The Golden Ring

The Women's Cathedral

Around Moscow there are a number of small towns together forming the Golden Ring. These places are basically little collections of how Russia might have been prior to the industrial and communist periods, with central cathedrals and monasteries surrounded by a small number of homes and little shops then quickly becoming farmland with the endless plains and forests beyond.

We went to Sergiev Posad, Suzdal and Vladimir. I’ve described Sergiev in the previous post and Suzdal was where we spent a night while Vladimir was the town that was the doorway to Suzdal so we spent an afternoon here.

The train from Moscow to Vladimir was technically the first section of Trans-Monglian rail that we were on. Although we did take a 4 hour suburban train, so not really a big long over land adventure like other sections of the rail. Upon reaching Vladimir we found a bus to take us on the hour journey out to Suzdal, supposedly the gem of the Golden Ring.

Another Cathedral

We arrived soon after and found the hotel we were to stay in. We’d been told by another traveller in Moscow that the hotels price had gone up significantly from what was described in the Lonely Planet which we have based on a year prior. So instead of being some really cheap stay was 2500 roubles for the night which is way over the top considering our room had no hot water, a shower that didn’t work and a terrible interior that hadn’t been updated from those terrible decades of the 60s or 70s. But on the plus side the hotel was based in a monastery so the extra price was kind of like paying for the novelty of staying with monks.

The Peasants Homes Outside The Nice Monastery

We had one day to spend in Suzdal, which was more than enough time as there is basically one thing to do here, which is look at cathedrals. The town has about one cathedral per thirteen people. So basically on every block of the town which is about 3 km by 3 km in size there is a small chapel. If you are the type of traveller who gets off on seeing old churches and stuff then go to Suzdal, it will honestly be enough church building visual stimulus to last you a life time. After going here I’ve pretty much had enough of domes/spires/archways etc etc to see me right through Russia, and am looking forward to getting out of the Russian Orthodox setting and into something else.

Riding In Style On The Suburban Train

After 4 hours and about 50 churches later we got the bus back to Vladimir. Here we bought a train ticket to Nizhny Novogrod. The train didn’t leave for a few hours so we got to walk around Vladimir with the aim of buying snacks for the train. The town again being a Golden Ring town was based around loads of cathedrals, which was not that impressive now. Although at 5pm there was a huge ensemble of bell ringing as all the cathedrals started competing with each other for the ringing of the 5 pm bell.

Another thing about cathedrals is that they make a good place for wedding photography, and Russians love getting married. So far we basically haven’t had a day where we haven’t seen a wedding party being photographed at some famous sight. I try not to take photos of all the brides in front of all the statues and churches that we see, but honestly they are everywhere, and especially in the golden ring towns. The day in Suzdal and Vladimir we must have seen approximately 20 wedding parties. Mostly we see the wedding party being photographed, which is basically the bride posing and looking ridiculous while the groomsman stands around looking bored. Russia is totally the place to go if you are a chick who has used her whole life to plan her big day.

Another Beautiful Wedding

Eventually the train came and we hoped on to possibly the best train I’ve ever been on. It was just a day train that runs the main line from Moscow to Nizhny Novogrod, the first and third biggest cities in Russia which takes about 10 hours (our section about 4). It was seriously awesome, the seats were similar to those out of an airplane, and the cabins had two tvs in them and we got served food and sparkling water on top of all that. It was far better than the third class overnighters we’ve been taking and beats the suburban trains hands down.

Unfortunately Nizhny Novogrod was not our final destination, but we were to go onto Kazan. We were hopeful that arriving at Nizhny around 10 pm would be early enough to get the night train to Kazan. But we were not so lucky and the next train wasn’t until 5.40 am the next morning. So we got to spend a surreal night in the train station. The train station seemed to attract all the typical rift raff of society that just need some government care. So basically we didn’t get any sleep due to constant pick pocketers, drunks, dogs, security guards and bright fluorescent lights keeping you well awake. Finally once we got on the train after a very long, long, long wait we managed to sleep well in the over heated carriage which had somewhat comfortable seats. Popping in about 6 hours of sleep before arriving in Kazan.

Price List:
Trains: ~$50 from Moscow to Kazan
Accommodation: 1 night ~800 rbls each
Food: I cant remember, but it wasn't that bad as we shopped at supermarkets
Total: $5150. This is becoming rather inaccurate at the moment...