Look, I Just Wanna Enter Your Country, OK? [Part 1, Russia]

Good news everybody, I’m home!

I was sitting in the Dominican with a sub-zero bottle of Presidente in hand, thinking about my future. A while ago I decided that my major goal this year will be to get back to Tokyo to finish writing a book I started while sailing across the Pacific. But Japan is far from the Caribbean, and it seemed a serious shame to miss all the adventurous territory in between by just taking a flight. Plus, y’know, I hate airports.

My Queen’s pals will appreciate this – when every option is open, one tends to get analysis paralysis. I’d sit there doodling away on Google Flights on my phone, saying “oooh, Ireland is cheap from Miami” or “huh, only $250 to Brussels… what’s in Brussels?” or “shit, there’s another invite to go sailing, maybe I should do that instead.” Open another beer, open another window in my browser and look for hostels or train connections, and generally get nowhere. It certainly wasn’t unenjoyable, but my month in the Dominican was quickly coming to an end and I needed to make a move.

[Brief aside – after deciding I wanted to get back to Japan, a few interesting freelancing options opened up. I’m excited to push my writing career, and while sailing to Spain would be incredible, I’m choosing instead to focus on professional writing. A month out of wifi range is not conducive to getting these gigs, so I gave up the idea of sailing across the Atlantic, for this season at least.]

Then I got an email from my accountant (thanks Colleen!), who had found another few bucks for me to play with this year. It’s a hard truth when your tax returns net you more money than your chosen profession, but I wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. With a bit more wiggle room in my bank account, I decided to re-open the idea of taking the Trans-Siberian Railway, a legendary train trip from Moscow to Beijing. If I could find a way to add a Western Europe visit on the front of the trip and a ferry to Japan on the tail end, I could in theory take rails all the way from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific. How’s that for ridiculously epic slow travel?!

Realizing that this would take some serious planning, I knew I’d have to sit still for a few weeks just to get everything organized – moving around distracts my simple brain. A bit of research revealed that it’s almost impossible to get a Russian visa outside of your country of residence, so the decision was made for me: I’d be going home! I booked a cheap flight out of Punta Cana (I love the Dominican, ask me for tips if you’re ever going, but please, please, don’t go to Punta Cana), spent my last few days soaking up the Caribbean sun and delicious Presidentes, and packed my gear.

I stepped off the Toronto Union Express train into a scene that brought a huge smile to my face; a horde of diverse Torontonians, every colour of the goddamn rainbow, were rampaging west through Union towards the SkyDome, all bedecked in the blue and white of our beloved Blue Jays. The (probably-drunken) mob grinned at my obviously-a-homecoming-backpacker getup, and I heard more than one “Welcome home!” as I swam upstream in the crowd. Toronto then treated me to one of her famous neon-pastel sunsets, oranges and pinks lighting up the jagged horizon of the western suburbs, and I couldn’t help but smile again with the joy of coming home.

---

Russia. I need some help, I think. Here’s where I stand:

• To apply for a Russian visa, one needs an invite from inside the country. These invitations are available from most hotels and tour companies, including the operators and ticket vendors of the Trans-Siberian train.

• All the web’s wisdom seems to suggest that I need to buy my train ticket before applying for the visa.

• Train tickets are only available up to 60 days in advance of departure, meaning that as soon as I click ‘Purchase’ I’ll have two months to get visas for Russia, Belarus and China, and then get to Moscow.

• The Russian visa, on a normal application schedule, will take ~20 business days, assuming everything goes smoothly. Belarus takes ~6 days and China 1-3 days, again assuming everything is up to bureaucratic par. Let’s say I’ll need at least six weeks to get all three visas. Canadians are exempt from the visa requirement for Mongolia, thankfully.

• Until I get all three visas, I can’t book any pre-Moscow travels, because I technically don’t know when I’ll be able to leave Canada.

• This puts me in the spot of spending in excess of C$1,000 on a train ticket for travel in multiple countries where I do not yet have a visa, with no guarantee that I will get one before my departure date.

• Step 4, stress.

While brainstorming the problem, it occurred to me that I could just book two weeks in a Moscow hotel, get my visa support documents from them, use those documents for my visa application, then cancel my reservation once I get the visa. It’s not illegal to change your in-country travel plans after you receive the Russian visa, so while this idea is sneaky, it’s not illicit. But then I think I’d also have to book flights in and out of the country to show with the application, and those are not as easily canceled as a hotel booking.

There are, of course, a million online companies offering to smooth out this whole problem and get me my visa for a fee (which seems to range between C$14 and C$700… ?) – but many of these services require me to mail my passport overseas so the companies can do their shady business and get it back to me, visa pages filled. I am uncomfortable with this idea.

So, uh, yeah – that’s it. My research is going in circles as I vacillate between trying to game the system so I can have a flexible schedule in Russia, or just hitting ‘Purchase’ on a few options and taking it all to the consulate service in Toronto myself, hoping for the best.

Does anyone have any experience with either this train trip, or Russian visa applications in general? If so, I’d love to chat.

Updates soon, as I make progress.  Until then, hit me up for a beer eh?