Dianedancer

Anyone take the train or fly between Mosow and St. Petersburg? Wondering how to compare them with reference to time (how long by train vs. by air), cost, hassle. Do the trains have 1st and 2nd class? Any information would be welcome.

Carson

I visited three years ago (!). I flew from Sher1 to STP via the national carrier Aeroflot (rather than one of the spin-off "baby-flots&quot. The service was very good aboard a brand new 737 and the flight took about an hour.

I might have considered the train had I more time. There are a lot of posts and posters with good info on them.

Best luck, Russia is a very interesting destination.

Garfield

Most people who take the train take the overnight train, a number of them depart around midnight and arrive around 8am. The do have some fast trains that take 4-5 hours during the day, A first class night train costs about 2400 rbls. Air only takes about 1.5 hours, but the airports are outside of the cities, taxis can be expensive if you are not familiar to the system. If you are flying into Russia with Aeroflot you can often get to St Petersburg at the same cost as going into Moscow, you can get a free stop-over in Moscow.

mimipam

It has probably been seven years since I rode the overnight train from Moscow to St Petersburg. The train had sleepers and they were pretty good. The toilets were not good. I slept in my clothes and they brought us a special lock to add to the one on the door. I was with a group and we were all in the same car. I don't know if there is still a safety concern or not. I would not do this alone or with another lady unless sbsolutely necessary. I would want to be with a group. However, this was a while back so things may have improved.
Happy travels!

katya_NY

taking the train between Moscow and StP is economical and fast. The overnight train is a value because it saves having to pay for another night in a hotel, but in reality is quite slow. The day trains take about half the time, and allow you to see more of the countryside.

I'm not sure about classes on the day trains, but I know that there is a major difference on the night trains. First on second class are fine overnight, less than that you are moving toward "platscart" which you don't want. The difference between first and second class is the # of people in a compartment. For 1st it is only 2, for 2nd it is four. There is plenty of space with four, but if you are traveling without speaking Russian, it may be easier to go with 1st class. Let me know if you have further questions.

scotcan

I enjoyed the "overnight" train journey to start with but things did not go according to schedule ...... train stopped in the middle of nowhere for almost 6 hours then half an hour later picked up a large number of local passengers who had no choice but to stand/sit/lie in the corridors outside the sleepers. Turned into a very very long trip! I remember being impressed by the fact that a very low wall (maybe 2 or 3 feet high) seems to run the entire length of the route, you can see that I had run out of things to do!

Tuni01

We took the Red Arrow night train. I believe it is one of the nicer trains. Our compartment was tiny but with nice touches. We left around midnight and arrived around 7am. They started announcing arrival well before 7. not much time for sleeping. You couldn't board the train until <30 minutes before departure as it was just arriving. I'd really weigh the day train or flying. It was a fine trip but not much sleep. We were very tired when we arrived Moscow.