Lake Baikal swim team

After 4 nights on the train it was good to get a break at Irkutsk and get on a bus!
70km took us to Listvyanka on the shore of Lake Baikal, the deepest lake in the world (1600m).

Lake Baikal

 Fascinating fact: Baikal could supply the world with drinking water for the next 40 years.

Highlights of the stay in Listvyanka were of the masochistic nature, going for a dip in the exceedingly cold lake and beating each other with sticks in a traditional Russian banya (sauna)

Church tower, Listvyanka

A few of us also managed to locate Retro park, a small scrap metal sculpture park.

Retro park, Listvyanka

Retro park, Listvyanka

We had time for a quick tour around Irkutsk including an area which is being rebuilt in the style of the old buildings, in fact some of the buildings have been moved from other parts of the city.  In the background you can see the local sports stadium which hosts outdoor ice-hockey in the winter - it makes sense but seems odd when you can only play indoors in the UK.

Irkutsk new old town

Into Siberia

Leaving Moscow on the Trans-Mongolian train, a 4 day journey lay ahead across 5 time zones and 4,000km from Europe into Asia.

Trans-Mongolin Train through Russia

The time actually passed by remarkably quickly in a cycle of eating, drinking, playing cards & games & sleeping.  Somewhat disappointingly the restaurant car could not better the instant noodles stocked up on in Moscow. Boiling water is on tap in every carriage so no shortage of tea.

Boiler

3 or 4 times a day (which could be the middle of the night) we'd stop at a station for 20mins or so which provided the opportunity for some fresh air, but again not much in the way of food.

Typal railway station en-route

An untypical chance to buy food on the platform

Ice cream, not a old as the packaging

The 4 bed cabins are a little cramped but offer up a decent amount of storage space under the bottom bunk with further storage above the door. The beds are perfectly sized for my thermarest which is now entering its 9th year of service.

4 berth cabin

Much of the first couple of days scenery was dominated by trees but gradually the landscape changed. We even went around a few beds (see picture of train above)

Moscow

Another overnight sleeper train to Moscow, & if you want to pick a perfect bunk partner how about a British expat who edits the what's on guide to Moscow.

We were met off the train by the lovely Sasha who made it her mission to show us as much of Moscow as possible.
So, first up, a visit to Red Square and Lenin who was lying in state, much as he has been for nearly 90 years. It's quite a strange process, everyone trooping through in silence, no stopping, no hands in pockets & certainly no photographs. Oddly enough you can buy postcards of Lenin though.

G.U.M shopping centre

St Basil's Cathedral

Red square was full of temporary seating for a forthcoming festival. St Basil's cathedral is the most impressive sight for me though.

Gorky park

Gorky park has been recently renovated taking away all the old roller coasters, it's somewhat ikea themed at present though.

The kremlin, the walled citadel which contains out of bounds government buildings, comprises numerous churches and, once I'd gone in it, brought back memories of visiting 17 years ago, as far as I can tell nothing much has changed.

Uspensky Cathedral, Kremlin

Granovitaya Palata, Kremlin

Big Russian building

We fitted in a boat trip and a quick tour of some of the incredible metro stations.

One of my cultural highlights was a visit to the dance show featuring various forms of Russian dance through the years. The dancing horse was one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

Rushin' to Russia

From Riga a few hours on the bus, out of Latvia and into Estonia.
Tallinn old town is compact and full of historical buildings and a good portion of the city walls. I can thoroughly recommend the free walking tour and the prison tour both led by sardonic Estonians.

Tallin old town

City walls, Tallinn

2 nights in Tallinn before the short boat trip over to Helsinki.
Helsinki, much like Stockholm, comprises a number of islands including Seurasaari a fortified unesco world heritage site.

Seurasaari, Helsinki

The weather was pretty grey which didn't help my impression of the city and the next morning it was back on the train for the 3.5hr journey to St Petersburg. The Russian boarder officials were most efficient as we were stamped between stops.

3 days in St Petersburg was enough to see the main sights, take a sunset boat trip and visit the hermitage.

Lenin foreground, Railway station background, St Petersburg

Church of the spilled blood

Hermitage

sunset boat trip, St Petersburg

Rostral Column

Palace square

Inside the hermitage

St Isaac's Cathedral

This was also the starting point for my Trans-Mongolian trip, which started off badly with the hostel on the joining instructions having to direct us onto a different place. We met up with local Victor who took us on a walk of the sights & an excellent Ukrainian restaurant.
The group is the usual mix of Brits & Aussies with a couple of Kiwis & Yanks. 15 of us all the way to Beijing on the train.

Baltic bound

Back on the road again after a London sabbatical. Actually mostly on the rails as I take the long route to Borneo. Raleigh training weekend has built the anticipation and from there I was straight onto the Eurostar to Brussels.

Boarding in St Pancras

For the first time on this trip I was visiting somewhere I'd been before & it brought back a few memories of new year with Steve, Matt & Charl. The drugstore is still there, manneken piss is still tiny & I still love the tintin art on the wall.

wall art in Brussels

Manneken Piss, Brussels

Next morning it was onto Cologne. As previously advertised the cathedral was huge and situated next to the train station there was no missing it. I was also struck by the number of cyclists and just how cycle friendly the city is - a recurring theme in Denmark & Sweden.

Cologne rail bridge & cathedral

Little mermaid, Copenhagen

But time is a ticking and I have a train to catch in Russia, so that night I was back on the train for an overnight to Copenhagen. For the record nearly every train was late that evening - Deutsche Bahn has no one told you you have a stereotype to maintain?

Wonderful Copenhagen was waiting in the sunshine. The 2-3hour walking trail took about 5 hours and so I had to hot foot it back to the station for the train across the bridge to Sweden. Incidentally, their little mermaid is many times bigger than Brussels' effort at a bronze statue

Nyhaven, Copenhagen

A day in Stockholm took in some of the waterways of the capital and a tour of the city hall - the location for the Nobel prize banquet each year. It's also the place most proud of its monarchy from my non scientific observations, postcards proliferate.

City hall, Stockholm

Time for a break from the train and onto a huge ferry (41) I'm counting this on sheer scale, 2 decks of restaurants & bars. Another overnighter & another time zone to arrive in Latvia.
Riga old town is fantastic, full of beautiful buildings and live music, it's definitely on the list for a return - maybe 2014 when it will be European city of culture.

Daugava river, Riga

London 2012

What a great couple of weeks to be in London, the whole place is buzzing as the greatest show on earth comes to town.  7 years in the planning but it's worked out just fine.  The stadiums are packed (ignoring the olympic family who seem to be having child care issues), the tubes are running smoothly, people are friendly & chatting to strangers and GB are winning gold medals - lots of them!

Firstly I have to record my thanks to Stephan 'the tout' Beatty for securing so many tickets with an unmatched dedication to checking the internet at all times of day.

So day 1 of my personal olympic games started early, very early, but I made it to Stratford and past the cheery ranks of volunteers pointing the way to the park.  First impressions were how big the park was, with a subtle hint of pink around the place.  20 mins walk from the entrance, across to the riverbank arena for 2 games of the group stages of the mens hockey including a 6-0 thrashing of South Africa by the Aussies.

An afternoon trip up the orbit gave views across the park and revealed the stadium to be lacking in grass following the opening ceremony.

Tuesday morning and time for GB gold Wiggo was favourite and he delivered in style with Chris Frome taking bronze. Stephan & I made our first BBC appearance of the games, you need to watch the medal ceremony really carefully. We'd already snuck into the NBC breakfast show the previous day in the Olympic park during a fascinating article on women's fashion.

A dash across town followed to the excel centre & men's weightlifting. The Chinese were in a different league and after a record snatch a solid clean & jerk meant a new world record.


Swimming heats saw the appearance of Becky Addlington & Michael Phelps (not at the same time). Being heats it also saw a new game of guess the country from the 3 letter acronym as the minnows made their appearance in the spirit of inclusion rather than competitiveness.

Beach volleyball was just an inspired location choice in horse guards parade.

Saturday morning at the Olympic stadium with golden girl elect, Jess Ennis in the long jump and javelin. The appearance of a certain Usain Bolt in the 100m preliminaries and a host of other events.

Worth too mentioning the atmosphere at Hyde park live that evening as Mo Farrah capped off the evening with a 3rd athletics gold for GB in the space of about an hour.

Soggy Sunday morning watching the women's marathon.

Gymnastics at the O2, sorry North Greenwich Arena, was the story of a surprise bronze and so close, but settle for silver, for Louis Smith in the pommel horse.


Back to the park & time for GB to win their final group game against China in the basketball.

Boxing really came to life when the GB boys were in the ring & both of them won to secure at worst bronze medals.


My final event of the games was a cracker, joining 200,000 others in Hyde park for the Brownlie brothers securing another 2 medals for GB.


{photos to follow eventually}