Most people will want to break their journey and stop off along the way. This is a good idea not only for the chance to stretch your legs and have a shower but also because some of the places you pass through are well worth exploring. You won’t learn much about life in Siberia by looking through a train window, especially if you’re sharing a compartment with other foreigners. With the exception of a few military centres, all cities on the Trans-Siberian can be visited. If you’re booking through an agency, plan carefully: once you have started on your trip, it’s too late to change your itinerary. But if you travel independently you can just buy tickets as you go along, and stop off whenever and wherever you like.
If your trip starts in Moscow (see p155) it’s usually necessary to spend a night there, although you’d need several days to see the main sights. A side-trip to St Petersburg (p132) is highly recommended. At the other end, it’s certainly worth spending several days in Beijing (p344).
In between there’s the ‘Golden Ring’ city of Nizhny Novgorod (p217) and historically rich Yekaterinburg (p226). Novosibirsk (p246) is the sprawling capital of Western Siberia, Tomsk (p255) is an interesting university town and Krasnoyarsk (p259) is among the region’s most pleasantly situated cities. Irkutsk (p265), capital of Eastern Siberia, is 64km from beautiful Lake Baikal (p278), the world’s deepest freshwater lake; a stay beside the lake is highly recommended. Ulan Ude (p289) is worth a stop for the Buddhist monastery nearby, and Khabarovsk (p303) is surprisingly pleasant. Vladivostok (p312), the brawny home port of Russia’s Pacific Fleet, is the eastern railway terminus.
Also recommended for those headed to Beijing is a visit to Ulan Bator (p322), the capital of Mongolia. Irkutsk and Ulan Bator are the most popular stopovers for Trans-Siberian travellers.
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