Fortunately Vladivostok sounds like Vladivostok in Russian and eventually we are out of the door and shock/horror, we are WALKING to the plane. What a break through… of course there are huge and sometimes deep puddles on the tarmac, which the locals wade through and I walk around and the incredibly old truck taking the bags out rumbles past and I am happy to see my bag perched on the top. It is just about the only one not heavily plastificated.

Vladivostok Air has rolled out another of those crummy TU-154’s and I find that their Business class is just the regular old three seaters at the front but they only use the window and aisle seat, just like those European carriers have been doing for years and making mucho money from it too. We do get a curtain to avoid the envious eyes of the masses. Our flight attendant, Valentina, is tall and in her bright blue uniform with a brilliant red scarf looks good, though she could do with some help from a dermatologist, but she speaks a little English and main thing is she is NICE; that is all that is needed. And she makes sure our seatbelts are on and even sits down and straps herself in … if I hadn’t been sitting down already, Idda fallen down from shock.

Once we have taken the whole runway to get into flight for the 2 hours south, she gives us huge trays full of food .. no nice Beluga caviar and supplies of hot blinis, but the standard cold cuts and red caviar and black bread. My seatmate eats it all out of sequence, muddling sweet and sour with no apparent discomfort. I turn down the proffered beer but he has one and offers to pay, so think that poss he is an upgrade. When he realizes that they are FREE, he has two more – he’s catching on fast.

And so we land in Vladivostok, in the rain and it’s back to the how many can we get into a bus in the rain (which is much more fun as those outside are being drenched and therefore pushing…). I am met by a nice tall young lady with an umbrella and she drives at high speed into VVO (as IATA calls it) and I feign sleep as I’d rather she keep her eyes on the roads, which look like skating rinks. It’s a long way into VVO. When there, I am deposited at the venerable looking Versailles Hotel, with fancy lighting and some awful artwork on the walls, all of which is for sale. The receptionist manages to give me the form to fill in, scans it and a computer screen and give me the key all without stopping talking to her mate on the phone. She is, I think, a Sybil Fawlty in training.

By recent standards, I have a musty big room with a bed and running water and a large Japanese machine for boiling water and possibly I can cook rice in it. It is huge and a view out of the window of a dog having a pee and it is all wonderful. I feel more like taking to my bed, but no such chance as someone is coming at 2pm to take me out and show me the town.

In the lobby, the statuesque Anna is waiting. She is taller than me and absolutely ravishing and speaks totally fluent English. Turns out she is a last year student at the University studying English and Spanish and had just come from an exam in English Grammar. I asked what that was and I wish I had written down the reply, as it didn’t mean a THING to me … all about using reflexive gerunds or something like that. I could not have written one word. She is accompanied by our driver Alexander and I ask if he is known as Sasha (as every Russian Alexander is) and they are amazed that I know such a thing .. well, she has her knowledge of gerunds and I know about Alexander aka Sasha! She is very happy to hear my British accent, as I realize that all the guides in Russia do speak British English, rather than American.  The gang I know in St Petersburg are amazingly posh sounding; it always amuses me.  As we progressed around, I did manage to add a few words to her vocabulary, like Trophy Wife, Toy Boy, Mutton-dressed-up-as-lamb, Queer as a Clockwork Orange and Bimbo, all with exact definitions and we got on very cheerfully. She was going to try out her new words on her professor and I’m sure she will be in trouble for hanging around with the wrong sort of native speaker – I did warn her but she could not wait!

It has stopped raining and we go see the sights. It’s a BIG place this. All around the harbor and of course is still the biggest Russian naval port of the east and until a few years ago was totally banned to foreigners, as those camera toting tourists would obviously all be spies and NOT Harry and Marlene from Kansas City on their Globus Gateway tour of Highlights of Russia in 17 days, meal plan optional. Now, we are admitted, but I was careful not to look at any submarines, just in case. I DID however then come face to face with one right out of the water and it could be visited. The front end had been cleaned out and made into a museum of subs and the rear part has been left as was, so you have to climb between the bulkheads, which could be difficult for some of our punters and it also gives you the chance to bang your head on various dials and bits of tubing. It came complete with hammocks slung over the torpedoes.  I had to leave very fast as it was really getting to me. Wild horses and any amount of vodka would NEVER get me underwater in one of these.

We drive up to the viewpoint and can see how it has all spread out and how pretty it must have been etc etc and Anna does not approve of all the high-rise building that is going on and who can afford it and I ask well who CAN and she says that only Russian New Money (which basically means their homegrown mafia and Mr Bigs). The apartments are bought as fast as they are built. She lives with her parents and brother in 3 rooms. Her father is an engineer … almost everyone you meet in Russia is either married to one, if they are old enough or is the offspring of, if they are younger.

We walk the streets, some of which have been made into pedestrian-only malls, so quite a breakthrough for around here and I ask about the music I can hear. (Have to confess I thought at first it was the boyz with their boomboxes – you can take this boy out of Brooklyn, but you can’t take Brooklyn out of this boy), but it turned out it is all piped in overhead and Anna thought it luvly ….hmmm … I shall now always associate Madonna not crying for Argentina with Vladivostok, which make odd bedmates for sure!

OK a break. Just one last episode and you will have been Around the World in 40 days.