Tanya, Natasha and I are half-way between Novokuznetsk and Moscow in an Airbus A320 (thanks Ural Airlines for once again providing Airbus instead of Tupolev!). We have been served our Ural Airlines food and the salmon dish, which we all ordered, was okay.
It has been a great time in Siberia and we have done a lot: Dentist, hair dresser (Tanya only), shopping, downhill and cross country skiing, city walks, scanning of some of babushka’s old photos, many meetings with friends and relatives, ice hockey (live and TV), cinema (Tanya only), dacha visit with winter edition of banja and snow cleaning, and not to forget celebrations of new year and Christmas. The weather was nice to us and approximately ten degrees warmer than last year. This meant for example that it was -18 when we went skiing in Mezhdorechensk instead of -28 like last year, much better.
The flights from Novokuznetsk depart early in the morning to the one and only destination, Moscow. This is not too bad, even though you need to wake up very early, since you get a full day in Moscow when continuing to Zurich tomorrow morning.
The plan is to meet with Moscow friends at lunch time at our favorite restaurant at Tverskaya, Yolki Palki. Later in the afternoon we will visit Sasha and Ira like we used to do for many Sunday mornings during autumn 2011 and winter/spring 2012.
Just checked Google Earth. The distance Moscow-Novokuznetsk is about 3100 km, about the same as Stockholm-Gibraltar. Amazing!