Train day 1 - Irkutsk to Yekaterinburg
This leg is only 2 nights but it's almost 2 full days.
There's not too much to say about train life really. It didn't differ much from the previous trip. The scenery was much the same and so was the cabin.
The provodnista on this train was a very friendly blonde lady but I didn't really go out of my way to talk to her much. She was however very fond of Oksana and Matvie. She'd often stop into the carriage for a laugh or a chat while she was doing her rounds.
We'd get off at every station that was more than a couple of minutes stop. And every time I'd be wearing my shorts and thongs and every time Oksana would ask if it was too cold and every time I'd give a thumbs up and say "all good" or something to that effect.
Oksana and Matvie invited me to lunch with them because we had spoken about Russian food a little bit and I said I wasn't really sure what "Russian food" was outside of the traditional stuff like borsch (Which I hadn't had yet) and piroshki. So we went down to the dining car and had borsch for lunch. It was not at all what I was expecting. I thought it was like a creamy sort of Beetroot soup but this was more of a clear vegetable and beef soup with a slightly vinegary flavour maybe. It was pretty good though Oksana and Matvie loaded theirs up with salt. Too bland I guess. I'd also assumed that borsch was one of those old-fashioned dishes that used to be in circulation but wasn't anymore. Oksana assured me that they eat it regularly at home so it is actually a modern Russian dish!
I also had a really bad Russian beer in the dining car.
We stopped at Novosbirsk for a while which was a pretty big city. As we were leaving the city lights were beautiful out the window of the train. It's supposed to be a pretty cool city so if I ever do this again I will make a stop there.
That's pretty much it I think.
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