Russia Trip

I got back two weeks ago from another trip to Russia, which was fascinating as usual. It's great to finally have my blog fixed so I can return to telling you about my travels. The statue above in in the Moscow Metro, Komsomolskaya Station. The Komsomol was the youth wing of the Communist Party.

The good news from Russia is that it is actually quite affordable now, for the first time in many years. A steep devaluation of the ruble means that for foreigners, prices are low. I stayed at a nice small hotel in St. Petersburg, the Kristoff, for $80 U.S. for a room including a generous and delicious breakfast buffet. The hotel is on Zagorodny Prospect, within walking distance of most of the city's attractions. Meals both in Petersburg and Moscow mostly came to $10 or less, which is cheaper than anything except the food courts and fast food places here in Montreal.

Once again, as in 2011, I travelled with Friendship Force International (www.friendshipforceinternational.org.) I stayed with a local host in a lovely home in a Moscow suburb for a week, enjoying some of the famous Russian hospitality and extensive sight-seeing, and met some very interesting fellow travellers from the U.S., the U.K., India and Japan. The local hosts were most accommodating, and the program included visits to two of the centres of the Russian space program. The suburb where we stayed was formerly a closed city, but now it is wide-open and seems to be thriving. Traffic was amazingly heavy, and within just a couple of blocks of my host's home, which was new and very comfortable, a series of five luxury hi-rise condo buildings is going up.

Keep reading in the next weeks for more information on my trip. It's nice to be back, but I miss Russia already.

Global Freeloaders

If you are a fan of low-cost lodging, there is no better price than free. That's what you get if you qualify to be a member of an online community called Global Freeloaders (www.GlobalFreeloaders.com.)

Qualifying is relatively easy--all you have to do is sign up for a period of 12 months, during which you agree to host guests yourself as well as being a guest. Hosts are supposed to be willing to accommodate guests in any way they can, completely free of charge, at the host's convenience. In other words, you don't need to accept guests if you don't like their approach, if you yourself will be travelling, hosting family, etc. And the lodging need not be elaborate--a mattress on the floor will do, or a room, or a separate apartment or cottage.

The community was started and is still run by Adam Staines, a 24 year old Australian who has already travelled widely and enjoyed meeting people all over the world. I like the layout of the site--minimal ads, lots of text, no distracting photos or videos. It is also filled with testimonials from people who have used the site successfully in their travels.

It is somewhat similar to Couchsurfing (www.Couchsurfing.com) except that Couchsurfing allows you to be either a guest, a host, or both. I also notice that Couchsurfing has become more elaborate, and that it now links to a number of social media sites. If I wanted to become a member, it looks as if I would have to do so through my Facebook account.

If you are up for the challenge of staying with strangers, GF may be for you. I never thought I would like staying with people I had never met, but after a trip last year with Friendship Force (www.friendshipforce.org) I am a convert. Whatever else, it is always an adventure.

Amazing Bargain Tour to Russia and Ukraine

If you are looking for a low-cost trip to Russia and Ukraine, it will be hard to beat one being offered by Friendship Force (http://www.friendshipforce.com/) starting next May 1. The trip includes a week's homestay in Lugansk, Ukraine and a week's homestay in Moscow, and is organized by the FFI club of Brisbane, Australia, but open to all. Cost for the two weeks? A mere $525 U.S.

Naturally, this doesn't include air fare, visa cost or insurance, but it is still incredible. It is easy to spend $525 on one night's stay at a luxury hotel in Moscow alone. I was sorely tempted by this trip, but will probably pass because I would be replicating the Moscow sight-seeing I did on my FFI trip earlier this year. Much as I love Moscow and its sights, I'm more interested now in improving my Russian, which could stand a great deal of improvement.

Lugansk is a smallish city in southeastern Ukraine, the more industrial part of the country. While it isn't known for its sights or history, I imagine the home hospitality will be amazing.

Right now there are still 25 places available on this tour, and you can find out more about it on the Friendship Force Website--click the segment marked "Experience the World" and scroll down.

Pictured above are some of the beautiful embroideries that were for sale in Zaporozhe, Ukraine, not far from Lugansk, in 2010.

Waiting for the Train at Port Baikal

My friend and travel mate on the Russia trip, Carol Ann Stoney, is shown below

while we were waiting to board the Circum Baikal railway in late May. Carol Ann and her family farm in southern Wisconsin, and I had not met her or any of the other fellow travellers before the trip.

Our backgrounds are fairly different, although we're both only children from the Midwest.

Carol Ann is an amazingly talented and hard working person, always doing some kind of handiwork while sitting in a bus or plane. She and her husband attend a farmer's market in Dubuque, Iowa every Saturday, where they sell mainly vegetables and fruit and samples of her crocheting, embroidery and knitting. Believe it or not,she and her husband has hardly missed a Saturday in 40 years. Carol Ann created a beautiful embroidered table runner for our lovely host in Irkutsk, and was kind enough to add my name.

I really enjoyed travelling with Carol Ann and the other Friendship Force(http://www.friendshipforce.org/) members, mainly from Dubuque but including some from Nevada and Texas. I'm a convert, having recently sent in my application to join the FFI chapter in Montreal. If the people I met on this trip, both American and Russian, are typical of Friendship Force members, I can't think of a nicer group to join.

Addendum in early January, 2017. I was very sorry to learn that Carol Ann and her husband were burned out of their homestead on Christmas Day. They survived, fortunately, but the house was totally destroyed. My thoughts and prayers go out to them.

Friendship Force International

I have written before about Friendship Force (http://www.friendshipforce.org,) a cultural exchange organization that offers home stays in various places around the world. However, that was before I had a chance to experience one of their exchanges.
My recent trip to Russia was a Friendship Force exchange organized by the club in Dubuque, Iowa. Most participants were from that club, but there were also two each from Texas and Nevada, and myself from Montreal. We stayed for a week each in St. Petersburg and Irkutsk with hosts, and for another week at hotels in and near Moscow.
It was relatively inexpensive, but it was also an amazing experience. My fellow Ambassadors (as exchange members are called)were uniformly welcoming and helpful, and my hosts in both cities were very kind and generous. Although I knew none of the other Ambassadors when I began the trip, by the time I returned I felt that I had a lot of new friends.
Friendship Force offers more than 250 exchanges a year to destinations around the world, and many are open to non-members. I can recommend the group heartily, and I plan to join one of the clubs either in Montreal or elsewhere. By travelling with a group like this, you have the chance for unique experiences such as visiting an English class at a public school in Vyborg as I did, meeting high level Russians who are eager to meet you, and getting a real glimpse into the lives of Russians who do not work in tourism.
This was my first trip with FFI, but I hope it will not be my last.

Amazing Siberia

I just returned from three weeks in Russia, including my first visit to Siberia, storied land of suffering and exile. I can report that there is a lot more to the place than those old tales, however true and valuable they may be.
Irkutsk, capital of eastern Siberia, is a booming cityof about 600,000 inhabitants with lots of traffic and new building. Made famous by the Dekabrist revolutionaries of 1825, it has long been considered the pearl of this vast, underpopulated region. The noble revolutionaries of the 19th century and their wives who voluntarily joined them in exile brought cultrue to this remote, forbidding area. Some of the mansions they built here still survive, along with numerous old churches and even a large Roman Catholic church built by Polish exiles.
Today Irkutsk is home to a large academic community and appears to be benefitting from some of the wealth generated by Russia's oil, gas and mineral development. There is still poverty, but the general mood seems upbeat.
I travelled to Irkutsk as part of a tour organized by Friendship Force, (http://www.friendshipforce.org) an international organization that brings together diverse groups of people who visit one another's homes. My host in Siberia was very generous and welcoming and did a lot to make my stay very pleasant. The same applied to a different host in St. Petersburg. I'll tell you more about the trip with pix in the coming weeks.