Sightseeing
We have an afternoon departure from Irkutsk to Ekaterinburg, so it was a leisurely morning beginning with a hotel breakfast, Russian style. It was a filling spread of eggs, cheese, salad, porridge and lentils.
We rested and checked out around 1100 having failed to secure a late check-out beyond the normal time of 1200. Left luggage at the hotel required a payment.
For sightseeing we had a failed start at Trubetskoy House, which we reached by taxi. This house is a museum which tells of the Decembrist movement against the tsar. It turned out to be closed.
Fortunately we were able to walk to another Decembrist house, the Volkonsky House. The first Decembrist House was ornate in dark wood while the second was a plainer painted building.
After some time at an internet cafe we went to the market to stock-up for our next train ride. Some things like meat and cheese were really cheap. We made a stop at the supermarket on the way back to the hotel but had no luck with getting some wine. With no wine, smoked fish and caviar didn’t seem necessary anymore.
We collected our bags from the hotel and managed to get the same taxi as this morning’s, to head to the train station.
Back on board for Ekaterinburg
Today’s train, which may have been electric rather than diesel, seemed rockier than the previous. It may have been windier or maybe we were going faster. The cabin was similar to the Mongol train except the upper bunks were absent and it had wood formica instead of dark wood. With an LG flat screen TV and blue seat covers, it was decidedly modern!
We departed on-time at 1620 local time which was 1120 Moscow time. We had a snack dinner of ham and cheese sandwich early. The ham was nice and moist, the cheese soft and the dry flattish bread quite nice too. We repeated our dinner later in the evening, somewhat like an indoor picnic.
Our cabin table was furnished with lots of snacks, sitting in the hot sun by the window. These are chargeable so we put them in a bag to remove the temptation.
Along the way we saw a bit of burning in the countryside in preparation for agriculture. After all, this is spring.
Fully guided option
We saw Tim Round (a somewhat well-known Australasian tour leader) taking his group of 42 mainly elderly customers. He had lost some weight so I nearly didn’t recognise him.
Chatting to some of them later, two couples had upgraded to First Class for an additional NZD1000 on top of their NZD12000 (including airfare and ticketed taxes). That’s a lot more than what we paid for, but they are fully guided. Their land component started in Hong Kong with train travel to Beijing.
They get fed on Moscow time, and with five hours time difference with Irkutsk, it’s like eating dinner at midnight. To make it worse, their group size requires them to split into two sittings. That would definitely not work for me.