Memories from the past.
June 28th, 2017, 12:19. I woke up early (3:00 AM) to catch the train to Ulan-Ude that I’m now leaving, letting it go to his destination. There are still 3.650 kilometres before the ending of the legendary trans-siberian railway. Unfortunately my visa allows me to spend only two more days in Russia but I’m not too much worried.
On my ’round the world trip next step is Mongolia and the best way to reach it is from here, from Ulan-Ude in the Buryatia.
Flying to Ulan-Ude.
If I’m reminding to you and me these moments of 3 years and half ago, is because I’m heading back again to Ulan-Ude. The trans-siberian railway will be soon my playground again.There are a couple of significant difference, this time.
The first one is quite obvious. I won’t leave from Moscow and so I need to fly to Ulan-Ude to start my real trip. The second one, that will have a stronger impact is we are in the middle of Siberian winter this time. I remember I had 43 degrees in Omsk during my previous trip. I could therefore expect about 60° or even 70° degrees less this time, but I’m not scared.
My plane leaves from Domodedovo airport, my favourite one in Moscow for a lot of reasons, at 9:00 PM. Six hours of flight but virtually a longer duration because of the time zone so, I will reach Ulan-Ude airport around 8:00 AM.
It’s covid time, so everybody is wearing a mask that can be removed only during dinner. 
I’m sitting next to window, an unusual choice for me during long flights (more than 3 hours) but I would like to see frozen Baikal.I’m pretty excited. This is my first real trip since a lot of time and therefore I don’t sleep. Outside I can barely see some blurred lights from cities that I can say only thanks to GPS. The two you may see in this page should be Omsk and Krasnoyark.
When we fly over Baikal is still too dark and I can only imagine the surface of the lake.
Is gonna be cold.
First lights of the day arrives on time to gift me a wonderful view of Ulan-Ude and near by villages.
In the partial darkness they look to me like the nativity scene they’re used to prepare for Christmas in Italy.
But I’m awakened from this thoughts by the voice of the captain after landing: “Welcome to Ulan-Ude, ground temperature is 31 degrees below zero“. I remember that I’m dressed as I would still be in Moscow and I give a kind of hysterical laugh…
Welcome to Ulan-Ude, welcome to Siberia in winter…
Here below few pictures.
