Itinerary
I will have almost 4 weeks to explore the world, beginning with a flight from San Jose to Beijing. During my 3-day stay there, I will visit landmarks such as Tiananmen Square, the Great Wall, and numerous palaces and delectable dinners. From there, I will board a train and make the 26-hour journey to Ulan Bator, Mongolia, sleeping for 1 night on the train. In Mongolia, I will stay in a national park, in a Ger camp, and enjoy some Mongolian cuisine, culture, and history, before returning to Ulan Bator for 1 night in a hotel. Then it’s back on the train and off to Russia! After another 24-hour single night on the train, I will arrive in Irkutsk, and travel by car to Lake Baikal, where I will ‘enjoy’ the true Siberian winter. After 2 nights, I return to Irkutsk for some city touring and museums before boarding the train to Yekaterinburg. This will be the longest train leg, at about 55 hours and 2 nights of sleeping. I will stay in Yekaterinburg for 2 nights, then take another 24-hour train journey into Moscow., where I will take in a ballet, the circus, and visit Red Square. After spending 2 nights in Moscow, I will take a brief, 9-hour overnight train to Saint Petersburg, to enjoy imperial palaces, folk dancing, and a cooking class. For the final leg of the tour, I’ll take the train back to Moscow and spend New Years Eve, and visit a Siberian sauna. I return home in January, flying from Moscow to Amsterdam, back to San Francisco, which will complete my full circumnavigation of the globe.
Preparing to leave
I will begin this epic journey in a new place. I am happy, and I like my job and love my husband and am insufferably infatuated with my ridiculously cute dog. I have nothing to run from, no need to escape. And I am certainly not trying to ‘find myself’ out there somewhere. I am, for the first time, embarking on adventure from a place of joy, of stability and comfort I never thought I would know. The perfect platform to jump off of and do one thing (for 28 days!) that scares me.
Unexpected complications
Of course, life isn’t always how you plan it. 2 weeks after putting down the deposit for this trip, I found out that I was in need of hip surgery. 9 weeks before departure, I underwent surgery to repair cartilage in my hip, and I’ve been in physical therapy since. It’s still quite painful if I over-exert it, but what’s an adventure without another side of adventure? This will explain some of my planning decisions later in the trip.
Why?
There are so many questions here. Why Russia? Why the middle of winter?? I have always wanted to travel to Russia, and am so excited for this opportunity to finally realize that dream. As soon as I learned that the Trans-Siberian railroad was a thing, I wanted to go. The trip itself is hyperbole: Siberia in winter. The idea of it evokes dread and mockery from my peers. My husband is certain I will meet an untimely end. Coworkers suggested I take a photo of my toes lest I lose them to frostbite and never see them again. People use the term ‘bucket list’, both to imply that this is definitely a trip to check from the list but also that it is one that might very well bring me much closer to the bucket. I picked December because of the ability to use all of the holidays and combine them with my PTO to cobble together 3 straight weeks.But that means I will visit one of the harshest climates on earth, during the harshest season, far enough north that I will only experience 6 or so hours of daylight each day. I am eager and excited and some small percent terrified. Time to start packing.
