On Oct.4th 2003,with my friend Sian Hoy,I,left Cardiff on a Wallace Arnold coach, to travel via Berlin,Warsaw,Moscow to St. Petersburg,to return home via Helsinki,Stockholm and Copenhagen.
This was a 16 day trip and we were warned not to regard it as a holiday--far too many am wake up calls!! We had excellent W.A. representatives--Paul, the tour manager and Derik the superb driver. The group we joined were very good-simpatico and humorous. 
We must have passed 1000's of birch trees and Tony would occasionally remark,"Oh,look,there's a tree!"
        Two of the group were keen bird fauna watchers and alerted those of us interested ,to deer, wolves ,osprey ,hooded crows,falcons,an eagle, herons and red squirrels. It was as interesting to see those as the many magnificent buildings, art treasures and famous places we encountered.     
[ I hope to insert some pictures here  ] 
What returns instantly to mind:
The wall-or remains of -in Berlin.Shan who'd visited twice before,felt that the city has lost something of old essence.
Warsaw is totally delightful with its reconstructed old city.I'll never forget our walk through the royal park with its palaces,water features and red squirrels. Our guide,in his 60's, ,had always lived in the city and ,obviously,he was still living its history-lovely chap.
     Next day we moved into Belarus-a contrast?yes-poorer but  I once I travelled home by air from Singapore.Dawn broke over the desert of the Middle East-wonderful-then we flew north over Europe and I could see the topography changing all the time-the ruggedness of Turkey and the flatness of the part of Germany we passed over.It was such a clear day ,I could see the cars on the autobahns.The coach travel was different -flat and often tree-lined all the way-long straight roads of vary
ing surface standard.The only other variation,lay in the efficiency ,or lack ,
of land management and the poverty of the villages.
The hotels were above adequate;inMinsk ,there was a la concierge on each floor-she was very pleasant and not dressed in black!In fact,people in Minsk&Smolensk,were ,in my experience ,friendlier than those in Russia,despite greater hardship.
     Impressions of Russia?Dachas almost disappointing-mainly clustered together as in a caravan site and situated about six miles from a town/city.Admittedly this is true only of n/w region we were driving through.The villages we passed werepoor &muddy.Most of the single storeyed houses had  largish gardens on which were grown subsistence crops.Each community had a shop and children were bussed to schools.