I left Tomsk after exploring the city for a few hours. Getting from the hostel to the train station was significantly less painful than in the other direction and I boarded the train with plenty of time to spare. Already waiting was Yuri, a trainee cardiologist, who was on his way back from Moscow, having flown in the other direction. He spoke pretty good English and ended up being my main source of conversation and translation services.

The train left and as is usual with Russian trains, something fairly interesting happened pretty soon afterwards (as far as I remember). I was participating in a mealtime, which is basically a way of consuming vodka, with food. The idea is that you take a shot of vodka (in disposable shot glasses, naturally) and then bite down on whatever food you have in your other hand. I think it’s to take the taste away, but it’s a very sociable way of consuming vodka and eating at the same time. I’ve seen adverts for cheese or salami or something since, all arranged around a bottle in small bits and have known what they’ve been hinting at. One of the other people in the carriage also spoke a few words of English, so over the several mealtimes during the journey, we managed to have a few conversations. One of them was to do with spear fishing, which the slightly-less articulate bloke took part in along with someone else in the same compartment and it basically involves getting into a wetsuit and swimming around with a harpoon, spearing fish. He had photos of the fish he had caught, along with one he had given his wife, for her birthday.

The sun rose the next day to an absolutely spectacular view of Siberia in the snow. The train track was winding around the bottom of the valley, with small groups of trees visible against the whiteness. There were still ice crystals in the air and as the train went around the corners, you could see both the start and the end of the train, depending on which way the track was turning. This was one of the most amazing things I had seen up until this point, so naturally I spent quite a lot of time looking out of the window.

The rest of the train journey passed without anything significant happening and we arrived in Irkutsk fairly early a few days later. After the problems of finding the hostel in Tomsk, I had specifically chosen a hostel which was easy to find, which it was. After getting organised and walking around the city (which was -8C at this point), I decided to make my own dinner, which was the first time that this had happened on this trip.

I got up early the next morning for a 6 hour bus ride to Olkhon Island, the main island on Lake Baikal. Once I had arrived, I discovered that I was going to be the only one staying in my hostel, which was huge. This wasn’t a problem and after the woman had explained everything that I needed to know, I walked up on to the closest hill and watched the sun setting. The wind was freezing at this point, so it was the wind rather than my own intuition deciding when I went back inside again. The next day I attempted a walk that the hostel woman had recommended. She didn’t speak very good English (none, actually) and so I decided to walk along to the next hostel and get their advice before setting off. It was a long way and a big trip to do in one day and so I decided to go on a shorter route. After walking for about an hour and a half, I emerged on what I thought was the next village. It was, in fact, the same village that I had set off from and so I walked back to my hostel, had my lunch and set off for another route the second hostel had suggested. I almost reached the next village this time and managed to get back before it got dark.

I got back to Irkutsk the next day and went for another walk, as it was significantly warmer this time. The train to Khabarovsk left early the next day, so I just made my dinner and got ready for that.