The Moscow metro is busy at 11 PM on a Tuesday night. Mindful of pickpockets I squeeze into a seat and hold my pack tightly across my chest. I strain to make out the recorded voice announcing stops along the Red line. It takes 20 minutes to reach Yaroslavskaya Railway Station, western terminus of the century-old Trans-Siberian railroad. After making it through station security, I find an empty place on the floor to organize my bag of groceries. The time table across across the hall indicates only one train departing anytime in the next 6 hours. Its final destination is given in cyrillic: Пекинo. Peking. Leaving Moscow at 12:40 AM, Train 4 winds its way east -- past long expanses of birch forest, over wide rivers, and through towns of every size. After tracing the shore of Lake Baikal for 6 hours, this train turns south and follows ancient tea trading routes into some of the remotest regions on the globe. It emerges from the desert nearly a week later, before traversing the broken landscape of China's Hebei province and arriving at the congested main station of Beijing.
Typically, travelers break-up the weeklong train ride by disembarking along the way. Lake Baikal and Ulaanbaatar are favorite destinations to seek relief from the monotony. However, a different experience awaits those willing to embrace the journey across Eurasia in its entirety. To watch every mile of Earth's longest train ride glide by uninterrupted. Chilly evenings in Siberia become sweltering afternoons in Mongolia. The crisp air of the Urals yields to the smoggy, mountainous corridors north of Beijing. With nothing to do for 6 days except point a camera out the window, I came away with a story told in snapshots. A story of harsh environments sparsely populated by countless ethnic groups, united only through a thin ribbon of railway.