World Trip

Pushed out of Russia

August 10, 2005

There are many ways to travel. How much money one spends depends mostly on research done and how much time, comfort and convenience one is willing to sacrifice. Traveling internationally by train in these parts of the world is one of those things where the price can vary greatly.

A regular train ticket from Irkutsk to Ulaanbaatar in Mongolia costs around $100. It is still quite cheap considering the distance that is being covered. However, a frugal traveler has an option to save over $60.

In Russia, trains tickets are priced based on distance. However, if there is a border crossing involved, a multiplier is applied. The trick is to break up an international ride into three tickets. The first ticket takes you to the Russian border town of Naushki. The next one, takes you just over the border into Mongolia, to Suchbaatar. Finally, the rest of the trip to Ulaanbaatar is the third ticket. The reality is that you are traveling the whole way on the same train, just need to get off and purchase tickets twice and get back on. This is not a problem from the timing perspective, as the trains stop for many hours on the border crossings.

There is a risk though. The risk is that there may not be enough tickets left for any one leg of the journey, and you may need to wait for the next train.

The train ride was a bit livelier than the Trans Siberian. There were a lot more foreigners on this train. In fact, the three cars we were in barely had any Russians in them. This is because there are lots of trains that do the route between Moscow and Irkutsk, but a much smaller number that go down to Mongolia. Having that many foreigners there turned out to be more of a pain than a blessing. A big portion of them were loud and rowdy and causing all sorts of havoc. I ended up hanging out with some really cool people from Holland and Germany, and having a quiet time in their compartment. However, the party was cut short by the provadnica, who had absolutely enough of the crazy Brits wreaking havoc in her kingdom, and I was forcefully removed back to my own compartment.

We got to Naushki without any problems. We did miss out on a great view of Lake Baikal, as this leg of the trip supposedly has some really nice sights, because we traveled overnight. At Naushki, we tried to buy train tickets just for the border crossing. They only had two left. We pleaded, and tried to get more tickets, but to no avail. Prior research warned of this situation, and we heard that it is often possible to get tickets even though none are officially available. You can try offering to pay more (a bribe) or other methods. NOTE: We obviously did not try hard enough. Later on in the trip, I met up with the Polish group again. Their situation in Naushki was similar. However, they were a lot more determined to get a train ticket, and got them. What is amazing is that a normal ticket across the border, if available, costs 150 rubles. They ended up paying 37 rubles a person and had to part with a bottle of vodka to grease the deal. Simply amazing.

With only two tickets in hand, we needed to decide who was going on this train. Allen was one obvious choice. His visa was expiring at midnight, and it will be tough enough for him to get out of Russia without an OVIR registration or entry card, let alone with an expired visa. The other ticket went to a Polish kid we met on the train who kind of tagged along with us.

The rest of us needed to figure out an alternate way of getting to Suchbaatar. After some research, we figured out it is possible to do it by car. First, we took a taxi from Naushki to the car border crossing in Kyachta. There, we needed to find someone who was willing to take us across in their car. It was impossible to cross the border on foot.

This was not really a problem. The border crossing was filled with Mongolian traders in minivans willing to take you across for a little price. We found one that had room for the five of us and were off, sort of. You see, this is the worst traffic jam I have ever been in. Our minivan was only four cars away from the gate, but the Russians were only letting one car through every twenty minutes or so.

The scene was out of this world. To start with, our minivan had a bullet hole in the windshield. Second, whenever the gate was bumping, all the cars would start their engines and go, often bumping each other in pursuit of a strategic position for the border crossing.

At one point, when our driver was out of the car, someone came along and dumped dozens of cigarette cartons through the window. When the driver got back, he calmly arranged them under the front seat. There is a quota for duty-free export, and since our car now had additional bodies in it, namely us, their cigarette quota immediately went up. The cigarettes were later reclaimed on the Mongolian side.

To add insult to injury, our engine seized. It simply would not start. We offered to push, but we were denied. Instead, the co-pilot, who was a large Mongolian woman, would push the car with some other guys whenever it was time to move. When we finally made it to the gate, we were literally pushed out of Russia.

Getting out of Russia was not easy. I did not get my required OVIR registration in any of the places I stayed. You need to register if you stay in one city in Russia for three days or more. However, I did not provably stay in any one place for so long, so I did not bother. It was difficult explaining this to the Russian border agent (who spoke some English). I was showing train tickets, hostel fliers, postcards, and museum ticket stubs. Pure comedy. Eventually, they let me through.

Getting out of Russia was an adventure, but things did not turn out as badly as they could have. We were now in no-man’s land, on the border. We officially left Russia, judging by the departure stamp in my Polish passport. We had not yet entered Mongolia. As our car rolled down the hill and eventually started, we were stopped by the first layer of passport control on the Mongolian side. We handed over our passports. The border guard looked confused as she looked through my American passport. I wanted to see what her reaction was going to be. I was traveling on two passports, and just departed Russia on my Polish one. It came out a lot cheaper for me this way. Now the border guard was flipping through my American passport with the Mongolian visa and found no sign of me leaving Russia. Seeing as she had a hard time formulating the question in a language that we would understand, I just gave her my Polish passport. She asked why I was traveling on two passports, and because I was not able to tell her in words she would understand the real reason, I simply responded “because I can.” She was satisfied.

At the real passport control I was hassled a bit more. It was more of a good-hearted jeering. The guard was confused as to why I had a Mongolian visa in my American passport. He spoke English well and I explained to him that I was told I needed one at the Mongolian consulate in Warsaw. He explained, just as I have originally heard, that Americans can enter and stay in Mongolia for 30 days without a visa. Obviously it was not a problem that I had a visa, but it was completely unnecessary and just caused confusion (not to mention a lack of $7 in my wallet for the visa processing fee). Afterward we were told to line up and one at a time walk up to a line in front of a device that looked like a camera. We obviously obliged and smiled nicely as they snapped photos of us. Very soon we learned that the device was really an infrared thermometer and they were measuring the temperature of people entering the country because of the threat of bird flu that was present in the area at the time. Luckily, we had no experiences with people trying to sell us unnecessary medical insurance for Mongolia, as many guides warn travelers. Maybe there is an advantage to crossing the border in a taxi.

We got a ride into Suchbaatar and as we were walking onto the train platform, the train pulled in as well, with Allen in the window. He has his own great Russian border crossing story, but since he tells it really well, I will let him tell it in his own words.

Getting a train ticket now was not a problem into Ulaanbaatar, and in no time we were bound for the capital of this faraway nation.