I think I feel another exclamation mark coming on.

 

The train, indeed. Almost eighty hours, the thick end of four thousand kilometers, no stop longer than forty minutes. The train is a good place to read, or (apparently) imbibe beer from three liter plastic containers, or sleep. Except it’s not great to sleep, due to the narrow bed and constant movement. I was really glad of a shower when finally reaching terra firma in Irkutsk today, and those around me were even more relieved I suspect. Trains run on Moscow time; at the destination it’s five hours ahead of that, so my body clock is not terribly happy right now. Due to daylight-savings oddities UB and Beijing are an hour behind, but that’s a trivial change comparatively. It turned out the ticket included food – assorted snacks and one hot meal a day, which was about right (allowing for what I’d brought along). The food was palatable but very bland, tabasco or similar would really help.

 

 

The train never goes particularly fast – not slowly, but never really flying. I suppose nothing about the network is build for high speed running. Braking in particular is pretty jarring, and at every long stop (several per day) people in high-vis bibs walk along the train tapping the axle covers and main springs with hammers. Presumably this is to detect failed or failing pieces, but it doesn’t exactly reassure. On the other hand there’s plenty of seriously rough junctions and long sections of old-style joined track. The noise is magical when awake, and hellish when trying to sleep (as is the accompanying osciliation).

 

I expected to see a gradual change in the landscape from day to day, but really there was almost none, from half an hour outside Moscow until reach Irkutsk. It did bring home what an enormously big country this is, and how many trees it contains. I mean, a lot of trees.