Lonely Planet Trans-Siberian Railway: A Classic Overland Route

Paperback - June, 2002 - Lonely Planet Publications
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By: Simon Richmond and Mara Vorhees
ISBN: 1864503351

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Reviews by readers

Excellent guide book

This LP was all i needed for the russian leg of my trans-siberian trip, It offers more than enough to keep you busy for the standard one month tourist visa. (The people above must have never gotten off the train between Moscow and Irkutsk!) If you intend to branch out in mongolia or china then you will obiously need to supplement this guide. It is a short compact guide focused specificly on the train routes, and it covers them remarkably well.

Good, but fast outdated!

We've used the book in july/august 2002 for a trip from Beijing to Helsinki. Much information in the book, but a lot of it is copy-past'ed from the country guides.
Another reviewer remarked on the rapidly changing circumstances in the countries... no guide can outrun those.
We visited Beijing, Irkutsk, Listvanka, Jekaterinaburg, Moscow and Saint-Peterburg. Most of the time we found accomodation from the book. At that time, the Trans-siberian handbook (Thomas Bryn - ISBN 1873756704) was older.

We had both books: LP fresh of the press and Thomas Bryn's book - THE guide to have.
Thomas' had a new edition in february 2004. Best to take the most recent editions of guidebooks. The handbook is more interesting to read, so that's a must. You'll have plenty of time to read!

The trip is recommended to anyone: we found a british couple with 2 kids doing it! Don't be too easily discouraged, try to take the east-west trip (to avoid wagons full of tourists!).

Bryn Thomas' Trans-Siberian Handbook the way to go

You'll get more of the generic country information that LP is good at (and provides in their various country-specific guides) but we found the research in the Handbook provides a much more informative passage across the time-zones. By far the best and most up-to-date source of information on booking tickets is a website called "www.seat61.com". Having tried various "tour" organisations, we ended up booking all arrangements through one of the recommended Russian agencies for half the price - all through internet cafes on the hoof in Bolivia! As for companion guides, much preferred the handbook.

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