Czars Reunited: Trans-Siberian railway adventures

Similarly as there are no earnings without work, there is no reaching the countryside without passing through the cities. And in such cases, even the Czars are not having an exception: they passed 4 cities in 5 days on their way from Moscow to the magnificent Altai republic.

Czars Fredovich and Bonegovich in the train.

The daily routine got soon into steady pattern - hopping off the train in the morning, setting the day objectives during the breakfast briefing in a local buffet, slowly completing all particular tasks (commonly including photo documentation of the key locations, spotting the Lenin square (present literally everywhere), ice-cream tasting), and boarding the Trans-Siberian carriage again in the evening.

Ekaterinburg (Sunday, Sep 6th)
After 27 hours in the train from Moscow, the Czars finally got off in Ekaterinburg at 5 a.m. Strolling across the super-wide streets with no traffic, resting on super-large (Lenin) squares with no pedestrians, and trying out local metro by random stops in the suburbs of Russian 4th biggest city, the Czars pleasantly spent the whole morning. In the afternoon they were picked up by their colleague Kristina (arranged in advance by their Russian ally Vitalik) who facilitated an excursion to nearby Ganina Yama - a pit in the mine 15 km far from Ekaterinburg where the dead bodies of Romanov Czar family were found. It was an emotional and touching afternoon for all the Czars and their souls.

The memorial of the Russian Czar family.

Comrade Lenin - seeing everything.

Omsk (Monday, Sep 7th)
It was raining - for the first time on the entire trip. And the Czars benefited from the misty atmosphere that covered the whole city. At first it seemed they all accidentally travelled back in time by 50 years, then the Czars started enjoying the old-school design of everything around. The evening stop in Rostik's-KFC and thrilling blockbuster in local cinema at 2 a.m. was a nice close off before boarding the train again.

The Omsk townhall.

The Omsk market.

Novosibirsk (Tuesday, Sep 8th)
While Ekaterinburg and Omsk definitely managed to conserve their specific atmosphere, Novosibirsk turned out to be fairly ordinary city - not bad, not astonishing, not old, not flashy. Nevertheless, the Czars had good time, as always: trespassing the docks while following the river Ob, having a traditional Russian lunch in a traditional construction site trailer, or messing up with smoky clown would surely be the highlights.

Russian speciality: "grichka s kotletoi" (Russian "rice" with ground meat).

Cheese!:) ...the Czars at the bank of river Ob.
Mafia disneyland in the background.

Biysk (Wednesday, Sep 9th)
Reaching Biysk on Wednesday morning meant the Czars had to leave the train for some time, as they finally arrived to the Altai republic and were eager to head to unknown Russian-Mongolian-Chinese-Kazakh borderlands. With the guidance of one of the local girls, Katya, who they met on the train, they briefly discovered the small but charming town and set off deeper into Altai. Let's wish them good luck!