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The price sounds way too expensive, but I’d guess you’d be staying at nicer hotels than I did. And doing the whole trip in just 2 weeks sounds crazy, you’d be spending half your time on the train!

How much it costs when you do it independently really depends on your travel style (what sort of accommodation, what class on the train, etc.), but a very rough guess of mine for transport (2nd class) and accommodation (cheap hotels, guesthouses or homestays) would be 500 £ maximum for 2 weeks. Food and other day-to-day expenses would probably be about 100 £.

Don’t forget about visa fees, they can be quite expensive, I would budget about 150 £ for all 3 of them, but check with the respective embassies in your country to make sure. If you’re not set on doing it quite so fast, it may be less hassle to get the Mongolian visa in Ulan Ude (all you need there is a passport picture) and the Chinese one in Ulaan Bataar.

Thanks Seraphim. I meant to say it was 3 weeks. I’m still unsure whether to do it independantly or with a group. Is it easy to buy tickets along the way? Ie is there a huge language barrier along the route? Or is it relatively easy to scrape by with english and maybe a few key russian phrases.

Forget English. That won’t get you anywhere. But that doesn’t mean buying train tickets should be a problem. Just write down your destination, the number of the train, the date and time, and the class you want to travel in (2nd class is called Kupe, 3rd class Platskartni) on a piece of paper (in Cyrillic) and hand it to the ticket seller. The only problems can be reading the schedules, the ones posted in the train stations tend to only mention the final destination. There is an information window, but the queue for that is usually at least as long as for buying tickets. Some stations have computers where you can check schedules too. I usually just looked up schedules beforehand on http://reiseauskunft… I doubt they’re complete, but if you intend to take fast trains over long distances, it works fine. Keep in mind that all times are Moscow time, not local time (as is usual with Russian rail). Another problem I had in Moscow was that I didn’t know each window corresponded with only a number of destinations (there is a list posted, but not very obviously), so I waited in the wrong line, got turned away and hadn’t a clue why. But I figured it out eventually.

I’ve met people who travelled independently but bought their tickets from an agency beforehand. I’m sure this is more expensive, but it can save you a lot of time (you may have to queue for up to 2 hours) and effort. If you don’t speak any Russian and your itinerary is set in stone, this is probably the most comfortable way to do it. Local travel agencies can often buy tickets for you too, and someone there will probably speak English.

I think a guidebook would have a Russian dictionary with some train stuff in the end – you can just show it in the ticket window. I got myself in typically the same situation in China when nobody speaks English, you don’t read local language and there are lots of people willing to buy the train tickets. A bit tough sometimes but pretty manageable finally.

www.timetable.tsi.ru has quite accurate shedules in English