How to Plan and Travel the Trans-Siberian Railway

How to Plan and Travel the Trans-Siberian Railway

Traveling on the Trans-Siberian trains through the longest rail track in the world is an experience of a lifetime. Everybody has heard of the word Siberia, but only some have an idea where it is, and only a few want to get there.

Siberia is more of a concept than a place, unless you live there. Some might imagine danger when they think of Siberia. After all, Siberia is a former hang-out for exiles and convicts, an ice-cold place in a remote part of communist Russia full of Russian mafias.

It’s as dangerous as depicted in movies where every place seems dangerous.

Some think that travel to Siberia costs a lot of money, not exactly, as long as you resist the urge to rely on travel agencies to arrange everything from A-Z. Do a bit of research before your travel and socialize with fellow travelers during your travel to get the latest information on deals. The best online resources and guidebooks cannot beat advice from those who had recently done it. Don’t worry about being alone or not finding people. You will find loads of temporary Siberian wanderers, just like you, hauling their knapsacks and hopping on and off the Trans-Siberian trains.

For those with concerns about the cost, skip the 1st and 2nd class tickets and sleep among the Russians in 3rd class. One common misunderstanding I found among the people who traveled in 2nd class was “We wanted to sleep, so we bought 2nd class.” No, you can sleep with 3rd class fare on your own bed, except that you won’t have a private closed section. But then again why you come all the way and lock yourself in a box?

You will be sad, no doubt. Sitting for days on the trains, talking to no one and seeing nothing except trees can be mind numbing. But keep in mind that you’re doing one of the most romantic journeys of the world and everything will be ok.

If you cannot find any other way to entertain yourself, you can always sleep, an experience that I’m sure you’ll find amusing.

Still need a little inspiration? Read this Paul Theroux’s “The Great Railway Bazaar,” and you’ll want to rush to the train station, jump on the first train and go on an indefinite journey.

Preparation

This type of traveling requires some level of planning because Siberia is vast and Russian bureaucracy is not user-friendly to non-Russian speakers.

If you dislike planning, pick out at least the start and end points. Visa restrictions and tricky Russian administration limits travelers’ natural tendency to plan as you go. You don’t want to find out in the middle of Siberia that you need to leave Russia immediately. You don’t want to lose your passport in Russia because you cannot apply for a new one at your embassy. You cannot go to the nearest country or country of your choice to apply either. I heard that you will be sent on a flight to home.

Use a travel guide to have all information in one place. Even if you don’t know anything about Russia and Siberia, you can look at the route map, take notes of cities along the track and get a feel of the distances and hours among the stops to plan your route.

(Read this article if you feel overwhelmed when applying for Russian visa.)

Trans Siberian railway map

Guidebooks on Russia and Siberia

Most travelers I met used Trans-Siberian Handbook by Bryn Thomas and Lonely Planet Trans-Siberian Railway as travel guidebooks. Keep in mind that these books provide information for only Russian cities along the Trans-Siberian route, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia and Beijing, China. If you plan on visit other cities, you might consider buying a guide about Russia, for example, this Lonely Planet guide.

Travel websites

Wikitravel – To create a detailed travel plan and budget, use your guidebook for reference and high-level planning and use online resources for more up-to-date information like ticket prices, accommodations or travel reviews.

• wikitravel.org/en/Trans-Siberian_Railway
• wikitravel.org/en/Siberia

Seat61 – (www.seat61.com) This website is maintained and updated by an English man who used to work at a rail company. He travels everywhere on trains and always chooses seat no. 61.

Waytorussia – (www.waytorussia.net) This website is operated by local Russians on topics from Visa and legal issues to brief guides on Russian cities. It also has an online portal to searching and book train tickets. I used this site to get information on trains between two cities like timetables, see availability and ticket prices.

I think the site is good, but remember that you will pay EXTRA (a lot) when buying tickets on English website. The markup price is around ~ $30 or more per fare and you can only buy 2nd class tickets. (More details below.)

Russia’s national rail – (www.rzd.ru) You can check for tickets directly from Russia’s national rail website. You get the cheapest prices buying online, although buying at the train station incurs only a small processing fee.

The booking interface doesn’t have an English version, thus you need either
(1) Understand Russian or
(2) Have help from the locals or
(3) Use a web browser which can translate web pages into English. I used Google Chrome and installed a Google translate extension.

You can do (3) by yourself, but first, you need (2) someone to help you get familiarize with the web interface. You create an account, then after that, you search and book tickets. Print out the confirmation, which is not a ticket. You need to print the ticket from a ticket vending machine at the train station or ask the staff there to issue one.

Note: Credit cards from some countries might not work on this website. None of mine worked; thus I asked a Russian to do it for me, and I gave her cash.

Ferry crossing Lake Baikal – (www.vsrp.ru/en/passengers/trips/ust-barguzin) This is the website to use in case you intend to cross Lake Baikal. It has timetables of the ferries. You don’t need to book tickets ahead as you can buy a ticket on board at roughly the same price.

Make sure to check the ferry schedule for planning your trip because there is only ONE ferry per WEEK. You want to leave more time to explore Olkhon Island and not rush it.

Russian language

You are not required to possess a high level of Russian vocabulary to discuss Putin and communism. Uh, you’re not supposed to talk about Putin and communism. If you really want to talk to Russians, you still don’t need a lot of Russian vocabularies to socialize with them either. Buy them lots of vodkas and let them do the monolog.

However, it will help you tremendously to read Cyrillic alphabets so you can quickly spot the names of streets, stations or shops.

Many travelers I met didn’t speak or understand Russians; they only learned how to recognize the different characters.

Cyrillic script is not a new writing system like Arabic or Chinese. Learning it is more like converting the letters to their Latin equivalents. “B” is “V”, “H” is “N”, “C” is “S” that sort of thing.

Sample Trans-Siberian itinerary

Use my itinerary below as reference

Start and end points

While it’s not necessary to plan ahead, you should decide the start and end point of the Trans-Siberia.

Typical break points are either
(1a) St. Petersburg or (1b) Moscow if you start/end in Europe Russia
(2a) Irkutsk or (2b) Ulan-Ude start/end in the middle of Russia on route to/from Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia or Beijing, China or (3) Vladivostok, the easternmost point of Russia.

I picked Moscow as the starting point for the sole reason that I lived in Prague and found a budget flight to Moscow. If I do it again, I will choose St. Petersburg instead, which according to many travelers, is more pleasant and has more things to see. To me, the new capital of Moscow is more of a happening city, big, modern and hectic. It might be a nice retreat at the end your trip but definitely not at the beginning, especially if you are not familiar with Russia. I found it energy-draining to walk all over Moscow with a heavy backpack while deciphering Cyrillic and navigating Moscow’s complex metro system and train stations.

Where to break
Most people I met along this route were doing the same thing: heading eastward or westward and stopped at similar cities because, after all, we carry the same books. However, ALL stopped at Irkutsk, the nearest city to Lake Baikal, the gem of Siberia.

Transportation expenses from Moscow to Beijing

My cost I exclude the flight to Moscow and the train out of Beijing because different people use different transportation to start and end the journey, and anything further from St. Petersburg and Beijing is not considered to be on this Trans-Siberian journey.

Total transportation cost for the journey from Moscow to Beijing with stops in between = 450 USD

Prices from guidebooks and online resource are much higher because they show the prices for 2nd class.

Factors which impact ticket prices

1. Class: I bought 3rd class (hard sleeper) on Russian and Mongolian trains and 2nd class (hard sleeper) on Chinese trains, and therefore paid a lot less compared to 1st, 2nd class and 1st class on bespoke trains. The price difference between each class is almost double. Sleeping costs a lot more than sitting or standing tickets (the latter only existed on Chinese trains), which I don’t think any of you will do. Don’t do it! I didn’t have experience with sitting tickets in Russia and Mongolia, but I had to sit twice in China, as there were no more sleeper tickets. Short-distance was manageable but long-distance was absolutely BRUTAL and ROUGH. The seat was so small as if designed for children and skinny Asians. There was no leg room. The seat was straight up, not able to be pushed back. You absolutely DON’T want to sleep sitting up for hours. By the way, the light wasn’t turned out in sitting cars.

2. Travel season: I traveled during July, the peak month of the peak season, and hence paid the highest price for the same type of tickets. I can’t say the same for Mongolian and Chinese trains because I could not find any English websites.

3. Types of trains: Tickets cost more on better and faster trains. I don’t think this is important because usually, you care more about the timetable and prices.

4. Types of tickets: I bought point-to-point tickets, which were more expensive than buying the entire route and not getting out in between, for example going directly from Moscow to Irkutsk. However, this is only slightly more expensive than buying the entire route with chosen stops, for example going from Moscow to Irkutsk, get out at city A on day 1 and leave city A on day 3, get out at city B on day 4, etc.

5. Means of purchase: I bought tickets from the Russian railway website above, and paid local prices, cutting agency and processing fees. If you buy from abroad, you can buy only 2nd class on Russian trains (no website for Mongolia and Chinese trains) and/or pay EXTRA, a lot more using travel agencies.

6. Early-bird: I bought only a few days in advance before my departure and might have paid more than if buying longer in advanced.

7. Border-to-border: Sometimes you save money by buying tickets to the border, cross the border using a different mean, then buy another ticket from the border city at the new country to the final destination. I will use Ulaanbaatar (UB) to Beijing as an example. The prices varied a lot among the people I met. The cheapest price, $95, was the result of booking a month ahead via a travel agency in UB. Others paid $110, $170 buying at a different time at the train station in UB. I was at the train station in August and saw people pay $135. One German paid $365 buying from a travel agency in Germany. The guesthouse I was staying asked for $160 which I almost agreed because at the time it was the only way. But if you look at my table, I paid a mere $58, almost half the price of the cheapest price.

8. Other means: I took the bus from Russia to Mongolia because it was 3 times cheaper ($35 vs. $98) and faster (14-15 hr vs. 23.5 hr).

Additional travel resources about Russia and Trans Siberia

1. Photos of cities and villages along the Trans-Siberian rail track
2. Camping in Siberia: The Magic of Lake Baikal and Olkhon Island
3. Trans-Baikal’s Old Believer Village
4. Ulan-Ude: Big Brother is Watching You
5. Krasnoyarsk: My Stranger in Siberia
6. Europe or Asia?
7. The Monasteries at Ganina Yama: The Murder of the Tsar and the Death of a Hollywood Princess
8. Getting Russian visa the easy way