Russia's Most Luxurious Train: The KRASNAYA STRELA

thousands of russians make this journey every single day and head across to leningrovsky station to take the crossnay estrella the red arrow up to saint petersburg i'm pretty impressed with this hello anderson vittier from moscow and from red square with the kremlin right behind me home of course to russian leaders and oligarchs throughout the centuries now when it comes to traveling around russia for these people of course the railway is king and it has always been that way and when the leaders were heading up to saint petersburg or leningrad as it was in the day they would take the crazy estrella the red arrow which is a overnight train from here in moscow up to saint petersburg and that's exactly what we're going to be doing today we're going to be following in the footsteps of the great leaders and the tsars and the dignitaries and taking a ride up to some petersburg on the crosney estrella the red arrow now before we go and jump on the train up to saint petersburg i need to show you the hotel i've been staying in here this is the soviets hotel built in the 1950s by the sun of joseph stalin and it was used to house all of the visiting diplomats and foreign leaders from around the world when they came to visit the soviet union um two reasons really not only because it was a really lavish and probably the most lavish hotel in moscow but also all the rooms were booked so that anything that was said by various leaders could be picked up by the soviet regime inside it really is something to behold so let me just quickly take you inside and show you this hotel before we head to the station and get on the train up to saint petersburg [Music] isn't this place just absolutely phenomenal halls and marbles everywhere just an absolutely beautiful hotel just outside the center of moscow look at this [Music] now back in soviet times of course this hotel would have been bugged by the communist leaders here in the soviet union and there's like lots of stories of little secret cupboards little secret doors to stop everywhere in this hotel where they used to have monitoring rooms to monitor all of the rooms from the visiting dignitaries i'm not going to talk too much about the history of the hotel because there's already a fantastic video on youtube by bold and bankrupt who's done a really nice far better job of talking about this place than i could ever do so i'll pop a link to that video up there but before we go off to the station i need to show you my room here now of course like any great leader we're not just staying in any room at the soviet ski hotel we're staying in this one this is stalin's apartment yes that's right this guy up here mr stalin himself well he used to stay in this apartment here as well as all the great leaders when they used to come to moscow visiting dignitaries and just look at this room here i mean crazy this is just the living room bit look chandeliers on the ceiling this is the first hotel i've ever stayed in where my room has got its own private conference room with this dude on the wall of course um just would you just look at this it's incredible i mean to think that leaders like stalin and thatcher have sat at this very table it's very desk signing decrees and things i feel like michael scott out of the office let me go through to the bedroom look at this oh chuck norris has slept in this very bed or hopefully not this exact same bed but in this location i mean of course for the same bathroom as well which in itself is a work of [Music] and margaret art has sat on this toilet actually that's not really a thought going through my head anyway please the list of people who have stayed in this actual room is just something else and now well i'm staying here right then it's time to say goodbye to stalin's apartment at the soviet ski hotel and head across to leningradski station to take the krasnaya strela the red arrow up to some petersburg let's go [Music] so today is a russia day here in russia which means everybody's heading out to celebrate tonight so the roads are pretty busy everyone's heading out into town to have a few drinks and celebrate [Music] russia then welcome to leningradski station in moscow right next door to this one here yaroslavlsky station which goes off towards yaris level and we're heading to some petersburg tonight so we go on the leningrad line which goes from leningrads it's a bit like pancras and king's cross in london really just a whole lot busier it's crazy there's 21 trains a day between moscow and st petersburg and about half of those leave around this time of night to get in early in the morning into saint petersburg it's a crazy busy route and obviously thousands of russians make this journey every single day so we're going to join them today except we're doing it in style of course on the train used by diplomats and leaders from around the world and the communist party elite and i'm going to be one of them tonight taking the red arrow i was telling you about how many trains are office in petersburg get on board almost every single train tonight is going to some petersburg um mine is a very top one the 2355 crores now strela am i going from where are we going from i don't know i think number it's train number two train number two on the russian railway network because train number one is the train the other way from peterborough to moscow we're on train number two which goes that way so um i should never know i should never know i don't know what that means i'll try and find out figure out where we need to head to to get the train up to some petersburg so it seems we are a little bit early for the train but they are boarding about an hour out by the looks of it um the trains are listed on here quite handily with the numbers of the carriages and where they are on the train and stuff so you can find your way into your carriage um there's about five trains leaving before 10 o'clock to some people premium means it's the sleeper service as was high and then they've got the express service as well they've got these sap sand trains that take four hours to do the route from moscow to petersburg but then obviously they've got all the night trains as well that take about eight hours to do the same journey over obviously going a lot slower so you get a good night's sleep before you arrive into some petersburg so i'm going to just hang around here for a bit and see what there is to do at leningradski station might get a bite to eat before we head down to board of the train [Music] [Music] i mean if you're traveling like an oily guard you might as well eat like one as well [Music] [Applause] [Music] so they seem to be starting boarding here or the trains about half an hour before they actually leave and we've got about an hour and a half until our train is but i am going to sort of hang around here in the platform area just for a little bit and hopefully be boarded soon and getting on our way um it's just such a fun experience just hanging around here and watching everybody just sort of running for their trains and stuff i love hanging around stations that's weird isn't it i do like hanging around train stations and just watching people flap and leg it for their trees that they're about to miss so we'll be on our way soon now most russian trains have the three classes of service on them you get third class sleeper trains which is the old sort of open plan dormitory style that you see on a lot of um trains here then you've got your second clash of coupe which is where you have like four beds in the room and you can either buy just one bed and share with either other men or other women or you can just buy all four beds for yourself which is something i've done before down in ukraine then you have your first class which is generally two beds and again you've got the choice of buying both of them if you want a room to yourself but the croissant estrella goes a step further they've got a deluxe class which is above the first class and guess what we're doing today as we're recreating the route of the old oligarchs and sars and party leaders we're taking deluxe class tonight of course when the train eventually starts boarding all right ready to go platform number three here we go off to petersburg all right so this train is really long that was carriage number 16. we're in carriage number one so we've got about 15 his left to go until we get to um our carriage at the end of the train isn't it a beautiful train though look at this one of the great russian trains one of the classic russian trains actually a lot of history behind it so looking forward to getting on board i think at this rate we're walking halfway to petersburg [Music] i'm talking [Music] it looks glass well here we are then deluxe class on the crazy astrala this is quite nice shut me door in a minute we'll have a look around this room but this looks gorgeous doesn't it right so let's have a quick look around this this is the deluxe room on the kresnayastrella i mean god lord look at this we have a tv playing russian soap operas no doubt we have some bedding up there nice gorgeous mirror um and then what have we got here a bit of storage along here look notepad look you get a crazy australian notepad wicked you get your room key a few lighting controls and stuff look at that it's like emirates first class on a plane and then down here what do we have we've got chocolate awesome any train company that gives you free chocolate well i'm happy with and we've got fruit and we've got dining stuff menu here uh menu module producer producer is that for breakfast or is that for dinner i can't remember i don't know it's not for either i don't know what it means menu or something russian speakers will know better um yeah glass of water and stuff on there that's pretty decent air conditioning individually controlled which is nice on these russian trains because they like to crank the heat in right up there it is coming alive up there let's stick that on and then we've got power look we've got uh what we got here top autumn autoplania um it's called the product nikka um and you've got power supply here and landfall as well look at that look very cool and then these gorgeous curtains here then we have another room this is the bathroom let me check oh we have a bathroom with a tiled good lord the tiled bathroom with a nice full-size shower cubicle oh my goodness just just look at this i mean i thought the caledonian sleeper was good and cool in the fact that they had individual bathrooms this has a full-size bathroom it's not a caravan toilet like you get on the cali sleeper no this is a full-size hotel room bathroom a bathroom with a window so you can watch the world go by as you have your shower in the morning wow and then i was here for wardrobe radio up there more storage i think you've got your sheets and stuff up there they're towels so you've got towels up there pillows for the beds this is proper sweet this is i like this so here we go this is what you get on the crescent yet oh strela little book all about the history of it as well which is nice all in russian um but nice little touches like this though it's incredible the history of the crosney estrella and then or wine list we have a wine list you order on the app and they'll deliver it to your room i like the sound of that we shall take full advantage of that very soon and then we have food menu summer menu appetizers this is proper cool so we actually get full room service for the looks of it too we have to try that in a bit i'm pretty impressed with this it's pretty decent isn't it um for a night train anyway so let's um try and sit back and chillax a little bit as we wait to depart from leningreski station and head towards st petersburg so it looks like we get breakfast on board actually there is a menu here menu for of the guaranteed feeding rations for passengers of luxury cars so my feeding rations are listed in here what should we get for our feeding rations in the morning let's have a look we have a choice of cold starter and we have a choice of main course rice porridge or berry topping omelette with cheese pancakes with red caviar you get caviar on this train wow we have to do that surely as a man of great power and statute in the party we need to have caviar for breakfast surely um what else do we get dessert fruit and berries platter chocolate choice of two soft drinks and a cup of coffee wow they do vegetarian breakfast if you are that way inclined as well they do a children's breakfast and i have one of them as well no not really enjoy your meal wow fantastic so i don't know when they'll come in or bring that around when they'll bring around my guaranteed feeding ration um but we'll find out in the morning [Music] i do like the fact that they give you not one but six coat hangers right this is an eight-hour train from moscow to saint petersburg who needs six coat hangers to hang all their stuff out of their suitcase wouldn't you just do what i'm going to do just grab it out the case in the morning when you're ready to get dressed crazy six coat hangers wow right we're five minutes before we are due to depart and the engines just fired up next door bearing in mind we are in the very front car of the train so we're right next to the engine um the loco i should say getting into my train speak um the locos just fired up and i've just felt the train clanging and banging about a bit so clearly they just connected summit oaks on the top so in a minute we'll be on our way all right so we're on the move right on time departure there and the provenita that's just come around the car attendant um i've gone through the breakfast options basically you can choose your breakfast to come um anytime between half six and when we arrive at eight so i've ordered it for half seven so i can get a bit of extra sleep and time for a shower also they've got a full wine list and everything and treats you can have in the evening so i've just ordered some drinks from there as well they're going to bring up tommy room and he's also brought around some slippers and an amenity kit which we'll go through in a little bit this is pretty cool this is um service fantastic actually so far um he's very helpful he's showing me all around the room and um yeah we'll get on our way [Music] now when he came around as well he also told me that was included in my fair because the deluxe room included in the fair you get a free transfer anywhere into petersburg at the other end so um yeah i've got a free transfer to my hotel when i get there which is pretty nice isn't it um excuse me happened to buckle around trying to find a yandex to pick me up when them they're just going to have a taxi waiting for me at the other end so pretty decent [Music] so i'm just looking at my rail map app um to see where we are and in a minute we're going to be passing a place called kimki which is the place that when i came to russia as an 11 year old that is the place i stay the school that we did the exchange with was in kimki and the family that i stayed with while i was over here lived right across the road from kimki railway station so in a couple of minutes we're going to go sailing through kim ki and i'm going to see the exact place that i came to stay when i was 11 years old which is pretty cool the first time in 30 years okay there's the river i remember the river that's the apartment box my friend's friend stayed in those apartment spots here we go here's downtown kinky there we go there it is wow that's the building just be on to the station there it is there we go going back through kim keep the first time in 30 years that is just incredible amazing [Music] perfect thank you with me good night the entertainment has arrived for the evening of course you can't come on the crosney estrella the most soviet of soviet trains without having some vodka and a glass of wine as well just in case the vodka isn't enough so yeah [Music] oh that's good half vodka buckle down three more half bottles to go so i asked the guy about the tv um and how it works and effectively it's not really a live tv you basically get a pack of dvds um to go through and you can pop them in the little dvd player that's up there on the wall let's have a look in the box see what we have this four is five there's three there's five there's nine uh just loaded a lot of dvds basically i'm presuming they're all in russian but essentially if you speak russian you're probably going to be all right here so you basically load the dvd up and it play on the tv up on the wall um it's not really live tv as such um i imagine that live tv on a train must be pretty difficult actually um when you're traveling as far as we are on this train um it's like 400 miles up to um petersburg from moscow so yeah we're not bothered with any telly tonight i'm gonna finish drinking my vodka possibly wine but i might save that until i get to the hotel don't know um and then try and get some sleep because in the morning we arrive into some petersburg at eight a.m which is pretty flippy and early considering we didn't leave until midnight um so um yeah let's get some more vodka drunk and then i can show you the immunity kit and we'll put the bed down right i mean the ticket time rzd it's the um russian railway company that's the name of them um so let's have a look what we get in the rzd kit we'll open it up see what we get that's pretty nice nice scene of a russian city we get what do we get siberica mouthwash there we go we got mouthwash do you think they're telling me something that i need a mouthwash um we get shampoo we get shower gel we get what is that so it's like a douche in the shower like i'm not big enough for douche anyway um some sort of shoe shine kit um earplugs presumably so that we can block out the train going to tubes next door we get a razor who bothers shaving like on a train i don't know if you want to shave on a train you can do on the crosney stroller you get a toothbrush in case you forgot yours and you get uh what's this toothpaste rosky toothpaste i think what's this shaving cream so yeah if you want to shave on the train that sounds really risky shaving on a train going over a bumps like slicing your face open yeah it sounds good does it uh oh well there's another bit as well nearly missed this bit what's this what's this what's this ah we got a comb an aussie comb we got a little leaflet thing and we get a refresher and blazing with a picture of a train on the front and it comes this little bag that hangs as well i love it when they do this that's pretty cool isn't it i think what airliner was um mom that did that ethiopian so ethiopians um i immediately support the same thing they've got a little hanger on them very cool anyway there you go if you get a train if you get the trasnier stroller and travel in maybe your first class as well i don't know but anyway whatever you get this the cool rzd immunity kit procrastia right we're going to try putting this bed together which after 200 ml of vodka or two little bottles of vodka is gonna be an interesting experience so let's see how we do from what he was saying we have to move this table first and move this out of the way and there's a little lever i think under here hang on where is he where is he where is it we're falling at the first hurdle here hang on he made it look really easy is it just pulled no it doesn't cool [Music] we're falling at the first hurdle apparently we have to move this table still i can't find how you do it oh dear this isn't good is it [Music] oh there we go oh it just moves it just moves there we go [Music] oh look at that hey we did a thing right now we have to pull this down you've got a little oh look at that look it folds oh oh that's tight that's tight is it gonna do it oh yes look at that and that's it wow look at the size of that bed that's bloody huge right and then i don't know clearly oh that's the mattress i know that's not the mattress that's the duvet um all right we've got a little thing here just unhook that maybe there we go bye-bye and then we've got a duvet and pillars one two there we go look perfectly made bed would you look at that hey hey i did a thing i made a bed rage rage rage i made a bed look me proud on me right okay um i don't think i need those pillows up there because there's some down there so i'm going to get undressed and i'm not going to record this bit because i don't want to put you all off your dinner um but let me climb into bed right so bedtime and the bed is not well actually it's not bad actually if you lay straight i can sort of fit in the bed quite easily which is quite nice um it's about as good as a lot of airline flatbeds but it's a lot wider it's like more than a single bed it's sort of um i don't know a big single bed basically yeah yeah yeah yeah so um yeah it's pretty comfortable so i'm gonna try and get some sleep i mean i need to set my alarm for in the morning because we arrive into saint petersburg at um just before 8 o'clock and it's a non-stop train so hopefully i'll get a decent night's sleep and i will speak to you in the morning good night well good morning from onboard the crosney australia and it's now just coming up to 6 30 in the morning so we've got around about um an hour and a half until we arrive into some petersburg and it's really bright and sunny out um some petersburg has these white nights at the minute um for this time of year which means it basically never gets fully dark because it's so far north so of course six o'clock in the morning it's like the middle of the day so that's kind of what's woken me up but never mind because it means we get to enjoy some of this scenery before we arrive into some petersburg on this beautiful sunny morning um see how i slept all right i got about six hours sleep or so i'd say which wasn't too bad the bed is really comfy just take some getting used to the rocking and rolling of the um train as usual when you travel on a sleeper train but yeah i didn't sleep too bad at all really um probably helped in part by the um vodka last night but um never mind um i'm gonna get up in a minute i'm gonna go and have a shower get sorted and um yeah we'll soon be arriving into some petersburg [Music] so i have to say this is the first train i've ever been on but they give you um a dressing gown how cool is that i've had a height of sophistication and luxury um quite a nice shower actually and very powerful um and spacious for a train shower at least i mean certainly um it's the best shower i've ever had on a train before um something words i've never thought i'd be saying but yeah that was pretty decent actually so i'm going to sort of get ready now my breakfast should be arriving in the next half an hour and there's more and more buildings appearing on the horizon so i think we're getting closer and closer to some petersburg now so just reading through this book that they gave me the crosney estrella has been going for 90 years this year that's incredible isn't it 90 years this train's been running non-stop between moscow and saint petersburg um and it started in let's have a look there's pictures in this book from over the years in 1944 during world war ii this was used to operate with a steam train back then and then back in the 1950s that's what it used to look like wow and here we go 2021 here's the modern face of the cresney australia that's what you get where's the that's the room that we're in nice there's a nice lady bringing your breakfast and the beautiful cups that you get your tea in lots of pictures of them well there's a bar on board as well should have checked out the bar last night actually there we go there's all the stuff of the christmas stroller on there pretty bunch of people there we go 90 years that's incredible isn't it and i think from what i remember it's only actually stopped running for like a very short period in that time during like the siege of leningrad or something in world war ii apart from that this train has run non-stop every night for 90 years just amazing isn't it really so looking at my rail map here we are literally on the outskirts of saint petersburg now um and we've got still about an hour before we're due to be arriving into saint petersburg and we're only like a few miles away and we seem to just slow down to a crawl a little last bit to make sure that we get in on time into some pieces so russian railways are just brilliant and if you can set your watch by them literally they're very very good in my experience so yeah about an hour to go i'm just waiting for me breakfast [Music] so breakfast has arrived and we have pancakes we have salmon with lemon we have a bit of bread and we have caviar i'm sort of starting slightly to regret ordering caviar for breakfast doesn't seem the most appetizing thing to eat at 7 30 in the morning but we'll give it a go hey we've got to live like these oligarchs did haven't we so um yeah let's do this [Music] so the salmon first someone's alright for it's my breakfast day breakfast usually i'll be missing the pork pie that i usually have for christmas day breakfast as well but never mind so a bit of salmon it's very good it is time to see what caviar tastes like at 7 30 in the morning with coffee yeah it's okay well in the evening maybe not for breakfast it's a bit [Music] pancakes of course [Music] thank you so we appear much be entering some petersburg now because there's lots of buildings i'm not saying the stations that we're going past are full of community into work so [Music] [Applause] [Music] my ride on the crasmere stroller tonight then cost me 148 pounds 34 or 200 us dollars working out at a cost of 33 pence per mile now of course you could fly this route in an hour many times a day for a lot less money but personally why go through the stress of flying through russian airports and then having to find a hotel at the other end when you could just spend the night in absolute luxury on board this train here we are then petersburg bang on time 55 7 55 in the morning rather um so we are bang on time for our arrival that's incredible literally to the minute we pulled in so let's um go and get off the train [Music] thank you thank you arrived in tucson pittsburgh with the national anthem playing to welcome me as the oligarch from mansfield arrives into some petersburg thank you rossiers as always i'd like to say a big thanks to my patreons you can join them at the link on the screen now for access to my whatsapp group live weekly zoom calls with me and much more this is how oligarchs should be treated [Music] all right room 320 after the airbus of course they must have known i was coming [Music] well here we are then want a few over the restaurant and everything here very nice um so welcome to saint petersburg uh what a lovely ride that was on the cousin austral i really enjoyed that um up from moscow traveling like the oligarch i aspired to be um and now we are here at the hotel indigo which is also quite a nice place so yeah welcome to some petersburg i've got a few bits i'm going to be doing up this neck of the woods as well so make sure you hit that subscribe button so you don't miss any of them in the meantime as always thanks for watching take care and i'll see you on the next one bye for now

2021-08-04 07:54

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