Christopher Rowe

The snowy haul to Moscow
If you haven’t already realized by now dear reader snow is something that I am easily excited about. Having seen snow only once (in my life) for a week whilst skiing in Australia before this trip, I have now seen it multiple times in different countries and it is fantastic. Unlike the locals I am not as yet put off by the slushiness occurrence that happens after snowing, it is still rather magical to me.

We are currently travelling by train from St Petersburg to Moscow, and the outside view for lack of a better word is spectacular; we have passed a number of snow lined forests, villages and streets buried in snow with dim light glowing from the windows and smoke pouring from the chimneys, it is incredible to see.

The railway yard leaving St Petersburg was also rather extensive, it seemed to take forever to finally leave the compound, passing various war torn buildings and rail lines and engines that had long since been discontinued.

I am eagerly looking forward to Moscow, but I have been warned that it is a lot different to St Petersburg. For one, the population is incredibly larger, and that alone produces its own problems. Law enforcement is a lot more strict; in the metro stations random passport checks are done on both tourists and locals (yes, Russians have both domestic and international passports), and in earlier reported cases, most dating back to 2004 some police officers would for no reason confiscate a tourist passport expecting the tourist to pay a bribe to have it back. In addition, pick pocketing in metro areas and around various tourist attractions is also a high risk.

As an initiation to Moscow we have arranged an ‘on foot’ tour in the morning to introduce us to the metro system (and hopefully purchase a week long ticket) and various other parts of Moscow. Two hours after that tour we start a night tour which is a more generalized city tour. The photographer in me whom especially likes to take night photos will be seizing this opportunity (with a Russian speaking guide) to do so, as I am not yet too sure just how much roaming the streets at night I want to do in Moscow, let alone with a camera and a tripod – it couldn’t be more obvious that I was a tourist even if I had a flashing neon sign saying so in Russian.

Aside from having to be a bit more travel conscious, which we initially treated St Petersburg with also, I am looking forward to a new landscape, new tours and a different perspective on historical significance. I will however miss the extreme low minimums and maximums that St Petersburg had on a daily basis, Moscow from the looks of the forecast is a lot warmer, with a maximum of around 14 degrees and a minimum of 6. I’d say there was a very slim chance of us seeing snow in Moscow.