Moscow

We were prepared for the worst weather on arrival in Moscow, we both had about 4 layers on and it was a warm 6 C - Doh! The sun was shinning and we were sweating trying to find a metro station, this was easy 'cos you locate them by finding a big red M although we did get lost at first! As soon as we entered the station the Q's began. The ticket Q was tame and tickets were purchased with signing, made easy by the fact that there is one tarrif anywhere you go on the tube, you just need to state how many journeys you need. We had our Metro map in our trans-siberian book in both cyrillic and english but that just confuses you so we concentrated on the cyrillic.



The Q to actually enter the Metro was massive and not really a Q at all, just a mass gathering of bumping bods viing for the next valuable space closer to the escalators that descend forever (the tube doubles as a bomb shelter) and at twice the speed of ours. The platforms are very ornate with gold, stained glass, chandlers and fresco's.
The interchange stations are strange at first - thats how we got lost. Exiting at the wrong interchange stranded us clueless pointing at english maps and addresses for where we wanted to go to even more clueless locals! One guy was extremely helpful tho' he even called a friend of his out the shop as he could speak english, but he didn't know what we were on about either.



On returning to the station we noticed a town map in cyrillic that matched up with ours in english - bingo! - we were then able to translate our directions. Pointing at our directions where instantly understood by the locals (valuable lesson learnt here we thinks).



Once off at the correct place and after 20mins of agony and indecision we found our hostel n checked in. As our beds were not ready we searched the city for the trans-siberian tickets. The office we were sent to explained they didn't have the tickets and it was the other office on the other side of the town! Joy! Armed with a photocopy of the centre (which became an appreciated aid during our short stay) we picked up our tickets and headed back to the hostel - our beds still where not ready - they recommended somewhere for us to get some Russian food, which we were not disappointed with and finally got a bed to crash in ... literally.
The next day we had a whistle tour of the Red Square and caught the train!