours with better class of hotels
and more feature-laden itineraries, at cheaper prices than
many other western operators. For example, a
Moscow-Beijing 'Three capitals' trip with visits, city
tours and hotels in Moscow, Mongolia and Beijing starts at
£1,335 per person for two people travelling together or
£1,450 for a solo traveller, with 2 tour departures a
month, departure dates guaranteed with no minimum group
size, but there's a maximum group size so (as their site
puts it) you're a small group not a 'herd'. Seat61
gets some commission if you use the
www.realrussia.co.uk link, but
feedback is always
welcomed. Reports on Real Russia's service with
visas and train tickets are always very positive, but it's
too early for feedback on their new tours yet.
The Russia
Experience,
www.trans-siberian.co.uk,
call 020
8566 8846: Another
reliable and experienced agency with good-value tours and
tailor-made itineraries. The Russia Experience charges about £840
for a ticket from Moscow to Beijing
in 2nd class 4-berth on train 20 including two nights hotel in
Moscow. Travelling 1st class in a 2-berth room on this
train costs about £1,240. Getting to Moscow, hotels in
China, visas and return trains/flights are extra - you can
arrange these yourself or they can do this for you. Unfortunately, The Russia
Experience no longer book places on the Chinese
Trans-Mongolian train (train
4), but they can book you on the Moscow-Ulan Bator and
Ulan Bator-Beijing trains with a stop-over in Mongolia.
Intourist
UK,
www.intouristuk.com,
call 0844 875 4026 (UK callers only): A
well-established and experienced UK agency, Intourist can
arrange tailor-made Trans-Siberian itineraries.
Intourist offer fares of about £720 per person for a
Moscow-Beijing ticket on the Trans-Mongolian train in 2nd
class 4-berth, including one night in a hotel in Moscow
and all meals on the train for the first four days, but
always get a quote as these prices are subject to
availability. 1st class deluxe 2-berth is offered at
£1,013, again subject to availability. Intourist can
also book westbound Beijing-Moscow trains (which for some
reason cost a few pounds more than eastbound), stopover
tours along the Trans-Siberian Railway, the
Vladivostok-Japan ferry and key trains in China. Getting
to Moscow, hotels in China, visas and return
trains/flights are extra - you can arrange these yourself
or they can do this for you. For Moscow to Vladivostok,
Intourist charge about £792 one-way in 2nd class 4-berth
or £1,445 in 1st class 2-berth.
Vodka Trainwww.vodkatrain.com: An
Australian agency offering budget Trans-Siberian tours.
Trans-Sputnik, www.trans-sputnik.nl.
This is a Dutch agency, but very good value so they are
worth contacting even if you're not Dutch! They offer one-way Moscow-Beijing
fares from 510 euros (£465) 2nd class 4-berth or 750 euros
(£680) 1st class 2-berth on train 4, a bit more for train 20.
They can also arrange an Amsterdam-Moscow ticket from 265
euros (£240) one-way with sleeper.
Sundowners,
www.sundownersoverland.com:
Sundowners offer all sorts of tours, including trips
covering just train travel plus a night or two's hotel at
each end. Sundowners offer Moscow-Beijing trips via Mongolia, with many options and
stopovers available.
Flower
Travel Pty (Australia),
www.trans-siberian.com.au, an Australian agency.
A whole range of Tans-Siberian trips is offered, with
visas and tickets and hotels all arranged for you.
How to buy train
tickets from London to Moscow...
The
Trans-Siberian Railway starts at St Pancras station in London,
so don't cheat by flying the first few hundred miles!
It's easy to travel from London to Moscow using Eurostar to
Brussels, a connecting train to Cologne and the daily Russian
sleeping-car direct from Cologne to Moscow,
see the London to Russia page.
You can only book European
trains 2 months in advance or less, so wait to buy your train tickets
to
Moscow after you've arranged everything else. Decide which service you
want using the London to Russia page,
then call
Deutsche
Bahn's UK office on 08718 80 80 66 (no booking fee)orwww.europeanrail.com
on 020 7619 1083 (£35 booking fee, but sometimes more
familiar with exotic bookings like this) to buy tickets.
You can buy tickets at the International Railway Ticketing
Office on Zamchyd Gudamj, a couple of roads over from the
railway station. The foreigners booking office is in
room 212, open 08:00-20:00 Monday-Friday (at weekends use the
normal booking window). International trains to Irkutsk,
Moscow and Beijing can be booked up to 30 days in advance,
except for berths on the Moscow-Beijing and Beijing-Moscow
trains 3/4, which only become available the day before
departure. To reserve trains starting in Ulan Bator from
outside Mongolia, either (a) contact a local hotel, guesthouse
or travel agency in Ulan Bator for example,
www.discovermongolia.mn or
www.legendtour.ru), or use one of the Russian agencies as
most have contacts in Mongolia who can arrange tickets
starting in Ulan Bator.
If
you book through a travel agency (either a western or a
Russian one) they may be able to book
connecting trains within China for you to Xian, Shanghai, Hong
Kong or even Hanoi in Vietnam. Or you can book
trains in China yourself at the ticket office when you get
there. Alternatively, you can pre-book using
www.chinatripadvisor.com.
For train times, fares and how to book trains in China, see the China page.
Train times and fares for the twice-weekly train from Beijing
to Hanoi are shown on the Vietnam page.
If
you book through a UK travel agency, they may be able to
book the Vladivostok to Korea & Japan or Shanghai to Japan
ferries
for you. However, it's cheapest to book these ferries yourself by
e-mailing or calling the ferry company.
See the Trans-Siberian
Timetable page for Vladivostok-Korea-Japan sailing
schedule
and how to buy tickets, and see the China
page for Shanghai-Japan sailing schedule and how to buy
tickets.
If you're going Trans-Siberian
one-way & returning by air, it's not
hard to find
affordable one-way flights.
Virgin Atlantic Airlineshas direct
non-stop flights from Beijing, Shanghai or Hong Kong to
London, a great choice for both price and service. Or
search
e-bookers.com to compare multiple airlines to or from a
whole range of far-eastern airports. Seat61 gets a small commission through
these links.
The absolute
cheapest way to buy westbound Trans-Sib tickets is in person
at one of the reservation offices in Beijing. However,
the two weekly Beijing-Moscow trains get booked up well in
advance, so buy tickets as far in
advance as you can. Westbound trains are easier to get
berths on than eastbound trains, and winter is easier than
finding a place than the peak summer season from May to
September. Train 3 to Moscow via Mongolia is often fully
booked a couple of weeks in advance especially in summer,
although it can be easier to get a berth on train 19 via
Manchuria, which occasionally has berths available even a few
days before departure (but not always!). So the basic
message is this: If you positively have to be on a
specific train on a specific date, forget booking at the
ticket office, you should pre-book via CITS or some other
agency and pay their extra fee. But if you're living in
Beijing, or plan to be there for some time before leaving, and
can be a bit flexible about exactly what date you leave, booking in
person can be a practical option. You can buy
Trans-Siberian train tickets in person in Beijing at:
the international train booking office on the ground floor of
the Beijing International Hotel. This is about five
minutes walk north of Beijing main station on Jianguo Men Nei Dajie,
open 08:30-12:00 & 13:30-17:00 Monday-Friday, 09:00-11:00 &
14:00-16:00 on weekends and holidays. The staff speak
basic English and leaflets are available with international
train times in English. See the section
above for fares.
Beijing main
station (metro Bejingzhan), in the ticketing office for
foreigners. This is on the north west corner of the
1st floor, accessed via the soft seat waiting room, open
05:30-07:30, 08:00-18:30, 19:00-23:00. It's now
reported (2008) that this office no longer sells
international tickets.
BTG Travel &
Tours, on Fwai Dajie between the New Otani and Gloria Plaza
Hotels, open 08:00-20:00. They have a desk for
Trans-Siberian tickets, with information in English.
Option 2: Buy tickets by phone or email with China Travel
Service (CITS)...
CITS are the
official Chinese state tourist agency, and this is probably
the cheapest way to buy westbound Trans-Sib tickets starting
in Beijing, other than buying in person at the ticket office, see
the fares above. You can book trains from Beijing to Moscow, Irkutsk or Ulan
Bator by emailing
support-en@cits.com.cn (you can check details on the CITS website,
www.cits.net) or by calling CITS on
+ 86 10 6512 0507 or + 86 10 6512
0503). It was reported back in 2005 that CITS had
stopped taking email or phone bookings, but they are now taking bookings
by email again. Expect to pay by bank transfer rather than
credit card. Reports also suggest they can't book
Beijing-Irkutsk tickets on train 3, only Beijing-Krasnoyarsk and beyond,
so by all means ask for Beijing-Irkutsk, but be prepared to
accept an offer of a Beijing-Krasnoyarsk ticket and simply get
off in Irkutsk (though their website shows Beijing-Irkutsk
fares!). They will still be the cheapest way to
buy tickets!
Further feedback on the CITS booking situation is
very welcome, to help keep this page updated.
Option 3: Buy tickets through an agency in China
or Hong Kong...
If you're in China or Japan and
want an agency to arrange your westbound Trans-Siberian
trip, try one of these two agencies:
Chinatripadvisor (www.chinatripadvisor.com):
If you just want the Trans-Siberian train ticket, a cheaper
option is to buy it
through
www.chinatripadvisor.com.
Beijing to Moscow costs $610 in hard/2nd class 4-berth, $899
in soft/1st class 4-berth or $979 in
deluxe soft/1st class 2-berth on Trans-Mongolian train 3, or $719 2nd
class 4-berth, $1109 1st class 2-berth on Trans-Manchurian train 19.
Monkey Shrine (www.monkeyshrine.com).
Monkey Shrine is an experienced China-based tour agency who can arrange a tailor-made itinerary with stop-overs and hotels along the way,
plus help with visas. Monkeyshrine offer a good service,
but are naturally more expensive than booking it all yourself
via CITS. A key advantage is being able to arrange
onward tickets, not just tickets starting in Beijing, and to
arrange hotels or tours along the way. They charge 649
euros (about $850) for a one-way Beijing to Moscow ticket in
4-berth on train 3.
Option 4: The Real
Russia trip planner & online ticket system...
Real Russia's online trip planner makes planning a
Trans-Siberian journey & ordering tickets remarkably easy, and
it works westbound as well as eastbound. The prices shown on
the Real Russia system are the actual Russian railways price
plus a small (15%-23%) mark-up (all agencies mark up the basic
price). Their system is linked to the actual
Russian Railways timetable & fares database.
The Trans-Siberian
trip planner...
Choose your
route
(Trans-Siberian from Vladivostok,
Trans-Mongolian or Trans-Manchurian from
Beijing),
pick your end points
(Moscow, Beijing, Vladivostok, eastbound or
westbound) and enter your date of departure.
On the next page
you can choose where you want to stop off, and
select how many days to spend in each place.
Then it'll give you
a choice of specific trains and prices for each
leg of your trip, and let you order all the
tickets in one go.
Can
anyone buy tickets using this system? Yes,
you can buy tickets online with a credit card
whether you live in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia,
or wherever.
How
are tickets delivered? Tickets can be sent to UK or
EU addresses for a £12-£15 fee, or couriered to
any address worldwide, also for an extra charge.
Tickets for eastbound journeys can be collected free
of charge at Real Russia's offices in Moscow or St
Petersburg.
Who runs this
service & is it reliable? This
service is provided by Real Russia, a reputable
joint UK-Russian company which gets good reports
from users. Real Russia can also arrange your
visas for Russia, Belarus, Mongolia
& China.
Booking tips: On the train results pages,
1st class = 2-berth. 2nd class =
4-berth (recommended for most travellers).
3rd class = platskartny open-plan bunks.
Trains marked 'Firm' are Firmeny high-quality
trains, with higher fares than 'fast' or 'pass'
trains, Firmeny trains are recommended unless you're
on a tight budget.
Classes: Because the Chinese classify
sleeper types differently from the Russians,
westbound trains 3 & 19 from Beijing to Moscow are
shown as having '3rd class', but this is in fact 2nd
class 4-berth. '2nd class' on train 3 is in
fact 1st class 4-berth. There is no
platskartny or Chinese-style hard class on trains
3/4 or 19/20.
Is
this the cheapest way to buy tickets? Real
Russia charge the regular Russian Railways fare plus
a 15-23% mark-up to cover their costs (all agencies
charge a mark-up, Real Russia is one of the
cheapest). There's
a 2.5% charge for credit card payments, but
you can avoid this by calling their UK office to pay
by debit card when your tickets are confirmed.
The fares shown include the mark-up, but not the
credit card charge. By all means shop around
other agencies as prices charged can vary.
Seat61
gets some commission if you book through this
system.
Option 5:
Buy Russian train tickets from a Russian agency
If you want a ticket from Vladivostok
to Moscow
ticket, or intend stopping off within Russia and need some tickets for
Trans-Siberian travel wholly within Russia, you can book
through several Russian agencies. They can often arrange
westbound Beijing to Moscow tickets through their contacts in
China, too. These agencies charge
more than the ticket office price, but not necessarily that
much more. They can also
arrange visa support for Russia and hotels in Moscow.
Try each agency to see who charges the best prices.
For travel from Japan to Europe
via Vladivostok, you can book the ship from Japan to
Vladivostok directly with the shipping company via
www.bisintour.com, then book the Vladivostok-Moscow train through one of these Russian
agencies.
The most hassle-free way to book Trans-Siberian travel, but
the most expensive, is to arrange a tailor-made itinerary with
a western agency specialising in Trans-Siberian trips.
They can arrange your whole journey, either eastbound or
westbound, with stop-overs and hotels along the way if you
want them, plus visa support.
See the section above for agency details, links and sample prices.
How to buy train tickets for onwards travel from Moscow to western Europe...
Don't cheat..! Finish your Trans-Siberian journey by
train all the way to London St Pancras.
You can book onwards travel by
train from
Moscow to Berlin, Brussels, Prague, Vienna and many other
European cities through a Russian agency such as the four
agencies listed in option 4 above, though the final Eurostar
leg to London will need to be booked separately online. See the
London to Russia page for train information from Moscow to
London.
How to buy train tickets in Ulan Bator, Mongolia...
You can buy tickets at the International Railway Ticketing
Office on Zamchyd Gudamj, a couple of roads over from the
railway station. The foreigners booking office is in
room 212, open 08:00-20:00 Monday-Friday (at weekends use the
normal booking window). International trains to Irkutsk,
Moscow and Beijing can be booked up to 30 days in advance,
except for berths on the Moscow-Beijing and Beijing-Moscow
trains 3/4, which only become available the day before
departure.
If you're going Trans-Siberian
one-way & one-way by air, it's not
hard to find
affordable one-way flights.
Virgin Atlantic Airlineshas direct
non-stop flights from the UK to Beijing, Shanghai or Hong
Kong, a great choice for both price and service. Or
search
e-bookers.com to compare multiple airlines to or from a
whole range of far-eastern airports . Seat61 gets a small commission through
these links.
Check train times & buy
Trans-Siberian train tickets online...
This system links to
www.realrussia.co.uk, a joint UK-Russian agency selling
Trans-Siberian train tickets. It uses data direct
from the RZD (Russian Railways) database so is a good
way to check Trans-Siberian train times. It's also
a good way to buy Russian or Trans-Siberian train
tickets, although this form only sells one journey at a
time, for multiple tickets across Siberia it's better to
use the
Trans-Siberian trip planner above.
What tickets
can this system sell? This system can sell
tickets for any mainline train journey within
Russia, Ukraine, Latvia, Estonia, Belarus,
Lithuania, Kazakhstan and the other ex-Soviet
states, including the Trans-Siberian Railway to
Mongolia & China. It will also sell tickets for journeys
starting in those countries heading outwards, for
example Moscow to Beijing or Irkutsk to Ulan Bator. Reservations officially open 45
days before departure, but Real Russia allow you to
request tickets up to 180 days ahead and they will
contact you for payment when the price is confirmed.
Can
anyone buy tickets using this system? Yes,
you can buy tickets online with a credit card
whether you live in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia,
or wherever.
How
are tickets delivered? Tickets are
collected free of charge at Real Russia's offices in
Moscow or St Petersburg, or an e-ticket can be
emailed to you so you can collect the ticket from
most main stations in Russia. Tickets can be sent to UK or
EU addresses for a £12-£15 fee, or couriered to
any address worldwide, also for an extra charge.
Who runs this
service & is it reliable? This
service is provided by Real Russia, a reputable
joint UK-Russian company which gets good reports
from users. Real Russia can also arrange your
visas for Russia, Belarus, Mongolia
& China.
Booking tips: Look for a train marked 'Firm'
if there is one. 'Firmeny' trains are the best
'quality' trains, with modern coaches and good
on-board service. 'TBC' means the system
cannot provide a price for that particular train
automatically, but they'll contact you with a cost
by phone or email.
Is
this the cheapest way to buy tickets? Real
Russia charge the regular Russian Railways fare plus
a 15-23% mark-up to cover their costs (all agencies
charge a mark-up, in fact Real Russia is one of the
cheapest agencies). There's
a 2.5% charge for credit card payments, but
you can easily avoid this by calling their UK office to pay
by debit card when your tickets are confirmed.
The fares shown include the mark-up, but not the
credit card charge. By all means shop around
other agencies as prices charged can vary.
After sorting out your
Trans-Siberian tickets, you need to get your visas.
How to arrange a Russian visa...
You will need
a Russian visa. Always check
the latest visa information, as it changes from time to
time. But here's a quick run-down of the
arrangements as at 2010:
Tourist, transit or business visa? A tourist
visa allows stays of up to 30 days, and is usually what you
need. A business visa allows a longer stay, but is more
expensive. A transit visa allows up to 10 days in
transit, but you aren't allowed to spend time in Moscow, as
most Trans-Siberian travellers do, so a tourist visa is
usually better.
When to
apply? Visas are only issued 3 months or less
before your intended date of entry to Russia, so there's no need to
apply before then. Ideally, allow a month for the
visa processing, but if you have less time than this,
don't panic, various agencies offer 'express' services that will help you get a visa
much quicker.
Letters of invitation & visa support: A hangover
from Soviet times is that to get a visa you need supporting documentation,
usually just called 'visa support'. In theory, this is a
letter of invitation from your travel agency setting out
confirmed travel & accommodation arrangements for your entire
stay in Russia or (for
independent travellers) an accommodation voucher issued by your hotel(s)
showing confirmed accommodation for each and every night you plan to spend in Russia.
Having to pre-book all this would be ridiculously restrictive, so here's how it
really works: You go to an agency such as
www.realrussia.co.uk or one of the Russian agencies listed
above and they sell you the necessary visa support for a small
fee, which allows you to get a visa without any genuine hotel
bookings, so you can travel around freely just as you would in
any other country, buying tickets and finding hotels as you
go. Behind the scenes, the agency usually has an arrangement with a local
hotel, they make a dummy 'reservation' for the period you want
to be in Russia
so they can legally issue the visa support,
though of course you don't pay for the hotel and everyone knows
(apart from the Russian government) that you have no intention
of ever using that hotel room. Crazy, eh?
The easy way to get a Russian visa: The easiest, quickest
& least-hassle way to get a Russian visa is to ask
www.realrussia.co.uk to get it for you (to use their
service, you need to be a
UK resident, or at least resident in the UK for over 90 days
before the application). Real Russia is a reliable UK agency
based in Russia which
arranges Russian
visas simply and
cheaply, with all
the necessary visa support included in the price. They have
been recommended by several seat61 correspondents.
Seat61 gets a small commission if you buy through
www.realrussia.co.uk using this link.
www.realrussia.co.uk can also arrange visas for Belarus,
Mongolia & China,
and arrange train tickets too. If you have feedback on their service, please email me.
Dates of entry & exit: Make sure you get these
right. It should be obvious, but I've known people date
their visa for the date they arrive in Moscow, then get thrown
off their sleeper train when it arrives at the Russian
frontier the night before, as their visa wasn't valid for
entering Russia until the next day. Your date of entry
into Russia is the date you physically enter Russian
territory, in other words the date your train rolls across
the frontier, not the date you reach Moscow, which is
irrelevant. Similarly, your date of exit is the date you
physically leave Russian territory, which on a westbound
sleeper train could be the day after you leave Moscow.
Double-check train times to see when it reaches the frontier,
and double-check that the embassy have given you the right
dates when you get your passport back with the visa.
Arranging a Russian visa in Beijing: The Russian
embassy in Beijing will not issue tourist visas for
Russia to anyone except Chinese residents, but they can
issue you with a transit visa, valid up to 10 days. It
costs around £70 and can be obtained in 1 day. This will
get you home, but will not allow you to stop off anywhere,
other than as necessary to change trains in Moscow.
You'll need a
Belarus transit visa if you are travelling between London
&
Moscow on the direct
London-Cologne-Berlin-Warsaw-Moscow route, as all the
direct trains from Cologne, Berlin or Warsaw to Moscow or
St Petersburg pass through Belarus. However, getting
a Belarus transit visa is
relatively straightforward. You'll need a tourist
visa if you plan to stop off in Belarus.
You will need
to get your Russian visa before applying for the Belarus
one, although you can apply for both together if you go
through
www.realrussia.co.uk.
Cost: The
Belarusians significantly increased visa fees in June
2007 and again in August 2008. A Belarus transit visa
now costs £63 one-way
or £114 return if you arrange it yourself direct with the
embassy, or £83 one-way or £133
return arranged through
www.realrussia.co.uk. It takes 6 working days, or
there's an extra-fee express option which takes 2 days.
Ouch! Before you blame Johnny Foreigner for this,
the high costs are in retaliation for stringent visa
requirements imposed on Belarusian by the UK Foreign
Office.
For official visa information see
the Belarus embassy website,
http://belembassy.org/uk/
or call 020 7938 3677.
The embassy
address in London is 6 Kensington Court, London W8 5DL,
visa section open 09:00-12:30 Monday-Friday.
The simple way to get a Belarus transit visa: If you live in the UK,
the easiest and quickest way to get a Belarus visa is to use
www.realrussia.co.uk. Real Russia is a reliable UK agency which
arranges visas simply and
cheaply, including all
necessary visa support included in the price shown on their
site. They have already recommended by one seat61 correspondent.
Seat61 gets a small commission if you buy through
www.realrussia.co.uk using this link.
www.realrussia.co.uk can also arrange Chinese and Mongolian visas,
and train tickets too. If you have feedback on their service, please email me!
Should you
avoid Belarus? Some people get worked up about
trying to avoid Belarus, and with the new higher visa fees
you might want to try. Just remember that if you pay
the visa fee, you can travel quickly and simply from
western Europe to Moscow on a direct train through Belarus
saving time and expense. Avoiding Belarus by
travelling via the Baltic states means an awkward and
time-consuming relay race of trains and buses, taking at
least 48 hours longer, with two extra hotel nights.
Going via Ukraine (Ukraine no longer requires EU citizens
to buy a visa) is quicker, but will still take at least an
extra 24 hours, changing trains in Kiev and with no easy
way to pre-book the Kiev-Moscow train before you get to
Kiev. In other words, the detour might be
interesting if you have the time and particularly want to
see Ukraine or Lithuania/Latvia on the way, but it will
take longer and in the end cost more than simply buying
the visa and travelling direct.
Getting a Belarus transit visa in Moscow:
If you're travelling westbound and want to arrange a Belarus
visa in Moscow, here's how. The Belarus embassy is at Maroseika 17⁄6, 101990, Moscow. It's a couple of
blocks from Kitai Gorod or Lubyanka metro stations. You will
need photocopies of your passport, your Russian visa & your
train ticket through Belarus, one passport photo, US$45 for same day visa issue or US$36 for
next day visa issue (for British & EU citizens), payable in
clean post-1995 US dollar bills, no change given. The visa office is open 10:00-12:00
Mon, Tue, Thur & Fri (allow plenty of time) and you pick up your passport and transit visa between
16:00-16:30 on those days. The visa entrance is down the
side, the door on the right then walk up the stairs to
the 2nd floor. If you need dollars, you can
change money into dollars at a nearby exchange office. There's also a Belarus
consulate in St Petersburg. US passport holders are currently
charged $177 for a same-day visa, because of charges
imposed by the USA on Belarusians. Visa regs &
costs change from time to time, the above is current
at the time of writing.
How to arrange a
Mongolian visa...
If you are
taking the Trans-Mongolian route and you're a UK/EU
citizen, you'll need a
Mongolian transit visa (if crossing Mongolia non-stop) or tourist visa
(if you intend stopping off).
See www.embassyofmongolia.co.uk
for information on how to obtain a Mongolian visa in the
UK. US, Singaporean, Malaysian & some other
nationalities do not now need a visa for
Mongolia, so check on their website.
As of October
2008 the Mongolian embassy in London no longer accepts
visa applications by post, so either take your passport
round to the embassy in person and collect it again some
days later, or use a visa service agency such as
www.realrussia.co.uk.
How to arrange a Chinese visa...
You'll need a
Chinese visa if you're visiting China.
You should
apply for a visa at least a month before you leave, but
less than 3 months before entering China.
In the UK, the
Chinese embassy (www.chinese-embassy.org.uk)
has outsourced visa issuing, and UK citizens should apply
for a visa via
www.visaforchina.org.uk. It costs about £30 for
a single-entry tourist visa. Alternatively, you can
use a visa service agency such as
www.realrussia.co.uk.
Chinese visa
requirements were tightened in 2008
for the Olympics, but were relaxed again afterwards.
You no longer need confirmed tickets into and
out of China, or confirmed hotel bookings for every night
in China. However,
feedback is always appreciated!
No Chinese
visas in Moscow: The Chinese embassy in Moscow
will now only issue Chinese visas to Russian nationals, so
don't plan to get your Chinese visa there.
Reduced
visa validity period: Note that the validity
window (the period for which a visa is valid when issued)
has reduced to just a couple of months, so don't plan on
months & months of travelling around before you reach
China, as your visa will have expired by then!
Above: The 'Baikal' to Irkutsk in
November.
You can travel the Trans-Sib year-round. Courtesy of
Sascha & Manuela
Dubach
Above: Worried about finding your train
if you don't speak Russian? Here's the departure board at Moscow Yaroslavski station.
Learn the alphabet and you can read the destinations.
You can clearly see that train 318 to Archangel
leaving at 19:35 will depart from platform 3.
The platforms for train 2 to Vladivostok (the
'Rossiya') departing 21:25 and train 6 to Ulan Bator
departing 21:35 are not yet shown as they are not
ready for boarding.
Learn the Russian alphabet here.
Photo courtesy of Daniel Brewster.
The
Trans-Siberian Railway runs all year round, so you can go at
any time of year. May to September are the peak months
for foreign tourists, with the warmest weather and the longest
hours of daylight. This makes booking a specific date
more difficult (you need to book well ahead) but you might
like the party atmosphere amongst like-minded travellers on
Moscow-Beijing trains 4 and 20. On the other hand,
Siberia in winter is a sight to see - the trains are well
heated, warm and cosy, you'll just need to wrap up well when
you get off for a stroll at station stops!
Should
you travel 1st or 2nd class?
On
the Russian internal trains there are normally 3
classes: 'spalny vagon' 2-berth compartments, often
described as 1st class (and sometimes called 'myagky' or
'lyux'), 'kupé' 4-berth compartments, usually
described as 2nd class, and 'platskartny' open-plan dormitory
cars, sometimes described as 3rd class. The Russian
Trans-Manchurian train (trains 19 & 20) only has spalny
vagon 2-berth and kupé 4-berth, there's no platskartny. Kupé is the way most
travellers go, and can be considered the normal class of
travel. Spalny vagon gives you much more privacy, with 2
people instead of 4 in the same size compartment, but it costs
twice as much. The choice is yours. Platskartny is a
bit rough for most western travellers, but some budget-minded
backpackers enjoy it. The Chinese
Trans-Mongolian train (trains 3 & 4) has 1st class deluxe
2-berth, 1st class 4-berth and 2nd class 4-berth. 1st
class deluxe 2-berth is expensive but worth the extra if you
can afford it as it has two beds, an armchair, and a private
washroom with showerhead shared with the next door
compartment. It gets booked out very quickly! However, 1st class 4-berth
on train 3/4 is virtually identical to 2nd class 4-berth (see
for yourself in the
photo gallery!) and is
probably not worth the extra.
What do you do
on a train for six or seven days?
This is
the question most people ask. Well, you put your feet up
and relax. You read,
watch the scenery, look out for the sights listed on your Trans-Siberian Handbook, go to meals in the restaurant car,
sleep in your own comfortable bed at night, meet
people, talk, play chess, drink tea, drink vodka, get off at
station stops and take photographs.... The
Moscow-Mongolia-Beijing route is arguably the most interesting because of
both the people on board and the sights and scenery on the way. You are
unlikely to be bored - the time just goes..!
The Trans-Siberian
Handbook has a kilometre-by-kilometre account of the
sights to look out for from the train. Highly
recommended, as this helps you get the most from your
journey. You can tell where you are from the black
and white kilometre posts all along the line, usually on
the south side of the tracks.
Take plenty
of reading books -
Tolstoy's War and Peace is the most predictable title,
but it's a great read. The funny thing is, you
probably won't finish it - there's so much else to do..!
Is not
speaking Russian a problem?
No, it isn't.
Very few western travellers on the Trans-Siberian Railway
can speak Russian or for that matter, Chinese or
Mongolian. However, even if you don't speak Russian,
it is worth learning the Cyrillic (Russian)
alphabet. You will then be able to read place names
and understand many Russian words. For example, 'PECTOPAH' is pronounced 'restoran' and
means (surprise surprise) 'restaurant'. 'ABTOБYC'
is pronounced 'avtobus' and means 'bus'. You'll also realise that 'CCCP',
the old acronym for the Soviet Union, is not 'see see see
pee' but 'SSSR'.
You can learn the Cyrillic (Russian)
alphabet here.
What
about food?
All
the main Trans-Siberian trains have a restaurant car, a
Russian one when in Russia, a Mongolian one in Mongolia and a
Chinese one in China. Few people go to Russia for the
cuisine, but contrary to what you might have heard, Russian restaurant car food is quite edible and
not expensive. Allow about US$15-$20 for a 2-course meal with
a bottle of beer. Some Moscow-Beijing tickets include meals for
the Russian part of the journey, so ask your booking agency if
meals are included. Don't expect an extensive menu,
typical meals include ham and fried eggs for breakfast,
schnitzel and potatoes for lunch or dinner, with soups and
salads for starters. The restaurant car also sells beer,
Russian champagne and (of course) vodka, chocolate and snacks. The
Mongolian diner will probably offer you rice and mutton.
The Chinese dining car has a selection of excellent Chinese
dishes. You can also buy food from the many vendors on
station platforms when the train stops. Top tips:
Unlimited
boiling water
is available free of charge from the samovar at the
end of each coach, so remember to bring a
mug, spoon, coffee and a selection of cuppa soups or
even dried pasta.
My personal
favourite: water-based drinking chocolate for a relaxing night-time
drink each evening...
What
about security? Is it safe for families or women
travelling alone?
The
Trans-Siberian is a very safe way to travel, even for families
and women travelling alone.
After all, the train is full of Russian families and women
travelling alone, it's how the Russians themselves get around..! Just use common sense as you would anywhere else, lock the
compartment door at night and
don't leave your wallet or camera lying unattended in your compartment
while you go to the toilet or the restaurant car. In
addition to the normal lock on the compartment door, Russian
'Spalny Wagon' and 'kupé' compartments have a security latch
which stops the door opening more than an inch or two, and
which cannot be released from outside even with a staff key. There's also a
safe place for your bags at night - if you have a bottom bunk,
there is a metal box underneath the bunk which you can only
get to by lifting up the bunk. In other words, for anyone to
get to your bags, they will have to shift you off your bunk
first..! Your carriage attendants may also lock the
access doors at each end of the corridor at night to prevent
intruders. So don't worry, you'll be safe and snug.
Men and women share the same compartments, but on some routes
you can now ask for a ladies-only compartment. If you're a
woman travelling alone and do happen to find yourself sharing
with men who make you uncomfortable, ask the carriage
attendants if they can move you to another compartment and
they normally will, without too much problem.
Do the trains have electrical outlets?
Suddenly, no westerner can travel anywhere without a whole
array of electrical gadgets, cameras, PDAs, iPods and
mobile phones that need charging. All Russian, Mongolian
& Chinese trains have shaver
sockets in the corridor and washrooms which can be used to
recharge things with the right adaptor, and the best trains have
one or two similar sockets
in the corridor that can be used to recharge things if you
keep an eye on them. However, you're unlikely to
find any
specific powerpoints for charging laptops, mobile phones
or digital cameras in your compartment. Your
carriage attendant may be willing to charge items using
the socket in their own compartment, for a small tip. Top tip:
Take a
Power Monkey universal backup battery with you, this gives up to 96 hours
phone stand-by when your phone's battery dies, and can also
be used for PDAs, iPods & some cameras. Highly
recommended!
Toilets & showers...
Above: Just to reassure you! This is a
clean & modern toilet in a 1st class 2-berth car on the
'Baikal' to Irkutsk. Courtesy of
Sascha & Manuela
Dubach
Each sleeping-car
has at least two western-style toilets and a washroom with sinks. The
carriage attendants (provodniks) will keep the toilet clean
during the journey. How clean depends on both the
provodniks and the passengers in your car(!), but there's
normally no problem, especially on high-quality 'firmeny'
trains like the 'Rossiya' and 'Baikal', see the photo on the
right. There are no showers on Trans-Siberian trains, with
two exceptions: On the Trans-Mongolian Moscow-Beijing
train (train 3/4), there's a shower hose in
the small washroom shared between each adjacent pair of deluxe
1st class 2-berth compartments. On the St Petersburg-Irkutsk
'Baikal' (train 9/10), there's a shower that
you have to pay for in car 7. There may now be a similar
shower on the Moscow-Vladivostok 'Rossiya' (train 1/2).
Remember that the need to take a shower every single day is a
relatively recent western social trend, not a human necessity.
Remember that not so many generations ago, Sunday night was
bath night, whether you needed it or not..! Just lock
yourself into the washroom half way across and make good use
of the sink and a cup of water.
Smoking...
If you're a rabid
anti-smoker, don't worry. There isn't a problem in the
compartments, corridor or restaurants. But if you're a
smoker, don't worry either. You can grab a smoke in the
vestibules between the cars.
Do Trans-Siberian trains run on time?
Within
Russia, the trains are remarkably punctual. My
train from Moscow arrived in Vladivostok two minutes ahead of
schedule. However, on international trains you should
expect an hour or two delay when crossing frontiers. For
example, on the Trans-Mongolian route it is not unusual to
arrive in Ulan Bator perhaps 1 or 2 hours late and in Beijing
2 to 5 hours late. Allow for this when planning any
connections.
All
Trans-Siberian trains stop at stations every few hours for
between 5 and 20 minutes, enough time to get off the train,
stretch your legs, take photos and buy something from the
vendors on the platform. But not enough time for a tour
of the town!
Many
people travel all the way from Moscow to Beijing or
Vladivostok all in one go on one of the direct trains. Other people
prefer to stop off along the way, breaking up the long journey
and seeing something of Siberia or Mongolia.
Yekaterinburg, Irkutsk (for Lake Baikal) and
Ulan Bator (Mongolia) are the most usual
stop-overs.
On the direct Moscow-Beijing trains, the varied scenery and
friendly atmosphere on board make travelling straight through
without stopovers perfectly bearable and indeed, fun. There are usually
lots of westerners on board as well as Russians, Chinese and
Mongolians, almost all of them making the whole trip, like yourself.
However, on a Moscow-Vladivostok train, you might be the only
westerner on board for much of the journey, the whole trip is
made within Russia, and relatively few of your
fellow-travellers will be making the whole journey to Vladivostok.
It may be better to break up this trip with one or two
stopovers, perhaps at Yekaterinburg or Irkutsk.
Remember
that Trans-Siberian trains are 'reservation obligatory'.
Every time you step on
board a train you must have a confirmed sleeping-berth
reservation for that specific journey on that specific train on that
specific date - you cannot hop
on and off trains spontaneously without a reservation. So if you want to travel from, say, Moscow to
Beijing stopping off at Irkutsk you need a ticket/reservation
from Moscow to Irkutsk and a second separate
ticket/reservation for the train you want to take from Irkutsk to Beijing.
Think of these as two separate journeys, not one. You can arrange all the tickets and reservations
before you go.
If
you are stopping off, remember that the weekly direct international trains 4
& 20 from Moscow to Beijing can only be used by passengers making
the complete international journey from Moscow through to Mongolia or
China, you cannot use them for domestic trips within Russia,
although train 4 does carry passengers between Ulan Bator and
Beijing, and allows passengers for Beijing to join at
places like Irkutsk. In practice, a typical trip from
Moscow to Beijing with stop-overs at Irkutsk and Ulan Bator can
be made using the 'Rossiya' or other Russian domestic train from Moscow to
Irkutsk, the daily train 362 from Irkutsk to Ulan
Bator and the weekly Ulan Bator-Beijing train, see the Trans-Siberian
timetable page for train times.
In
theory, the Russian railways have a system whereby if you hold
a ticket/reservation from A to C, and get off the train at B,
you can get the ticket endorsed by the station manager, then
make a second reservation and pay a small reservation charge
when you want to resume your journey. However, this does
not work with international tickets. The Russians
themselves don't often
use this facility, so Russian
railway staff may not be familiar with it. I recommend
buying separate tickets/reservations for each leg of your
journey before you go, but if you want to try this, you had
better practice your
Russian language skills!
Taking your bike, car or motorcycle...
Believe it or not, this gets asked
from time to time. Trans-Siberian passenger trains do
not carry cars or motorbikes, full stop. However, you
can take bicycles with you, zipped up in a bike bag with
pedals removed and the handlebars turned, free of charge as
hand luggage. Bear in mind that it will take up space in
your sleeping compartment, so it may be less anti-social to
book a berth in a more spacious 2-berth compartment than to
inflict your bike on three fellow travellers in a 4-berth
compartment.
You'll sometimes
hear Moscow-Vladivostok in 7 days on the 'Rossiya' referred to as the longest
train ride of them all. It isn't. Nor is
Moscow-Vladivostok in 9 days on the daily lower-quality slow train
904 (not a train normally used by foreigners, or one you want
to get on by mistake...). Once a
week the Rossiya conveys a through sleeper from Moscow to
Pyongyang in North Korea. This is detached at Ussuryisk
just an hour or so before Vladivostok, then it heads south all
the way
into Korea, making this a longer continuous train ride than
Moscow-Vladivostok. But this isn't the longest train
ride either. There is a through train from Donetsk and
Kharkov in
Ukraine to Vladivostok, and this appears to be the longest
scheduled continuous train ride of them all. Unless you
know differently, of course..!
About the journey: Moscow
to Beijing on Trans-Mongolian train 4...
Train 4 to Beijing was surprisingly modern, clean and
comfortable. There were at least 50 westerners aboard,
with
a pleasant party atmosphere all the way. There were plenty of Chinese, Russians and Poles to meet,
too. For the
first 3 days, the train travels across the vastness of
Siberia, meaning endless birch trees and villages of small
wooden houses and mud streets. The train passes from Europe to Asia 1,777km east of Moscow,
although this train passes this point at night so you probably
won't get to see the obelisk marking the boundary.
On day 4, the train rounds Lake Baikal, the deepest fresh water
lake in the world, with excellent views of the lake. In
Summer, the countryside appears green and pleasant, though in
some parts the permafrost lies only inches below the surface.
It can be quite humid, although train 4 is not
air-conditioned. On day 5, after passing through Mongolian
customs late at night, you wake up to a total change of
scenery: Grassy steppe, covered in dew, giving way South of Ulan
Bator (Mongolia's capital) to the open wastes of the Gobi
Desert. Look out for camels and 'yurts' - the circular
tents used by Mongolian nomads. Also look out for the
stainless steel statue of Mongolia's only cosmonaut, in front of
the station at Choir. Reaching the
Chinese frontier at midnight to the sound of triumphant martial music
played at full volume over
the station loudspeakers, the train is taken away and jacked
up to have its bogies changed from Russian 5' gauge to standard
(4'8½") gauge. You can remain on board while this
is done or
wander round the station while this is being done. The
next and last day, the train crosses the
mountains north of Beijing, and when I travelled it passed through the
Great Wall of China at Qinglongqiao (the train now takes a
slightly different route).
Arrival at Beijing's main station, due at 15:33
on day 6, was four hours late. A Russian restaurant car is
attached to the train for the first four days, a
Mongolian restaurant car is available for day 5 (you'd better
like mutton & rice...),
and a good Chinese restaurant car is
available on day 6.
Above:
Train number 4, the Trans-Mongolian train from Moscow to
Beijing. For
more photos
of this train, see the Trans-Siberian
picture gallery.
Above: 1st class 4-berth compartment. 2nd class
4-berth is almost identical.
Above: Train
number 4, the weekly
Chinese train from Moscow to Beijing, heads South across
Mongolia towards Ulan Bator.
About the journey: Moscow to
Vladivostok on the 'Rossiya'...
A
journey on the 'Rossiya' was a completely different experience.
Travelling to Japan via Vladivostok, my 1st class 2-berth car
was comfortable, spotlessly clean and even air-conditioned. Meals in the restaurant cost around US$7,
and by the end of the trip Mischa in the kitchen would have my ham &
eggs in the frying pan for breakfast as soon as I appeared in the
restaurant car. I
was the only Westerner on the train until Irkutsk, and unlike
the Moscow-Beijing train where almost everyone is making the
complete journey, the Rossiya is used for all sorts of
intermediate journeys, with Russians getting on and off at every
station. I had a compartment all to myself on leaving
Moscow, then shared it with a professional Russian ice hockey
player from Yaroslavl to Perm, on his way to trial for the team
there. His place was taken by a Russian lady from Yekaterinburg to Irkutsk who
said very little. In Irkutsk two professors from Alabama
joined the train and became my meal companions in the restaurant. The train stops several times a
day, usually only for 10-20 minutes, but you can
stretch your legs and take photographs. Arrival in Vladivostok was two minutes ahead of
schedule, seven days after leaving Moscow. The ocean terminal is adjacent
to the station, but you may need to spend a night in
Vladivostok to be sure of a safe connection. Vladivostok is an
interesting city, and a day or two spent there will not be
wasted. Overall, the
Moscow-Vladivostok route is 7 days of Siberia on a train with
few fellow westerners and indeed few Russians making the whole
trip. This makes for a much less interesting journey that
the Moscow-Mongolia-Beijing train, and one that it would be good to break
up with stopovers rather than make in one go. To see more
photos of what Trans-Siberian train travel is like, see the Trans-Siberian
picture gallery.
If you've got the time to watch it, Google Maps have posted a complete
real-time video of the view from the window on the
Moscow-Vladivostok 'Rossiya', see
www.google.ru/intl/ru/landing/transsib/en.html.
Above: Almost the longest train ride of
them all... The 'Rossiya' from Moscow to Vladivostok
(pre-refurbishment).
Above: Approaching
Yekaterinburg (known as
Sverdlovsk during the Soviet era) at the kilometre post exactly
1,777km from Moscow, the Rossiya passes the obelisk marking the
boundary between Europe and Asia.
...and onwards by ferry to
Japan...
The Far-East Shipping Company provides
a twice-weekly sailing from Vladivostok to Fushiki in Japan,
year-round. In the past, ships have occasionally sailed to
Niigata which has a Japan Rail Pass exchange office and a
Shinkansen 'bullet train' to Tokyo taking just two hours.
However, all sailings are now to Fushiki, which can be difficult
to find on a map. Fushiki has a branch line rail service
to a secondary mainline which reaches Tokyo a long way round.
There is no Japan Rail Pass exchange office at Fushiki. So
why do FESCO go there? Easy - it's the used car capital of
Japan, and FESCO make more money shipping used cars to Russia
than they do from carrying passengers!
Above: The ferry 'Rus' from Vladivostok to Fushiki in
Japan. Photo courtesy of Paul Markham
In
the late 19th century, Japan, Britain and America all managed
to gain footholds on the Chinese coast as bases for their
trade with China and the Orient. Russia too needed to
secure her foothold on the east as well as securing the vast
expanses of Siberia, so in 1891 Tsar Alexander III approved a
plan for a trans-continental line linking Moscow and St
Petersburg with Vladivostok on the Pacific coast, as this was the only
year-round ice-free port on Russian territory.
A
railway had been built as far as Ekaterinberg as early as
1878, and this was steadily extended Eastwards. Omsk was
reached in 1894, Irkutsk and Lake Baikal in 1898. The
Trans-Siberian Railway finally reached Vladivostok in 1901,
but for several years
passengers had to cross Lake Baikal by ice-breaking ferry to
connect with a second train on the other side - only in 1904
was the line around Lake Baikal completed and the whole
journey from Moscow to Vladivostok possible on a single
train. Until 1916, the eastern end of the journey involved cutting
across China, over part of what is now the Trans-Manchurian
route - you can see how the Trans-Manchurian line initially
heads towards Vladivostok on the route
map above. The Russians secured the right to build
and maintain this route across China thanks to a treaty signed
after they made a generous loan to China to help them pay
off their debts to Japan. From 1916, the complete journey
could be made from Moscow to Vladivostok within Russia, taking
the
route followed by today's 'Rossiya' and skirting the Chinese
border to the north via Khabarovsk. The Trans-Mongolian
line is a relatively recent addition to the Trans-Siberian
network - construction started in 1940, it reached Ulan Bator
in 1949, and it was completed
into China by 1956.
The
Trans-Siberian Railway today...
Today,
the Trans-Siberian Railway is a key part of the massive
Russian railway system. It is not a tourist line - it is
a real, working railway, carrying a huge amount of freight and
passenger traffic. It is double-track and electrified
all the way from Moscow to Vladivostok, and on some parts of
the line freight trains rumble past every few minutes.
It is not the only line in Russia - on the contrary, if you
saw a map of Russian railways you would be hard-pressed to
decide which of the many routes Trans-Siberian trains actually
take for the first few thousand miles East of Moscow.
There is in fact now a second route across Siberia to the
north of the Trans-Siberian to Sovetskaya Gavan on the Pacific
coast, called the BAM (Baikal-Amur-Maestral railway).
Started in the 1930s, it was only completed in 1991.
However, this route is of little interest to most Western
travellers.
The best resource for
further information about the Trans-Siberian Railway is www.transsib.ru/Eng/.
Trans-Siberian web resources...
These sites are very useful in planning a Trans-Siberian
train journey:
If
money isn't a problem, you can now travel on the Trans-Siberian
Railway on a luxury private train. UK-based company Great
Rail Journeys (www.greatrail.com) offers
5-star escorted tours, leaving London overland by Eurostar via
Brussels, Cologne & Warsaw to Moscow using scheduled trains,
then across Siberia on a deluxe charter train to Vladivostok
with private en suite sleepers, lounge and restaurant with stops
and tours along the way at places like Irkutsk, Lake Baikal,
Ulan Ude and even Ulan Bator in Mongolia. Expect it to
cost over £6,500, though this does include all transport,
accommodation, meals and even wine in the restaurant car.
Great Rail Journeys also offer rail-based holidays to other countries
in Europe and worldwide. Check the holiday details online, then call
01904 527120 to book or use their
online booking form. Seat61 gets some commission to
help support the site if you book your holiday through this
link and phone number, please mention seat 61 when booking.
The Thomas Cook Timetables...
The
Thomas Cook Overseas Timetable
is probably the most adventurous timetable ever
published... It
has train, bus and ferry times for every country in
Asia, Africa, America and Australasia. It includes
a complete timetable of all the trains on the
Trans-Siberian Railway and other main lines in
non-European Russia, China and Mongolia. It also
contains useful climate, currency and visa information.
Highly recommended.
The
Thomas Cook European
Timetable has
train, bus and ferry times for every country in Europe,
including European Russia.
Bryn Thomas' excellent Trans-Siberian
Handbook has journey planning information, town guides, train
information, the history of the line, and most
importantly, a mile-by-mile guide to
the sights you can see from the train, to help you get the most
from your trip. The Lonely
Planet guide to the Trans-Siberian Railway is also highly
recommended. Buying one or both of these
Trans-Siberian guidebooks is well worth it, both for planning
your trip and on the go.
At Amazon.co.uk...
At Amazon.com...
Or you can buy the
LP guide direct from the
Lonely Planet website, with shipping worldwide.
You should also take a
good general guidebook for the countries you are visiting, and
perhaps a Russian phrasebook, too. I think the
Lonely Planets and Rough Guides are about the best ones out
there for the serious independent traveller, with plenty of
historical and cultural background as well as stacks of
practical information on accommodation, places to eat, things
to see, visas, transport, dangers and annoyances. You
won't regret buying any of these..! If
you buy anything at Amazon through these links,
Seat61 gets a small commission which helps support the site.
Also consider
these guidebooks (click
the images to buy online)
Book a
hotel
in Moscow, Siberian cities or Beijing...
A guidebook like the Lonely Planet or
Rough Guides will point you at some good hotels in each town
or city when you get there, or you can pre-book hotels in
Moscow, Beijing or almost
any Russian or Chinese city through
www.hotelscombined.com, just use the search box
below. This is a free search tool
which checks all the main hotel booking sites (AsiaRooms,
Opodo, Expedia, Travelocity, LateRooms and many others) to
find probably the widest range of hotels and the rates on the net. Remember that once you've booked a hotel in China, they may be
able to book domestic Chinese trains for you departing from
that city, for a modest fee.
Never travel without insurance from a
reliable travel insurer, with at least £1m or preferably £5m medical cover. It should also cover loss of
cash (up to a limit) and belongings, and cancellation. An annual
multi-trip policy is usually cheaper than several single-trip
policies even for just 2 or 3 trips
a year (I have an annual policy myself). Here are some suggested insurers.
Seat61 gets a small commission if you buy through these
links.
If you live in the UK, get quotes from
Columbus Direct or
Go Travel Insurance, or go to
Confused.com to run a price comparison on a whole range of
travel insurance providers for your dates of travel, seeing
their policy's features at a glance.
Don't expect travel insurance to bail you out of every missed
connection, but European international rail conditions of
carriage (known as the 'CIV') contain consumer protection
provisions that entitle you to travel forward by the next
available train if you miss a connection because of a delay to
the first train, irrespective of who operates which train, and
even if your ticket is in theory train-specific and
non-changeable.
Feedback from using
insurance for rail & ferry travel is always welcome.
If you're a
UK citizen travelling in Europe, you should apply for a free
European Health Insurance Card, which entitles you to free or
reduced rate health care if you become ill or get injured in
many European countries, under a reciprocal arrangement with
the NHS. This replaced the old E111 forms
as from January 2006. The EHIC card is available from
www.ehic.org.uk. It doesn't remove the need for
travel insurance, though.
Get a pre-paid euro currency MasterCard from Caxton FX...
You can save money on ATM charges and exchange rates using a
Caxton FX euro currency MasterCard, or indeed the
multi-currency 'Global Traveller' MasterCard.
Find out about these cards & sign up here.
Get an international SIM card...
Mobile phones can cost a fortune to use abroad, and if you're
not careful you can return home to find some huge bills
waiting for you. I've known people run up over £1,000 in
data charges just by leaving their iPhone connected during a
simple trip to Europe. However, if you
buy a global SIM card for your mobile phone from a company
such as
www.Go-Sim.com you can slash the cost by up to 85% and
limit any damage to the amount you have pre-paid. Go-Sim
cuts call costs in 175 countries worldwide,
and you can receive incoming calls and texts for free in 75 countries. It's pay-as-you-go, so no nasty bills
when you get home. It also allows cheap data access for laptops
& PDAs. A Go-Sim account and any credit on it doesn't
expire if it's not used between trips, unlike some
others, so a Go-Sim phone number becomes your 'global phone
number' for life.
If you live in the UK, get quotes from
If you live in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland or the
EU, see
If you live in the USA or Canada, see
