Journey to Moscow, Russia – Day 8-9: The voyage home…

The voyage home
At this point in my trip I am completely exhausted and near death from the worst allergies of my life. I wake up in the morning spitting up a massive amount of green vile and snot. I cleanse out my system, pack my bags and wait for Yriy to pick me up. I ended up wait quite a while because he is stuck in traffic, so I muster up the strength to go to Starbucks and get a snack and a latte. Yriy arrives and drives me to the airport. We get pulled over on the way there to have his documents checked. We make it to the airport and he escorts me to the ticket booth. Thank you Yriy for all your help while in Moscow and getting me to and from the airport, you are a great man!

I waited in line a good half and hour and checked my bags in. I made it to my terminal and charged my computer before boarding the plane and taking a muscle relaxer to help me fall asleep on my flight back. I sleep almost all the way to Washington D.C. We arrive late due to weather and eventually deboard the plane and head to customs. The customs line was insanely long and took almost an hour to get through. This meant I missed my plane to Los Angeles and had to wait for the next flight out of D.C. I end up getting to Los Angeles at 8:30pm an wait at the airport for Chris Peel to pick me up. Once he arrives we head to Union Station so I can take Amtrak to San Diego. We get lost however and by time we make it to the station the last train had just left. We drive back to Long Beach and I spend the night at Chris’s house. In the morning he drops me off at the metro station in Long Beach and I take the metro all the way to Union Station, then catch a train to San Diego and have Cory Casey pick me up when I arrive. All in all this was a real journey.

The inside of my hostel room

The other side, I slept on the bottom one in this picture.

This is where you ate the food you made.

This was a couch that you could hang out by yourself and get online.

This is the plane I am about to get to from Moscow to Washington, D.C.

Mockba aka Moscow

Getting ready to board the plane, my flight seemed to have fair share of seniors and sex tourists.

The metro train from Long Beach station

Union Station Los Angeles

Union Station Los Angeles

The last photo I took before the battery died. Shortly after the train rolled homeward bound to San Diego.

Last Thoughts
Moscow was a very beautiful city mixed with modern buildings and atmosphere combined with lots of history. I really enjoyed walking around this city and seeing the sites. The food I had was all good. And the skaters here have a special place in my heart. When I go to Russia again, however, there are several things I have learned and will do different. First of all I will not go by myself, it is a very hard city to navigate and communicate with people. So it would be nice to have a fellow English speaker. Second, I will get a hair and beard cut. I stuck out like a sore thumb, with people laughing at me because I didn’t look like anyone else. I didn’t like this at all and it took away from a lot potential fun I could have had in Moscow. Third, the pollen and allergies here are insane. I will bring lots of medicine and start taking Claritin before I even get on the flight! Thanks to everyone in Moscow I hung out with for making my trip a success. Especially Yriy for being an amazing host and Boris for taking me to meet some skaters. A shout out to DM for being a funny guy!

Don’t forget to check out my first six days of my trip to Moscow:
Day 01: San Diego to LAX
Day 02: Washington D.C.
Day 03: I’m Here!
Day 04: A Day of Business
Day 05: A Walk Around Town
Day 06: May Day!
Day 07: The Metro