Kazakhstan
Bigger map (161 kByte; new window)
Also for the giant Kazakhstan, we will unfortunately not have that much time, a maximum of a week. Possibly, we are going to travel to the Chinese border where the new railway from 1992 to Urumqi in north-western China crosses. Unfortunately, we can not continue into China, as we only have single entry visa for Kazakhstan and could not return to Kazakhstan.
Tuesday, April 20, 2004
Wednesday,
April 21, 2004
Thursday, April 22, 2004
Friday,
April 23, 2004
Saturday, April 24, 2004
Sunday,
April 25, 2004
Monday, April 26, 2004
Tuesday,
April 27, 2004
Wednesday, April 28, 2004
After the thorough exit control, the entry to Kazakhstan works quite smoothly. The border guard is slightly irritated about the fact that our visa have already been valid for three weeks now and wonders whether we have already been in Kazakhstan - a question that he could easily answer himself as we have no Kazakh stamps in our passports. Then he seems to be unable to imagine that we really want to leave this train in Kazakhstan and not travel straight to Moscow and asks "Transit?" all the time. But finally he understands, and we sleep on while the train is heading westbound in Kazakhstan.
In the morning, we change to a diesel loco. At the location where the electrification
ends, there is also the branch of the line to Almaty. We are going to go there,
but first, we continue further to the west on the line to Moscow so that we
can enjoy our luxury compartments a bit longer. We finally leave the train at
Qyzylorda in the late morning. It is about 300 km (190 miles) from the Cosmodrome
Baikonur, but there seems not to be a launch at the moment.
We need to get Kazakh cash, we have only exchanged a little amount on the train.
In the city, we hit the first operational ATM since Istanbul and withdraw 10
000 Tenge (approx. 70 US-$) - the number of zeros continue to drop since Turkey!
Here, there are even banknotes with a value big enough to justify the effort
to pick it up from the ground if you dropped one of them.
At the ticket office, we realize that we have shifted our watches wrongly. Not
only is eastern Kazakhstan one time zone ahead of Uzbekistan, in addition, there
is daylight saving time at present which Uzbekistan does not have, Now it is
less than 15 minutes to the departure of the train, and we have no tickets yet!
There is quite some queue at the ticket office, and when it finally is Till's
turn, the ticket vendor says "It's five minutes left to departure, now
I'm closing!" and closes the curtain.
We get on board anyhow at the closest car and ask the provodniken (conductor)
for empty beds. We have come to a "Platskartny" coach, a quite crowded
type of couchette without compartments where there are bunks on both sides of
the corridor. He charges us quite hefty, about double the price at the ticket
office, so now we have nearly run out cash in Kazakh Tenge. After a while, we
are given places in a sleeper coach. The four-berth compartment is full, but
some get off at the next stop, and the provodnik relocates the last passenger
to another compartment. So we even have a compartment on our own, but now, this
provodnik also wants to be paid. We try to explain him that we have already
paid to hiss colleague, but he just says "This is my coach". He is
in a superior position and obviously aware of it. We succeed to negotiate a
bit down to 70 US-$. As a small revenge, he gets it in one-Dollar notes...
During the time, we have learned what it means if the provodnik tips his index
finger to the throat, he wants to know if we wish to have vodka. it is forbidden
on trains, but drunk a lot anyhow.
A closer look on the map reveals that we have actually been in Kyrgyzstan during
the night without even noticing it. About 15 to 20 km (10 to 12 miles) of the
line are in this country, however there has been no passport control. Probably
there is a control at the station for passengers getting on and off at the only
station in Kyrgyzstan.
Many borders in Central Asia cross roads and railways forth and back and force
people to transit a neighbouring country to move between different parts of
their country. While the republic borders where not that important in the Soviet
era, they are now borders of independent countries with complicated visa regulations.
Even if this is mostly handled reasonably on a local level, it is still a constraint
for the development. There have been and are being built a couple of new railways
and roads for this reason. Kyrgyzstan has had no fewer than 6 sections of railway
(some of them are most likely closed today) that have no connection with each
other within the country, but only via Uzbekistan or Kazakhstan.
As one can read from the train's number, our train belongs to the lowest category
of Kazakh long-distance trains. It stops frequently and often quite long. The
on-board selling exceeds all we have experienced in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
Except food virtually anything is sold, toys, dishes, lamps, newspapers and
many other thing. At one occasion, we count 25 vendors in 10 minutes passing
by our compartment. As we will hear later, it is vice versa in the remote western
parts of the country: The trains supply the villages as shops on wheels. This,
however, we do not see here.
The closer we get to the metropolis of Almaty, the higher the mountains east
of the railway grow, they form the border to Kyrgyzstan. The line to the capital
Bishkek diverges at Lugovoj, approximately 400 km (250 miles) from Almaty.
A faster train coming from the country's new capital Astana, former Aqmola or
Tselinograd, passes by us. We could have changed and arrived at Almaty earlier,
but like this, we get longer train travel for our money. At a station some twenty
miles before our destination Almaty, we stop quite long, until we hear someone
say "The Spanish train!". There a Spanish-built Talgo trainset is
rushing by us, the very latest and most expensive train of the Kazakh Railways
that has been going between Almaty and Astana for about a year now. The train
has a quite futuristic appearance between all the rolling stock from the Soviet
era.
Our journey was 1180 km (740 miles) long, and it has taken us no less than 29
hours. We have not checked our arrival time in advance and believe we must be
heavily delayed as we arrive in Almaty after the many long stops - but we are
actually on time. The train stops first in Almaty I, a big station and major
junction about 10 km (6 miles) from the city centre, and terminate finally in
Almaty II, a smaller station close to the centre.
We contact David Berghoff, the German Almaty-based Central Asia expert who organized
our Turkmenistan journey. He recommends us a mid-range hotel where we are going
to stay two nights.
We begin our next day with some bureaucracy, we have to register no later than
72 hours after entering the country. The travel agency Central Asia Travel that
has issued our invitations fixes that for us. This way, we do not need to stand
in a queue at the police authorities, that is worth some bucks extra - and we
do not have a choice anyhow, as they have issued our invitations and we are
in a town where they have an office, it is compulsory to register via them.
We organize our tickets to Astana for the following day. We want to ride the
Spanish-built Talgo train but do not get any free berths, so we take an ordinary
train instead. We find out later that we have received a faulty information
that the train travelled daily - there is only one trainsett and only two trains
per week and direction, and the train does not run the day we want to travel.
Later in the afternoon, we get to the railway line and look for a good place
to take photos of interesting rolling stock. At that time, we still believe
(faulty) that the Talgo train would leave this evening. We hit a location 15
minutes walk from the station where we wait. We see a fairly modern catenary
maintenance vehicle that rolls over to a side track to give space for an approaching
express train. Train No. 10 from Astana approaches the station on schedule.
The train is mixed of coaches in the UIC profile and the broader profile of
the former Soviet countries. However, after that the direct car from Astana
to Berlin apparently has been discontinued recently, Kazakhstan has no longer
direct connections to Europe outside the former Soviet Union, so the UIC coaches
obviously only go in domestic services and to Russia (Note: The direct car Astana
- Berlin has been reintroduced in the meantime). After a while, the maintenance
vehicle comes back on the main track and blocks the station, so we realize that
there will be not Talgo train, and go back.
We meet up with David Berghoff downtown. He has been living in Central Asia
for several years, first in Turkmenistan, but he was not allowed to stay there
any longer. Now he has been living in Almaty for a bit over two years and runs
his travel Agency "Stantours" there. He has also bought our tickets
from Astana to St. Petersburg and through a partner reserved tickets from St.
Petersburg to Helsinki that are supposed to be delivered to us in St. Petersburg.
As a little compensation for the missed depot visit in Ashgabat in Turkmenistan,
we get the tickets at cost price, and he invites us to a beer and orange juice
- and this despite the fact that this misshap was due to factors beyond his
control. Thanks, David!
After our second night in Almaty, it is time to break up for the Capital Astana.
The train does not leave before lunchtime, but we get to the station early in
the morning nevertheless because this morning, we are finally going to see the
Talgo train arriving from Astana! A bit outside the station, where the line
comes in a curve into the town, we take our positon, and after a while, diesel
sound announces the Talgo train. While the other trains are hauled with electrical
locos, the Talgo will be diesel-hauled until the new Chinese electrical locos
have not yet been delivered to the Kazakh Railways. These are by the same manufacturer
as the loco we have seen in Uzbekistan, but not of the same type. The existing
electrical locos are only approved for up to 100 km/h (62 mph), so it is quicker
with the fast diesel loco for at moment.
The light is bad for taking photos, but there is nothing good close to the town
at this time of the day. Back on the platform, one of the train hostesses in
a nice blue dress permits us a look into one of the modern, functional sleeper
compartments. As we continue taking photos, an overambitious police officer
approaches us and wants us to stop taking photos. He gets with us to the station
manager's service room. We explain as good as possible that we are tourists
interested in railways and show some of our pictures. All people in the room
look a bit helpless, and it seems that the station manager comes to the conclusion
that we are harmless. We get to the platform with the police officer again,
and while he is still standing besides us, we continue taking lots of pictures.
Victory! ;-)
Now it's time to pick up our luggage from the hotel. On our way, we see among
others a Czechoslovakia-built tramway from Berlin with a big German Mirinda
soft drink advertising.
Something more that we find notable in the city is steam pouring from cracks
in the asphalt at some places, it seems to be leakages in the district heating
or something similar. It has become colder.
Back at the station, we wait until we can get on board of our train. We see
a room "The International Hall" marked with English and Chinese letters.
That must be for the passengers to the train that leaves twice weekly to Urumqi
in North-West-China. Unfortunately, we have not seen this train. This connection,
opened as recently as 1992, was one of the links in our original plan to travel
from Europe to China without crossing through Russia and to get home on the
classical Trans-Siberian route. As we decided to shorten the trip and to leave
out China for this time at least, we still wanted to travel until the Chinese
Border, however, this is a restricted area on the Kazakh side, and David Berghoff
told us how he was arrested there and brought to court once only for being there!
We get on board of our train. We have booked a two-bed compartment, and it is
just as stylish as the sleeper we took out of Tashkent. There are nice tea dishes
and bed sheets, the only annoying thing are the dirty windows that cannot be
opened for taking photos... but this is fixed at the next stop at the big junction
Almaty I.
We first follow the line we came on westbound, before we reach the big track
triangle where the line to Astana diverges to the north. During a stop on the
line, a guy gets off and starts picking flowers along the line... It seems that
extra income is essential. The line is in relatively good shape, after all,
it is the most important one in Kazakhstan and the one that is used by the most
exclusive and expensive train in the country. We are not using the direct route
but change direction in the city of Shu west of the triangle in the afternoon.
There again is a lot of platform trading, while there are hardly any sellers
on board - it seems that those are only with on the slower trains, while our
train belongs to the faster ones and only stops in a few bigger cities.
After a calm night, we approach Kazakhstans capital. The weather has turned
to the worse, it's raining cats and dogs, and it has become quite cold.
The capital has changed its name three times under its lifetime. It was founded
in the 1830s as "Akmola", "white plenty" in Kazakh. That
has its background in the fact that the area was known for its diary products
and bread. Under Khrushchev, the town was re-named to Tselinograd - "Virgin
Lands City" as it became the centre for a project to develop untouched
areas. After the break-up of the Soviet Union, the town got back its old name
Akmola, and the president Nazerbaev decided to make it to the capital instead
of Almaty. One of the reasons stated was the risk for earthquakes in Almaty,
but critics translated Akmola with "White Grave", convinced that declaring
a provincial town with extreme climate to Capital would be the political dead
of president Nazerbaev. The town was finally renamed to Astana, which means
simply "Capital" in Kazakh.
At the station, we see lots of used West-European city buses - virtually all
except the trolleybuses seem to be such ones. Bengt spots a couple of buses
coming from the Greater Stockholm Urban Trafic Company and feels immediately
like at home. We take a cab to the centre and find an internet café.
As the weather is not very inviting, we spend a couple of hours there, write
E-mails and burn photos on CDs. Renaming the files according to our scheme alone
takes many hours...
In the late afternoon, we start looking for a hotel. Our traveller's guide is
four years old, that is a lot in this region of the world. It has become even
colder, and the rain has turned into wet snow with strong winds. Of course,
we have a headwind as we walk to the quarter that looks most promising on the
little map of the guide, and we go into the first hotel we spot. It is the "Europe
Palace", directly besides the parliament. It looks very nice and luxurious,
with a magnificent bar in the parterre and only a few rooms upstairs. It is
not cheap for Kazakh conditions, but the price is bearable, so we book two nights,
the rest of the time until our train to St. Petersburg will leave.
The rooms have a strange layout. It is four double rooms, grouped around a little
dining room where our dinner is served. It is apparently a guesthouse for the
government that is used as hotel when there are no official visits.
During the night, it has cleared up, and now it is -7 °C (19 °F) -
the lowest temperature during our whole journey. The weather is now more invitning,
but now, the whole town is covered with ice, and one has to look up not to slip.
Snow and ice clearance is being performed by old-fashioned means. We get up
early to see the Talgo trainset as it arrives from Almaty. Actually, we could
have stayed in Almaty a day longer and taken the Talgo ourselves, but it's always
easy to second-guess...
The station is newly built and very modern. One can guess that the city grew
in importance only a few years ago. There is a even a pedestrian bridge over
the tracks, but most people walk over the tracks nevertheless despites the high
platforms. As the Talgo train arrives from Almaty, it stops on the track closest
to the station building. We succeed to take better pictures than in Almaty.
During the time, a full urban train arrives on the platform behind. While some
people go around the Talgo that is in the way, most wait until it is shunted
to the depot... and as this happens, a real flood wave of people climbs down
and up the high platforms. In fact quite an impressive view...
We take a look into the depot area that is situated nearby the station. Nearly
no-one is there, the grind is open. Some trainsets are there for cleaning, but
no especially unusual vehicles.
We finally get back to the centre and take a look around downtown. A lot is
newly built, and there are quite some representative government buildings. However,
it is not as extreme as Ashgabat in Turkmenistan with its grossly oversized
monuments. We also walk by the parliament side by side to our hotel and speak
to a member of parliament who is just passing by. He speaks quite well English,
we ask if it is possible to visit the parliament and explain that in Sweden,
all people have the right to visit the people's representatives at their work.
He is very friendly but explains us that it was unfortunately not possible to
visit the Kazakh parliament - "We have a different system." Well,
you can really say that! Even though Kazakhstan is the wealthiest and probably
the most liberal of the Central Asian Countries, it is far from democracy.
We take it easy on our last day before we start our journey home. We have the
whole day as our train to St. Petersburg will not depart before close to midnight.
We make some trips with urban buses without specific destination to have a look
at the less representative parts of the town. Most are newly-built quarters
with a lot of grey concrete apartment blocks. We get the chance to ride on one
of the few newly manufactured buses in the town, they are from Korean production.
Till spots an old blue "Bahnbus" from the time as the former German
Federal Railways DB still operated its own regional bus lines. The old DB-logotype
and the destination sign "Erbach (Odenwald)" are still intact... Erbach
is a small town in Germany about 150 km (90 miles) north of Tills birth town
Stuttgart, but it must be regarded as unlikely that the bus really is on its
way there now... ;-) Till will report this observation later to the communal
administration in Erbach by E-mail, but never get back any comments...
We go shopping in a mall with a choice nearly like at home. There are many imported
goods at the corresponding prices, but Bengt does not find his favourite cheese
from the Swedish Västerbotten county.
We are quite early at the station until the train to St. Petersburg is about
to leave. We have taken an old bus from Stockholm here, so Bengt will say later
that he began and terminated his journey home with the Greater Stockholm Urban
Trafic Company.
This is going to be the longest journey in the same train, we are going to sleep
three nights in our four-berth compartment. It is close to midnight as we begin
our journey home. Now we are actually a little homesick...
The next morning, we are still in Kazakhstan. The train does not run the shortest
way to Russia but takes a zig-zag route on partly non-electrified lines further
to the north, so it is nearly 1000 km (600 miles) to the border.
We share the compartment with a Russian businessman from Chelyabinsk who workes
in the tube business. With sketches and a little help of the dictionary, we
can talk quite a lot about technical things and materials despite the lack of
language skills.
In the town Tobol not too far from the border, we have to change to a diesel
loco and reverse direction. The northbound railway we continue on is electrified
a bit, but obviously only for coal transports to a power plant about halv the
way to the next major junction Kustanay. We see extensive industry railways
with their own electrical locos of types completely different from the ones
ususal at the state railways in Kazakhstan and Russia.
In the afternoon, we arrive at the border to Russia in the town Kaerak. The
Kazakh border guard is very suspicuous about Till's passport that is a little
worn. He looks carefully at the edges and seems to believe that it is something
is homemade. But he does not find anything and is finally satisfied. Bengt asks
under the time the guards to smile and wants to take photos, but they do not
like it at all. Fortunately, the flashlight does not trigger, so the guards
do not notice that Bengt has taken a photo, showing a border guard clearly disliking
to be photographed...
Aftet an hour of stop, the train goes on, and we continue our way to the Russian
industrial and border town Troicsk.
