Our alarms woke us up painfully early 4:00am) for us to make the train for the next leg of our journey. We walked across a cold and deserted Kazan to the train station were we boarded our train at 5:30.

We encountered another angry train guard who refused to allow us to lie in our beds without making them to her satisfaction. When she finally left us, we slept in peace for 5 hours or so.

During the morning the train was mostly empty, so we had the luxury of sitting by the window. At some point there was a surge of new passengers and we returned to our own seats, only to find that our neighbours were not particularly keen on sitting up, relegating us further to the upper bunks where we stayed for the rest of the trip.

We arrived in Yekaterinburg at 20:00 where we waited for the arrival of the train that would take us the rest of the way to Irkutsk. Other than realising that we had left half of our supplies on the previous train, we boarded the next train smoothly, and slept well.

The train passed several time zones during the night, so we woke up slightly confused. Most of the day was spent playing the game 'Murder on the Orient Express' (quite fitting).

In the evening the four Russian lorry drivers sitting across the aisle introduced themselves and offered us vodka which they produced from a bag with a flourish, proudly proclaiming "Russian". As drinking is banned on the train, they gave the impression of naughty school boys, with one acting as lookout, while the others carefully poured several glasses. They also offered us bacon ("Russian"), lamb ("Russian"), and more vodka ("Russian"). The party was shut down a few hours later by another passenger who disapproved of drinking (as a Russian himself, this surprised us very much).

Despite a terrible nights sleep (likely due to vodka and questionable Russian meat), our last full day on the train turned out to be our favourite. The train emptied out at Krasnoyarsk, where we also said goodbye to our lorry driver friends. The scenery was good, the sun was shining, and the smell of meat and sweat that we had come to associate with the trans-siberian was diminishing. We spent most of the day reading and filming out of the window, before getting some drinks in the dining carriage with a Colombian called Raoul and some Russians.

The next day the train arrived in Irkutsk at 10:30 in the morning. We quickly remembered how to walk on solid land, and realised we had no idea where our hostel was. We oriented ourselves (with the help of a german-speaking information assistant at the station) and jumped on the first 'tram' into central Irkutsk. I use '' as calling this thing a tram would be overly generous- on board a poster advertised the 70th anniversary of the Irkutsk Streetcar System, and this very much seemed to have been one of the originals.

We dumped our bags at the hostel and, after a brief rest, headed out into the city. We followed the 'Green Line Tour' of the city, literally a green line painted on the floor, linking the highlights of Irkutsk. The city has an American frontier town feel, with (seemingly) abandonded, dilapidated wooden houses dominating the centre. After walking along the river, and along both Lenin and Karl Marx Streets, we went back to the hostel.