CLASSIC TRANS-SIBERIAN TRIP

Tour program

• Day 1

  MOSCOW

  Arrival in Moscow. Transfer to the hotel of your choice. Overnight in hotel.

• Day 2

  MOSCOW – TRANS-SIBERIAN

  Breakfast. Full day tour with all the must-see places of the Russian capital, such as: Cathedral of Christ the Savior, Sparrow Hills panoramic viewpoint and MGU (Moscow State University), Novodevichy Convent, Red Square, Manezhnaya Square, Alexander Garden, GUM (State Department Store), Tretyakov Gallery (or Historical Museum), Moscow subway, and the famous pedestrian Arbat street. In the evening, transfer hotel – station for onward travel to Kazan by the daily superior train #24 at 23:08. Journey time: 11h35m. Overnight on board.

  

  

  

  

• Day 3

  TRANS-SIBERIAN — KAZAN

  10:43 Arrival in Kazan. Meet your guide and enjoy a half-day tour of Kazan city with lunch in Tatar cuisine restaurant. You will see the most remarkable sights of this millennium-old city, such as the Old Tatar Sloboda, Märcani Mosque, Lake Qaban, Tugan Avilim (Native Dwelling). Enter Kazan Kremlin and take a look at Söyembikä leaning Tower, Annunciation Orthodox Cathedral, and the legendary Qol Sharif Mosque. 14:30 Check-in to the hotel of your choice and explore the city by your own in the afternoon. Overnight in the hotel.

  

  

  

  

• Day 4

  KAZAN — YEKATERINBURG

  04:30 transfer to the train station and departure for Yekaterinburg by the superior trains #60 or #16 at 05:38. Journey time: 12h:26m. 20:15 (local time). Arrival in Yekaterinburg. Transfer to the hotel of your choice.* Overnight at hotel.

• Day 5

  YEKATERINBURG — TRANS-SIBERIAN

  Breakfast. Full day tour with lunch. Yekaterinburg grew up around Plotinka Dam which harnessed the water in the Iset River for the town's ironwork factories. The dam has been reconstructed twice, and now it holds back the water in the City Pond, at the heart of the city. Around the City Pond, the majority of Yekaterinburg museums are located. You will see the historic center of the city with splendid Church of Spilled Blood at Tsar Nicholas II Death Site as well as the Chapel of St. Elizabeth. You will observe the beauty of downtown Yekaterinburg, gorgeous 19th century Urals’ gold merchants’ houses and monumental buildings of Stalin’s neoclassicism style. After lunch in a Russian tavern, you will visit the "One foot in Europe, another one in Asia" monument located on the outskirts of the city. It is installed on crossroads of two parts of the world and made of typical local stones mined in the Ural Mountains. You will also visit one place of your choice: the Museum of Perestroika in the newly built President Yeltsin’s Innovation Center or Ganina Yama. Yeltsin Center: opened in 2015, President Yeltsin Center preserves the legacy of the first President of the Russian Federation, who was born and raised in Yekaterinburg. The complex includes a branch of the Yeltsin library, the exhibition hall and the museum, all tasked with presenting the political history of the 20th century, and Boris Yeltsin's place in it. Ganina Yama is the mineshaft where the remains of the last Russian royal family were hidden after the execution, six miles away from downtown. Today an orthodox monastery with six wooden churches is located there. The churches were erected without any nail, in the old-fashioned Russian way. Transfer to railway station*. Departure on one of the evening trains heading Novosibirsk between 18:30 and 22:00. Journey time: around 21h. Overnight on board.

  

  

  

  

• Day 6

  TRANS-SIBERIAN — NOVOSIBIRSK

  Arrival in Novosibirsk between 18:06 and 19:48. Welcome to Siberia! Transfer to the hotel of your choice.* Overnight in hotel.

• Day 7

  NOVOSIBIRSK — TRANS-SIBERIAN

  Breakfast and full day tour of the Capital of Siberia, including lunch. The scientific town Akademgorodok, located 30 km/ 18 miles away from Novosibirsk, is the only scientific town in the world where all the branches of sciences are fully represented. For this reason, it is sometimes called the “Scientific Vatican” in Western media. In 1957, at the acme of the Cold War, Nikita Khrushchev and Soviet mathematician Mikhail Lavrentyev created a special town for scientific research that they named Akademgorodok, or Academy City. They built this town near Novosibirsk in the depths of the Siberian hinterland and convinced some of the Soviet best scientists to move over there. A nice town in the woods, Akademgorodok is home to Novosibirsk State University, several academies, and 35 research centers. The commonwealth is untouched by industry and enjoys the proximity of the Ob Sea, as the reservoir created by the damming of the Ob River is called. You will enter Akademgorodok via Lavrentiev Prospekt Avenue, marked by the Guinness Book of World Records as the “world's most scientific street.” You will see the Ob River Reservoir, called the Ob Sea by locals. You will know more of this town when visiting one museum of your choice: Archeological Museum at the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography (closed on SAT and SUN) / Geological Museum at the Institute of Geology and Mineralogy (closed on SAT and SUN) / Open-Air Railway Museum with a huge collection of Soviet locomotives and railway carriages (closed on MON and TUE). Then you return to Novosibirsk, the only settlement by the Trans-Siberian Railway that later turned into a million-plus city. You will try Siberian specialties for lunch before you proceed with the city tour, covering all the main attractions of the city: Novosibirsk Railway Station, the biggest station of the Trans-Siberian Railroad; Krasny Prospekt Avenue, one of the longest straight streets in the world (7km / 4.4miles); Lenin Square, the city center with the world’s second biggest Opera House (after that of Buenos Aires); historic wooden houses on Gorky St, the oldest part of the city; St. Nicholas Chapel, marking the geographic center of the former Russian Empire; embankment of the 7th longest river in the world (the Ob river); colorful Siberian farm-market. Transfer to railway station.* Departure on one of the evening trains heading Irkutsk: — 20:26 standard train #070 (daily). Journey time: 32h56m; — 23:54 fast standard train #008 (even dates). Journey time: 31h34m; — 01:44 (of Day 8) fast superior train #002 ROSSIYA (uneven dates). Journey time: 28h56m. Overnight on board.

  

  

  

  

• Day 8

  TRANS-SIBERIAN

  Day and night on board.

• Day 9

  TRANS-SIBERIAN — IRKUTSK — LAKE BAIKAL (LISTVYANKA)

  Morning arrival in Irkutsk: — 06:22 on train #070; — 07:40 on train #002. — 08:28 on train #008; Meet with the guide, proceed for breakfast, followed by the full day tour of Lake Baikal with lunch. En route to the lake, you will visit the open-air museum of wooden architecture Taltsy that was opened in the early 1980s with an attempt of preserving some historic houses that should have sunk in a newly created Bratsk reservoir. This outdoor museum is a 166-acre collection of authentic Russian and native Buryat, Evenki and Tafalar dwellings and community buildings from the 17th to the early 20th century. The wooden structures were moved here from various Siberian locations and reassembled into little hamlets and nomadic camps. The gate to a 17th century fort, a working chapel built in 1679 and a potter’s workshop give travelers a feel for the people who lived here back then. Your next stop will be at the village of Listvyanka, in front of the famous Shaman Rock. After you enjoy your fish lunch, you will visit the Museum of Lake Baikal which has an aquarium complex with the flora and fauna of the lake. Video excursions to the bottom of the lake will be also arranged. After that, you will reach the shore to take some wonderful pictures of the lake. On your way back to the center of the village, you will visit the colorful fish market and enjoy a boat trip of lake Baikal. By the chair-lift you will reach the observation point known as the Stone of Chersky for the breathtaking panorama of lake Baikal and the beginning of Angara river. Check-in will be possible at 14:00. Free time. Overnight in the wooden chalet at Listvyanka.

  

  

  

  

• Day 10

  LISTVYANKA — IRKUTSK

  Breakfast. Morning free. 12:00 Check-out and transfer back to Irkutsk, followed by Irkutsk city tour. Take a city tour around all of Irkutsk major historic sites including Znamensky Orthodox Cathedral, old-style wooden houses with distinctive hand-carved trims, the Monument to the Pioneers of Siberia topped with the bronze statue of Russian Emperor Alexander III. You will also visit the Decembrists’ museum to know more on the Revolt of December 14, 1825, its participants, and their life in the Siberian exile. You will walk along the historic Quarter 130 with reconstructed city’s buildings of the 19th and 20th centuries. Overnight in hotel.

  

  

  

  

• Day 11

  IRKUTSK

  Breakfast. Morning transfer to the airport for onward flight from Irkutsk.