Vladimir and Suzdal

So after Baikal, we had a couple of hours in lovely Irkutsk (main city next to Baikal). It was lovely, with a very nice small city feel. As we were taking a flight the next morning, we had to rest early and wake up early. I was not too keen on the flight (even tho it was the best option for our plans by far), mainly because of the fear that we may lose our luggage. The check in process and the entering the flight process was pretty smooth. For a flight price that was similar to our budget flight to Beijing, Aeroflot was a real good value for money. the seats were alright and the staff onboard were really courteous and nice. The best part of the flight tho, was the meal! It was so delicious that i would have payed to get that at restaurants, let alone flights. They served us, crepes with cheese, chicken, ham and cheese, a bread with a delicious jam spread and a large tub of amazing vanilla ice-cream. I was so satisfied by the meal :D.  The flight itself felt like an eternity simply because i could not seem to fall asleep for a long period of time (damn day flights!). Finally tho, we landed safely in Moscow’s airport and we got our luggage. All was well 🙂 We also managed to get sim cards that provided us data for all part of our Russia travel (which was going to come in very very handy). After the trauma of cabbing to Listvyanka, we decided to take a bus into the city and take the famous Moscow Metro to the railway station. The bus in took alittle while but was alright. Before taking the metro, we stopped by for a meal at kfc (which was disappointing to say the least). The metro, on a mere glimpse was as beautiful as it was claimed to be. The railway was pretty confusing but we were fortunate enough to have planned some extra time so that we had the cushion of time to find our train. The train itself was really comfortable as well as empty! After some time-passing using Chinese chess and talking, we started to mainly enjoy the scenery. While i was charging my phone in a separate cart, i met this really awesome Russian lady by the name of Dasha Shibaeva who was on her way home on the train. She was an experienced traveller, who has lived all over Europe, USA and South America. She was actually just back from her travels in South America (5 months). She had some really cool stories and some scary ones like how she was attacked in Peru (luckily nothing happened because a group chased the guy away). Was a real privilege to have met and learnt some tips from her :).  It was quite a quick ride to Vladimir and thanks to the “Gett” app, we were able to get a cab to our hostel for a cheap price (2.50 SGD for 4 people). The hostel itself was pretty cool and the main word to describe it, would be Hipster. Our host seemed unfriendly but was actually really helpful to us. Vladimir was more or less a small urban area and we did not spend much time there. The next morning, we were off to Suzdal, one of the Golden Ring cities. It was a quick ride and we faced the next speed bump. While carrying our load, i put in the wrong address and took us in the completely wrong direction. Luckily, a kind old man pointed us in the right direction and told us there is a bridge over a river that was not on the map. After another 30 minutes we reached our accommodation and it was great. Two big rooms, fully functioning kitchens, a television set that i could plug my laptop into. After some rest, we headed out into the city center. There was a route on the map but for some reason, we ended bashing though snow (like in army), had to cross a small frozen river (pretty fun) and we ended up in a farm. Fortunately for us, we skirted around the farm, phew. We spent quite some time exploring the Suzdal Kremlin and city centers.The most apt description for Suzdal is the word magical. It was like fantasy land, completely untouched by time or globalisation. No fast foods, no high rise building, nothing. After our sightseeing, we started looking for dinner but for some reason, all the dinner places with reasonable prices were closed by 5! Hence, we simply decided to buy supplies at a supermarket and cook dinner for ourselves. This turned out to be a great decision as we were left with a filling dinner that was so much cheaper than eating out. We watched shows and played cards till we slept. The exhaustion of the trip was starting to catch up with us as we were starting to got tired faster every night (this is a real concern for us). The next morning, our host was kind enough to save us a tiring 30 minute walk and drove to the bus station. From there we took a return journey to Vladimir by bus and waited for our train to Moscow. Really excited for Moscow (the part of our trip i had been super hyped up for).