The Russian Riviera

Listvyanka is something of a Russian Gold Coast, perhaps a little more classy (perhaps not?!). Located between the mountains and Lake Baikal, it stretches along the shore for about 7km of scenic townscape.

On the weekend, Listvyanka is overrun by tourists, mostly Russian tourists (spivs and spivettes) and wedding parties, but there were other internationals as well. We met Belgians on their way to Ulaan Bator and a group from the UK watching their laddish friend take a skinny dip in the icy waters of the lake.

Travelling through Siberia (in which Lake Baikal is situated) involved a lot of fried-y snacks. Dough, filled with cabbage, onion, potato or met was generally the order of the day, whether we were sitting down in a nice restaurant, or hastily purchasing vittles from Babushkas on train stations. But on the shores of the glittering blue Baikal, it was all about Ormul.

Ormul is a fish only found in Lake Baikal, the world's largest body of freshwater. The fish individually are about 20cm each, but they're big here. A weekend market in Listvyanka was about 50% ormul sellers, and 50% stalls carrying other local trinkets and souveniers.

The fish are sold fresh, dried, smoked and, I think, salted. And they taste pretty good, even to a non-piscatorian like me!

Other delights on offer mostly included tchuckas (sp?) made out of local Siberian/Baikal stones and crystal - purple charyosite, green or black jade, black&white jasper and the green-black 'snake' stone.

As the weekend drew to an end, the weather also closed in, delivering a wonderful snow storm on Monday, where we couldn't leave the hotel - forced to drink vodka and spend a steamy hour in the sauna (no, not in a dodgy way, sheesh!).

All in all, highly reccomend Lake Baikal!

Raining in Vladivostok

It's raining here today, and the port is grey. Vladivostok is an interesting town but definitely seedy and decrepit. Footpaths are riddled with potholes to snare the drunken foot of a night, plus they tend to end in odd places, then start again.

Work is going on all over town, every building seems half built, or semi-renovated, or sadly in need of it!

This place feels like the end of the earth, I have to say... and that's speaking as someone who technically lives in a country that many of the world's inhabitants would actually consider the end of the earth.

My Russian is sadly lacking ... trying to force myself to use it, rather than cowering in a corner yelling English words and hoping to be understood. Ah, I've only been here a day... the locals also seem kinda, well, bitchy? But I also have to steel myself not to care about them liking me. After all, what is the likihood I'll ever know what they think, let alone be back here?

Some advantages: the town is MUCH easier to navigate than Tokyo - all that running around trying to find the right subway lines and exits was getting extremely tiring in the Japanese capital. Here you can do it all on foot, but must keep a sharp eye out for said pathway-hazards!

The women here wear tonnes of makeup, I look very fresh-faced with my usual amount of cosmetics on. And they all stare and Isco and I as we walk around, do we seem that different?

Then there's the Eurodisco... but I think I'll leave Isco to wax lyrical-suicide about that.

OK Tokyo

Tokyo so far is a bit less hectic than I'd expected and, although we've mainly gone to touristy things, there's a pretty high degree of tat about...

Feeling very good about being here though. Glad it's not the last stop on our journey as I think we'd be sorely tempted to buy up big on aforementioned tat - so much kooky/cute/kitsch stuff to be had!

So far the food is amazing, had excellent gyoza yesterday and a delicious soba noodle today. Isco had tempura prawn with udon noodle soup, also very tasty. Keep thinking of a story about my fussy hairdresser, who was apparently starving in Tokyo because he's vegetarian, and giggling to myself - there is SO much good to eat here, vego and meaty.

Hoping to check out some bars/nightlife tonight as we must soon prepare for a 4am start to get that bloody plane to Toyama\Vlad.

Haven't yet worked out how to upload pix, that will be my next challenge.

Ferry fiasco

Everything was packed, everything was perfect, I went out on some last-minute errands and returned to find the ferry to Vladivostok was cancelled (bad weather) and Iain running around trying to make alternative arrangements.

Three hours before we had to head out to the airport, we decided we`d have to ditch the whole boat idea and fly 1970s Vladivostok Air planes to Vlad instead, plus leave it up to our (hopefully) accomodating Tokyo Hotel concierge to book it all for us once we arrived.

In Tokyo now, after a gyoza feast (better than we could have hoped, yum!) But a guy in a silky pirate shirt is kicking me off the free internet about now but suffice to say, it all worked out fine, really glad we decided to pay a bit extra for the good hotel, the efficiency is amazing! We arrive in Vlad on Friday so we get a couple of extra nights there, and one extra night in Tokyo.

All good, no stress... must go!

I've been to Romania

Well, the embassy at least.

It's suprisingly difficult for Australian passport holders to get into the country itself.

After handing over details of flights, accomodation, bank balance, marriage certificate, first-born child's blood type and my husband's shoe size, I finally won a visa to visit the land of Dracula. I can enter once and once only anytime from the start of December until the end of the month, spend 15 days maximum there, then must leave promptly.

I can't wait. : )