While you are sitting here, Russian Railways sells tickets for retro-train very well. These are, naturally, with a steam locomotive. Yes, steam engines will survive a lot, including nuclear war. Yes, you can take a ride on our strategic reserve.
So, we have the Ruskealsky express train that runs in Karelia from the city of Sortavala to the mountain park of Ruskeala. It is 5 hours from Petersburg to an important tourist point.
In addition to the retro-train, retro-passengers traveled with us. More precisely, theater college students who staged an immersive production of communists carrying party gold. What brought the brain to a considerable number of pensioners.
How to get on this retro train
First you need to go on this page of the Russian Railways website and select a route. This is 921CH (the return is 922CH), a ticket costs a maximum of 500 rubles per hour of travel (you can take for 300 if you catch it much in advance). He departs from the Sortavala station in Karelia, but he still needs to be reached. Previously, this was an so-so idea, because it was necessary to do it with an ordinary electric train or by bus, which did not bring any joy and required an overnight stay somewhere in Karelia, so as not to get tired of fatigue. Now the "Swallow" walks in about 4 hours, which dramatically changes the situation - you can and should put the whole trip in one day.
So, you have to wake up at 5 in the morning to leave at 6:15 from Finland Station by train 821. It is better to take food with you or buy at the station.
In an hour the Internet will begin to end, and in two - electricity. At 44 kilometers from Vyborg in Kamennogorsk, the 3000 Volt network will finally run out. And the "Swallow" she really needed. But we live in a country where engineers are able to overcome reality, so a special diesel locomotive is hooked to the train, which can distribute these same 3000 V.
It is not recommended to leave at this station, but you must do this if you want to look at this:
An hour later signs of Karelia begin:
If you see something like this outside the window, it means soon Sortavala. On it, the "Swallow" is docked with the "Ruskeal Express", that is, it comes to one platform, gets up exactly the opposite, opens the doors - and the passengers simply transfer to another train. I think if suddenly "Swallow" is late, then its express will wait. It looks like this:
Pay attention to the column, it is working
And somewhere in this place a psychedelic begins. These fighters pass the entire station in length, shouting “The road, comrades!”:
But the passengers are busy. Some of them get on the train, and another part is going to take a selfie with the engine. It is large and warm, it comes from different places with steam, and a star in front. It seems that for some passengers, 500 rubles per ticket pays off before landing by the opportunity to make this picture.
Although, you know? For a hundred years, almost nothing has changed:
I saw a lot of locomotives, but they were all terribly static and stood somewhere in silence. A working locomotive whistles, sniffles, gurgles and blows steam front and back.
Due to a slightly different traction device, the train starts moving a little differently, and it moves not quite evenly, but with characteristic small jerks. It cradles a little more than the usual movement on a diesel or electric locomotive.
At the station there are two more further:
Between the arrival of the "Swallow" and the departure of the retro-train 15-20 minutes at the connections (there are connections there and back).
Strange young ladies begin to walk on the cars at this moment:
Set aside the young lady! First you need to talk about the cars. There were 5 on the train, but in our case there are already 6 cars. One restaurant car (32 seats, tables for 4 people) and 5 compartment cars for 39 and 42 seats (layout 3 + 3, in one of the cars the first compartment with one side). It is officially stated that "the interior of the cars is made in the original design of the" Nikolaev Express ", in the style of the late XIX - early XX centuries."
The first thing that guarded me was these very compartments for the disabled with accompanying persons. The second - these well-known by no means Nikolaev door handles in the style of the late twentieth century:
And yes, the guess is correct. These are Ammendorf staff cars! That is, the train consists of 5 staff cars, one restaurant car, a tender and a steam locomotive. It seems to me that this is a record for the number of staff cars per passenger in a train - there are 0.02 per person. This is about an order of magnitude larger than usual. We look at the compartment further. Everything is more or less familiar here:
But the plates are all made under retro.
True, the compartment of the conductor is no different from ordinary ones:
But at the entrance to the restaurant car:
Now the restaurant car itself:
It is better to take places in it right away. Or you have to stand here:
Disabled toilets were open in one direction and closed in the other. In general, the basic strategy is this: when you see the sign of a disabled person on the toilet, but you do not see anyone nearby on a gurney, you should go there right away. Firstly, it greatly simplifies the cognitive choice between two figures (they are sometimes drawn so that we need to think for a few seconds), and secondly, it’s usually much cleaner and more spacious than usual. So here:
But while I look at the pieces of the train, passengers look at nature:
Actors are preparing:
Well, the rest take selfies with lamps in the original design of the Nikolaev express in the style of the late nineteenth - early twentieth centuries:
The combination of retro and Russian Railways standards is simply excellent - it was necessary to solve the problems of standards and interior. For example, the panels above the aisles are clearly from the twenty-first century, titanium with boiling water from the twentieth (well, in general, as are the car generators):
Interior of a compartment from the beginning of the twentieth:
Coasters and refined products - from the USSR:
Brush for footwear:
Emergency brake:
The inscriptions on the cars are modern:
The locomotive team - completely:
A walkie-talkie is hanging next to the steam column:
Real coal:
Firebox too:
The assistant driver recently drowned (judging by his face):
Light in the booth and outside on a steam train from its own steam generator:
But the headphones and vests are modern:
And so that you are completely crazy, let's move on to the game. More precisely, as its director defined, performance with elements of an immersive theater.
Performance
I remind you of the beginning - these two are raging at the departure station, carrying a suitcase with wild cries:
For each carriage there are 3 actors: two Communist fighters and one enemy of the people. First, fighters pass through the cars, knock on each compartment, introduce themselves as fighters and read a short speech about the fact that you, as a real communist, should help. Oh, it seems we are being eavesdropped! No, everything is okay. Gold party on the train. Need to protect him.
They issue a volume of Lenin with a code:
And left to solve. The cipher, by the way, very vividly reminded me of the licensed protection of podosovye toys, based on the fact that the pirates do not have instructions on hand. Most of the pain in my time was delivered to me by King's Bounty - I assumed that sooner or later I would get the word “army” and enter it over and over again. Somewhere from the 60th attempt it worked. But I was distracted.
The origin of the books is interesting - the Karelian College of Culture and Arts used to be a political educational institution, and Lenin's works that no one threw away in his basements. Actually, here they come in handy.
Lenin's book has a completely charming effect on senior citizens. Not only were they given refineries as in childhood, not only were they driven on a retro train (already in this place they were touched), but there it was. Grandmother explains to her granddaughter the essence of how important this book is in the life of a Soviet person, and why no one read it at the same time. Actually, then the granddaughter tries to crack the code, and the grandmother is nostalgic:
Each carriage has its own actors, tapping everyone and decorating with books in about 20 minutes of movement. And they warn that all this must be kept secret:
By the way, I have not forgotten yet. Maybe someone needs a car number, here it is:
Further time is given to guess. There are phrases like “key under the rug”, “key behind the lamp” and so on, allowing you to find the key. Further along the wagons is the third actor - the enemy of the people. And he tries to get either a key or a book with a cipher in each compartment.
Here are the most interesting scenes, because citizens work all kinds of miracles - they immediately give the key with the words that they do not support communism, then they try to detain the actor in the compartment and call the fighters. Well, it doesn’t get to the passenger-driver connection and the real beatings.
Then the audience enjoys the chase (for every enemy of the people in their car) and the collection of books back. The performance ends here, the train arrives at the terminal station, a request for everyone to empty the cars. Students dress and go out in the cold and become completely unlike ladies in the style of the late nineteenth - early twentieth centuries:
In general, I must say that with all the wild simplicity of the mechanics of this performance game, the director did not have any particular options. In general, they often play with space (doing a performance on a stairwell, doing a performance on a platform during a transplant), and for the first time they tried a train. The train device itself dictates approaches to each individual compartment - otherwise, without options, interact with everyone, there is no area for the audience. The format of the performance (the name of the game where there is only one strict storyline, but the viewer can do something to wean) is chosen because people can watch nature, take selfies and even hate it when they distract it. This is the good old Prague scheme, when in a tavern in Detnitsa, scene after scene is shown to consumers. There are several halls, and a couple of three actors go and arrange their own mini-shows in each. About this restaurant, I have a separate story about what the audience can train, but everything is logical here. The only thing that bothers me is the cipher. Rather, I would snap to the carriage, such as a riddle based on paintings, a joint search and matching of objects, and so on. But the main thing in this game is to make it very simple. Because the atmosphere is important, and it is already the costumes that set it.
Students trained in their classrooms, attacking strangers. I can say that the poses, speech, and who, like what says, poking in the compartment, worked out just perfectly. According to the results of the first run, more than half of the passengers guessed the quest, and many interacted with spies (they caught and surrendered or immediately betrayed their homeland). For the future, they noted that it was necessary to make the code easier, and that at the rehearsals, the gondola did not run after the actors to take pictures with them, and there were no traffic jams from people going to the restaurant.
Passengers announced the play - at the box office warned about it. The ticket price from the performance did not change. The second performance was the next day, November 3, but I found only the premiere of the 2nd. News about two performances at Interfax .
Back to the train
So, the locomotive brought passengers to a standstill in Ruskeala. There is no turning circle here, there is no second steam locomotive with a tender either, and now one more “Swallow”, which was launched by an additional train for the holidays, should come.
It is only planned to build a turning circle and everything else in the park - just as it is planned to make a connection somewhere from the direction from Moscow. But so far there is nothing. Therefore, no one cools the car.
Then the engine waits until all the witnesses had left ...
And he starts quietly and without a pale to take back from the stop!
Now he will miss the "Swallow". Then the "Swallow" will leave, he will return by evening with the wagons again, unhook, another steam locomotive will cling to the back:
He will bring the train to Sortavala. And ours will go one tender ahead with minimal visibility from the booth backwards to Sortavala itself. Because the locomotive that leads the train to Sortavala in the evening also made this journey backwards.
Well, then you already know - docking in Sortavala, a return to the high-voltage highway in Kamennogorsk, the emergence of the Internet an hour before St. Petersburg, Finland Station, the real world. And memories of how impressive the locomotive looks.
Here are Max posts about how locomotives and wagons are arranged, on the blog in general dofig of our posts about railways and all-all-all, but here again - you can choose one of these trains. Specific Ruskeal Express here . Trains Petersburg - Sortavala . In the next series about why, in fact, go to Ruskealu, and what does the burning of marble have to do with German cable channels.