Border #2

Oh my, no wonder this train right is so long. We first sat for several hours on the Mongolian side of the border without much happening at all. A Mongolian woman and her son asked us if they could hang some jackets in out cabin. Took us a while to figure out they were smuggling. 😉 I was already dawn when we moved and crossed into Russia. Weird feeling actually (growing up in Eastern Germany gave me a certain “caution” about Russia), the big crowd of guards with machine guns certainly didn’t help. Wilm, our Dutch train companion, told me there would be showers on the other side, but only one. So, as soon as we stopped at the Russian border station, I jumped out and ran for it. Really nice shower, big with all extras. After I was done, only in a t-shirt and a towel, I walked our. Unfortunately the train was gone (for several hours)! I was pissed, but Amy got me a chess board from a market and I played chess to pass the time. Even after train was back, the Russian guards searched the train several times and confiscated our passport for a while. You need patience for the Russian borders!