Travel Visas and Tran Siberian tickets have arrived!

The tickets for the tran-siberian and all three visas needed arrived over the weekend. Its the first time I've had anything 'exotic' in my passport as I've only ever been on holiday in Europe - so its quite exciting!

Anybody who is planning a trip on the tran-siberian railway, we bought our tickets and had the visas arranged through Real Russia, and I cant rate them highly enough. Excellent customer support dealing with my no dount highly annoying questioning regarding the complexities and red-tape with the notorious 'Russian Visa'.

Obviously they make a mark up arranging the visas and booking the tickets. With each visa they charged £20 extra on top of what you would pay if you were to go to each embassy and apply in person.

A small price to pay considering they do all the leg work of arranging dropping off and collection of your passport to the different consulates. Very pleased!

The first leg of the journey!

View Route in a larger map

Here's a map of the initial route we're taking. Starting with a flight from Luton to Amsterdam, then flying from Amsterdam to Warsaw, then by train from Warsaw to Krakow, followed by a train back from Krakow to Warsaw!
Then back on the plane from Warsaw to Saint Petersberg (8 hour stopover at Riga) and finally train it from Saint Petersberg to Moscow! All in 12 days. Stressful much?
On the 12/4 at 21:30 local time we board the Trans-Mongolian bound for Ulan Bator!