Yekaterinburg

Writing this entry from the lobby of the Sverdlovst Hotel in Yekaterinburg - our home for the last 2 days. We arrived monday night with low expectations of a dark industrial city. Pleasantly surprised by the place (you can see the pictures eventually). Ok, its got its fair share of the usual scum but where hasnt? Its got alot of history - where the last tsar met his end... The train from Moscow was over 30 hours and we had the most interesting Providnista (Train Guard). He drank half our Vodka and talked about his time in Afghanistan! He also carried a taser which he was not afraid to demonstrate to us (he was only joking of course.. but you take it seriously when a Russian weilds something at you). We are leaving on the number 10 train early tomorrow morning (0400 local) for Irkurstk which is 2 days away. We will visit the beautiful Lake Baikal. Rob

A few more pics for you, starting with the interesting train journey between Moscow and Yekaterinburg - Thats Andre who loved Jeremy Clarkson, and worked with his wife taking turns to look after our carriage. So when he was off duty he would spend his time with us, the lads (check out his tattoos in the third one down). The scenery really started to change on the way to Yekaterinburg. When we reached our big soviet style hotel, with possibly the longest corridoors in the world we had a great view of the dark city. We visited the Church of the Blood, a Russian Orthodox Church erected on the site where the last Tzar, Nicholas II, and his family were murdered. Bit of war memorobilia hanging about the city too!