This is it! I’m on the train to Siberia! The train is quite old fashioned in some ways although we have a TV in our compartment. I got on, found my berth and who should walk in but a MAN. Now I’ve paid a lot extra to be sure of sharing with a woman so went out to have a conversation with our carriage attendant. She commandeered the help of a colleague who helpfully had a translation app on his phone. The results were hilarious and bore no relation to anything that was happening in our little sphere. The train was packed with happy football fans. I returned to my seat to find I was in the wrong place (der – dumb or what???) – I’d gone by the big no 5 on the door not the smaller no 5 which refered to my berth. Problem solved! So I bunked in with a lovely woman from Panama on her way to watch Panama play England in Nizhiny Novgorod just one night’s journey away.

Arriving in Moscow yesterday was about as good as it gets for the traveller – I was freshly showered (yes, there was a shower on the Paris to Moscow train), clean clothes on, full of a good breakfast, a full bottle of good water in my bag and my insides behaving in exemplary fashion (so far…..ha ha can’t tempt providence). What more could a girl ask for?