Making masala chai from a packaged spice blend

An Indian friend visited awhile back, Suzana Syiem, and passed on some interesting tea, and some Indian snacks, and masala chai spice mix, which is what I'm writing about here.

I usually make masala chai once the weather gets a little cool; it seems to help me pretend that it's winter, even if it's still hotter than a US fall out (or summer, in most places).  There was just a touch of chill in the air a couple weeks ago but it didn't amount to much; it wasn't down below 25 C / 77 F even in the very early mornings.  It warmed back up and I'd missed my chance.  Now that it's past Thanksgiving, and Loy Krathong, I'm making masala chai anyway, even though it's not cool at all. 

Later edit:  it was down to 24.5 C this morning, around 75 F, positively chilly for Bangkok, finally!

Looking at the blend ingredients it's not like the versions of masala chai I make every year, from-scratch versions.  Those include cardamom, cinnamon, clove, and ginger.  Per my understanding star anise and black pepper are also relatively standard spice additions but I typically leave them out.

That package label shows the ingredients in this:  fennel seeds are listed first, with clove at the end.  Cassia is related to cinnamon, per my understanding (and Wikipedia's take) more often sold as cinnamon.  This blend version won't be like what I've been preparing.  It's a powdered spice blend, which is completely fine, only an issue related to storage conditions and storage time after you open it.  Recipes and some individuals recommend grinding or crushing fresh spices with a mortar and pestle right before use, which of course would be a little better, but powdered spices work too, especially when they're fresh.

I'll keep this explanation of brewing process and tea description short.  I simmered the spice mix along with a Thai version of CTC black tea I bought for blending (around a year ago; I don't get to that much), and threw a couple of Lipton tea bags in to shift the black tea character.  My wife picks those up in hotels when they're in the room and such, and they tend to just sit around.  That Thai black tea isn't astringent at all but it is a bit woody for flavor aspect, not typical of CTC teas in general.  Malt doesn't really stand out either, or mineral undertone, mostly just the mild wood tones.

kind of an odd look while it simmers, before adding milk

not ideal as black tea goes but it works well enough

I added some cloves to bump up that spice flavor range, really the only adjustment.  I also added a small dash of salt since I like the way that evens the balance.  It wouldn't take much of that to be way too much.  Instead of carefully measuring it all so that I could duplicate and adjust amounts later I sort of just dumped it in; one and a half very small spoons of the spice, a spoon half the size of a teaspoon, and unmeasured black tea.  It's possible to adjust the intensity a lot by adding more milk at the end, a factor that doesn't come up in almost any other teas I prepare, maybe just the orange Thai spiced (artificially flavored) black teas I've been drinking more of recently.

It would be possible to simmer the milk with the tea or to not, to just boil it with water.  I added the milk at the end to get some of that effect since boiling it does seem to change the taste a bit.  I'm not sure it matters much how long you simmer tea made like this since it's ground tea with powdered spice.  It boiled around 10 to 15 minutes and I think adding another 10 minutes probably wouldn't have changed much.  For more-whole spices it would make sense to give it a longer infusion, maybe by simmering a little, leaving it sit, re-boiling, then leaving it sit.  Or simmering for awhile; it probably wouldn't matter which.

after a bit of simmering

palm sugar; the shapes it comes in vary

Sweetener is the only other factor.  Using white sugar would seem normal.  Oddly we don't keep white sugar at the house all the time; funny how that works out.  I used up all we had that was nicked from hotel room tea and coffee set-ups with that Thai tea I had been making. 



Often we will have palm sugar around; that's a good alternative, not so different than brown sugar, just not exactly like that.  That seems to be the same thing referred to as jaggery I've seen in discussions about making masala chai online.  Since we're out of both I went with honey.  I love honey on toast but I'd as soon just use white sugar in a tea like this, but it sort of doesn't matter.


Skipping to how it turned out:  it was nice.  It was much different than what I was used to, the quite-different spice blend version, but it was good.  I didn't like it as well for it being less familiar, but it was hard to split out the impact of the blend balance not being optimized from that factor, just dumping it all in at no set ratio.  The other masala chai versions I'm used to have a lot of kick from the ginger and clove standing out and this was a lot milder.  Fennel seed was hard to identify as a separate flavor since it all integrated.

I'm guessing that using two thirds as much spice and half as much tea for the same amount of water would've turned out better.  It's hard to judge how much tea went into it since both the tea leaves and spices expand a lot simmering but it looked like way too much for two large mugs of tea produced at the end.  After drinking both my nerves were a bit jolted too.  I think beyond that factor, ingesting too much tea at one time, the flavors would balance better not made really strong.  All the same it worked well enough.

my son made breakfast again (bacon needed another sear, otherwise very nice)

when people ask about how to get dosed on caffeine this will come to mind

I usually make a Christmas blend around this time, and a version last year was based on a modification of masala chai (adding white chocolate and a touch of bitter orange marmalade).  I'm not sure if I'll get around to that or not.  Throwing some peppermint and a touch of chocolate into a black tea could count as one, maybe along with some orange peel for balance. 

It would be nice to be back in the States since pine needle would be a great input for one, and I could walk outside in lots of places and collect that.  Per past experiments I suspect dried pine needle might work best (versus just brewing it fresh then), but that would easy to arrange, laying it out for a bit, or speeding that up by putting the needles in a very low temperature oven for half an hour.

making a chocolate covered cherry themed Christmas blend

I bought some Christmas decorations today (when writing the draft); maybe finding our tiny artificial tree in storage and putting up some lights and the rest will make it seem more natural to get back to that theme.  Cooler weather wouldn't hurt but there's nothing to be done about that.  It's typically cool for about a week at the end of December but it's also not consistent.  Even though it never really seems like we re-create a US version of the holiday, missing the weather, not doing decorations justice, or hearing much of the songs, my kids appreciate how much we do manage to observe, so we'll make what we can of it.

awhile back; like a plastic version of that Charlie Brown Christmas tree

in Murmansk last year; odd to go to Russia to experience more of that holiday

An East Berlin early Cold War tea mystery

Someone contacted me about a tea mystery, about tracking down a childhood tea for an acquaintance of theirs, with the details as follows:


He is seeking a tea he remembers from his childhood in Berlin after the war. It is likely to be Russian, or perhaps, Georgian. He does not know the name or type. It is very, very strong, sort of ‘oily’ but not exactly oily, smokey but not Lapsang. The family housekeeper would bring it from the Russian-held part of Berlin.


So the time frame is late 1940's, with that tea from East Berlin. A Russian tea vendor contact told me what is now being sold as "Russian caravan blend" is a made-up designation, just modern marketing spin, but if it had existed 70 years ago that would be a possibility. A blend including some Lapsang Souchong would account for the limited smokiness. Or tea processing style or preparation methods could be other critical factors.

The "oily" designation may be a clue; not many teas come across in that way, and black teas in general tend not to. Maybe it's a black tea but mixed with an herb, which is not unheard of in Russia. I have willow herb at home, also called "Ivan chay," and it has been described that way, and per recently trying it I could see the connection.

I posted this as a request for more input in a few related online groups.  I'll include a combined review of the best input here.  I'd asked in the International Tea Talk Facebook group that I'm an admin for, in the Gong Fu Cha group, in a St. Petersburg FB expat group, on Quora, and in the Trip Advisor travel forum section, and in a couple of other similar groups.

me with a mural in the St. Petersburg metro system

That last group mentioned might seem a little out of place; tea history isn't travel.  Back when I was asking around about tea in Russia before I went there over the last New Years people active in that group / discussion area were most helpful.  They were a little touchy about people not reading the entire FAQ section too (who does that?), but beyond that very nice and informative.  I'm a fan of Russian culture now, after that trip, and that kind sums up how Russians seem in general:  a little gruff, and plain-spoken, but nice and helpful as could be once you get past all that.



I'm a member of that St. Petersburg expat group for the same reason.  St. Petersburg is fantastic, by the way, almost worth it to visit just to see the metro system and the buildings.

Let's go right to what turned up.

Groups and forums input

One person in the St. Petersburg forum mentioned this great article on the old "elephant" brand Russian commercial tea.  It seems pretty unlikely that's what it was but maybe it could've been.  Per that article it seems more likely that product was developed in the 1960's, with the question about a tea experienced in the late 1940's.

Russian "elephant" tea (credit that reference article page)

I'll cite some of that article, since it's fascinating, if not a likely lead:


Initially, there was only Russian Georgian tea in the USSR . This was a real breakthrough in the industrial industry, and the drink was even exported to other countries, where it became popular... In the seventies the tea industry in the USSR fell, the state suffered losses and began to decide what to do about it. 


Many people, who came to the USSR, sadly remember those times when both "the grass was greener and the sky was cleaner", and the products were of the highest quality, in comparison with them, even the imported ones were useless. But many did not even suspect at the time that they drank tea, collected not in the territory of their beloved homeland, but far beyond its borders. It so happened that the Georgian tea had become unusable, so the USSR concluded a contract for the supply of tea with countries such as Sri Lanka, Kenya, Tanzania, India and Vietnam. With our previous importer, China, which could also supply tea, our state quarreled and therefore did not use its services... Initially, this scam went well, but still "domestic" tea replaced the same Indian tea "with an elephant". 

This tea was distinguished not only by its bright and strong taste, but also by packaging, which was specially developed in 1967, and Indian tea "with an elephant" was sold in 1972... Tea "with an elephant" was divided into higher and first grade... The first grade packaging contained only 15% of tea from India, 5% from Ceylon, 25% from Madagascar, and as many as 55% of sheets from Georgia. 


It's a little rough (automatic translation) but all that seems clear enough.  The earliest time-line isn't really stated but if the earliest date mentioned is the initial origin the products were made since the 1960s.

A link mentioned in the Trip Advisor forum responses shows the modern version of the tea for sale (which had been discontinued at one point), with that person's input that the modern version of the tea didn't seem very good to him.

That Quora question turned up some interesting input, not cited for sourcing, but worth considering:


The three main general kinds of black tea available for the Soviets at that time were: Chinese, Georgian and Azerbaijanian. Of those, the Chinese tea would be the least probable, given the state of matters in China at that time (civil war followed by the Japanese invasion).

The Georgian black tea of lesser quality (it’s highly doubtable that the elite kind would be available to the troops) is described as “smelling like tobacco and having a terrible taste.” The Azerbaijanian tea was quite similar.

As for the herbs, the Russians were often adding all kinds of those to the tea, the main limitations being the fantasy of the cook and the availability of the herbs around. Therefore it would be almost impossible to know what exactly was added back then (if it was). The Ivan Chay, aka Fireweed (US), aka Rosebay Willowherb (UK), was not only used as an additive, but also as a cheap surrogate when the real tea was unavailable.


Another comment (hard to keep track of where) claimed Indian tea was also available in Russia at that time.  Indian and Sri Lankan teas were definitely around then, so it might come down to a matter of what really were "main" imports, per that answer input framing.  That overall import source proportion may not determine if teas from those nationalities really would have been sold in East Berlin then.  It would be impossible to remember a taste from 70 years ago in enough detail to trace that back to a foreign tea style back then, never mind linking it to a blend.  The aim here is to see how far review might be able to get.

dog sledding at 5 PM; it had been night for a couple of hours

I just had black tea mixed with herbs (which ones wasn't described) in a visit to a sled dog camp outside of Murmansk, Russia, back during the last week of 2017.  It was a bit hard to place; it's easier for mixes of different things to be non-distinct.  That was actually made in a samovar too, the only time that came up in the Russia trip.

In kind of a typical theme for me I was taking my daughter to use the restroom when they actually talked about that part, that brewing device, and what teas were typical, and what it was we drank then.  My son just became a Thai novice monk monk recently, and after waiting around for two days of training and build-up my daughter absolutely needed to use the restroom at a few moments before he took the vows (with more on how all that worked out here).  I really don't mind at all; they are the priority, and the rest comes and goes as it will.

samovars brewing tea at the dogsled camp

that tea break, just before they brought out crepes

with tea break company like this the other details don't matter so much

To make a longish story short I reported back to the person posing the question that I thought the tea probably would have been one of three things:


1.  an earlier version of a Russian caravan blend, mixing Lapsang Souchong and other tea versions.

2.  a Georgian or Azerbaijanian black tea.

3.  black tea mixed with willow herb (Ivan Chay) or other tisanes.


It probably never would be possible to narrow down which it was.  It would be possible to try modern Georgian tea, and that tisane, willow herb (with both sold through this Moychay site), and to try out mixing the two.  Maybe something would seem really familiar, a likely match.  I reviewed two Georgian black teas from Moychay here and they just seemed like normal black teas, maybe slightly different in character as teas from different regions or teas processed differently tend to.

Review of willow herb

I bought willow herb in the Perlov shop in Moscow (where I also bought the only Russian tea I found on that trip), and this prompted me to try out that tisane, reviewed as follows.

the exterior of that shop is beautiful

friendly Russian guy who translated tea labels for me there

The "tea" tastes nice rich and malty, just in a different sense than in the two other ways I tend to use malt as a description.  The main way I use that description is for Assam, related to that strong near-mineral flavor range.  A second is for sweeter, richer, smoother teas with a version of malt that reminds me more of Ovaltine.  A mid-roasted rolled oolong can also taste malty (like a Dong Ding), which can be really pronounced in a winter harvest tea version, but it's malt in a different sense, a bit closer to how Ovaltine comes across, or a malted milkshake.

When I first smelled this tea a warm, sweet, complex scent was familiar from long ago:  it smelled like animal feed.  That sounds like an insult, but processed malted grains used as animal feed smell nice.  I won't get too far into details but I raised pigs when I was younger, growing up in rural Western Pennsylvania.  There are more stories about how that went but none that help the context make any more sense than it already does.  It was kind of a normal thing to do there.

I don't know what those feeds were made from, although I must have read the bags back then, around 40 years ago.  I don't know how they were processed in order to smell as sweet and rich as they did, or what was blended with what.  I loved the smells related to that farming activity, and truth be told I loved those animals too, perhaps one main reason I spent nearly 20 years as a vegetarian later in life.

The first taste of the tisane was a little like that, just probably much cleaner, more complex, and more pleasant than it sounds.  Tisanes often come across as really one-dimensional compared to actual tea but this had a good bit of aspect complexity going for it.  The flavor was sweet and rich, mostly related to that malted grain taste.  There was other earthy range that gave it more depth, a strange sort of root-spice complexity, not so far off licorice.  It's almost as much an overlapping interpretation versus being a different aspect but it also tastes like bread dough, that one yeast-like flavor that comes up.  The feel was thick, a bit oily, and the tasting experience ended with more trailing aftertaste than usually occurs with tisanes.


Related to this being drank on its own it's fine, a bit richer and more complex than infused herbs tend to be.  I'd probably rather drink a mid-roasted rolled oolong, which seems closest to this in profile, but those are more complex.  It might work really well combined with black tea, since it is smooth and complex but a bit thin related to that broader aspect range.  It lacks all of the edge that standard black teas typically have, the astringency, and also the flavor range that is more typical of what people call malt when reviewing teas, and the other mineral or fruit range that different black teas can express.

As chance has it someone just gave me what looks like a pretty standard plain Kenyan tea (Williamson Tea "Traditional Afternoon" blend), so I tried it mixed with that.  I tasted that black tea alone first:  it's CTC tea-bag black tea, not great, not awful, not surprising in any way.


The blend of the two was a little unusual.  I'm just not accustomed to drinking black tea mixed with much, although I did buy a floral and Ceylon black tea commercial blend in Russia for the office staff here.  That was ok, those inputs matched.  It didn't help that I don't really love CTC black tea, that malty, mineral-tone, rust-like edge those have.  This mix might've been what he had been drinking as a child but it would take some getting used to.  That's especially if someone had already been on the page of drinking better Chinese black teas, deviating to drink a better orthodox Assam or Ceylon when those come up.


I think I liked the tisane better alone since it didn't run counter to my expectations for black tea in the same way.  That malted grain and licorice range sweetness and flavor depth just seems odd paired up with it.  Towards the end it started to make more sense and I'd bet if I had it a few times I'd like it a lot better.

Back to the search

I drifted just a little further towards tracking down willow herb (Ivan chay) and other Georgian tea options in NYC but didn't get far with that.  I asked about options in a NYC tea group and heard nothing back.  I had tried a reasonable Russian caravan blend from Sun's Organic in the NYC Chinatown but it wasn't really close to that initial flavor description.  It seemed highly unlikely that even a tea based on the same mix of tea type inputs (from the same regions) would be similar when made from modern versions.


I asked around a little about Russian markets in NYC but mail order was probably going to be an easier path to follow, unless the person checking wanted to spend a couple hours on Google search and a half a day walking around that related neighborhood.


Of course Google does turn up options fairly quickly, so it wouldn't take much to try finding that one tisane.  After a few clicks an online option turned up locally (there), associated with a local physical store, and some of the same search options I'd checked in this investigation turned up other promising leads.

As mentioned it really could've just been plain, unusual character Georgian or Azerbaijanian black tea, and it may not be possible to find an identically processed tea version today, 70 years later.  If someone had dried teas indoors using heat from a wood fire back then that could have contributed that smoke aspect, and what might well be seen as updated processing improvements might drop that smoke aspect out.  Ordinary black tea shouldn't seem oily, a plain tea or a blend, so maybe that was from an herb, or it could've just been from a processing flaw, or atypical result.  At one point I considered whether it may have even been a Liu Bao instead (a hei cha, not black tea at all), but I've not been discussing that since I rejected it as unlikely.

If anyone reading this thinks "I know what that probably was" it would be interesting to hear more input, probably best communicated through this blog's related Facebook page.

Travel in Russia, to Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Murmansk

This post shares experiences traveling in Russia, to Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Murmansk (within the Arctic Circle).  It's not about tea, although I will write about what turned up related to that separately.   I did attend a tea tasting in Moscow, with two of the Russians involved with making Laos Tea, and found some interesting shops and teas.

Russia was amazing, on a few different levels, so there was lots to cover.  I had made notes on the trip, explaining the shifts in time-frame in this.  There was a challenge related to covering so much range of experience in a moderate length summary.  The solution:  let it run long.

I completely get why a typical reader attention span is under 1000 words, and this is quite a bit  longer than that.  Make of it what you will, and feel free to share feedback or discuss parts with me in comments here, or in the FB page for this blog.

not in Kansas anymore

the recurring Christmas theme was nice

Moscow based intro

Why Russia, one might wonder.  The short version:  to see snow and Northern Lights.  Thais love the idea of cold weather, even though it takes work to prepare for it, and then the actual experience is a bit mixed.  We visited the US last year around the holidays so my family knew what was coming, except for the experience of the Arctic cold.  It was a separate goal to experience a little of Russian culture (especially tea, but not mostly that).

I might start by saying that I do like Russia and Russians.  They're a bit somber, and wear so much black and grey that along with their reserved demeanor and the industrial looking buildings things seemed a bit dystopian.  People having that limited clothing color option--or they could also wear maroon--and the ever-present security staff intensified that impression.

hotel room view in Moscow

But they really do seem very nice, once you talk to people.  What about the Thai stereotype that a lot of Russians are gangsters?  We went three for four in getting scammed by airport shuttle van services, and our SIM card data credit level wasn't as-sold, so there's that.  In general we aren't experiencing much related to crime or petty scams though, or even people being unpleasant.  When seeing guys in track suits I might think "they're mafia!," but that could just be a fashion choice.

Architecture is cool here, and the subway system is magnificently decorated and fixtured.  Red Square and the Kremlin is something to see (although we skipped most of the touring options there), and lots of other infrastructure is very impressive.  It's the opposite of China, where it's all obviously brand new, even far-removed from lots of Bangkok being modern, with other parts a bit more dated than here.  The industrial look in Moscow reminded me of my past in the American Rust Belt, of being from near Pittsburgh.

typical nicer hotel in Moscow

The trip itself, air travel on the way to Russia, was interesting for being awful.  My wife mentioned a long layover, and I basically just said "yeah, whatever," but we ended up spending a night in the Hanoi airport.  I've traveled a lot but never actually experienced that.  On the one hand it was really not restful, and uncomfortable, and on the other cool, related to the novelty.  We camped out in a baby nursing room, that extra bit removed from blaring announcements about departing flights, which seemed to let up around 2 AM.  In a special violation of Thai culture I used my boot wrapped in a newspaper as a pillow.  It all worked out.

Hanoi airport at 3 AM

Moscow is really something.  I'd already mentioned that it looks a bit bleak and industrial but there is a style and beauty to it as well.  That one cathedral beside the Kremlin is every bit as cool as it looks in the pictures, or maybe just a little more, so unique looking that it doesn't seem real.  Christmas is ramped up to several times over Bangkok's observation of it.  That's a bit odd given that Bangkok seems more modern in lots of ways, quite Western in a few senses, but Russia has much deeper ties to the West, and they're not Buddhist.

at Gorky Park; not that cold, but still too cold for good packing snow

A Russian contact mentioned language would be difficult and it was.  We more or less knew exactly what we wanted for metro (subway) access and it still took 15 minutes and the help of a couple of bystanders who spoke some English to set it up in Moscow.  The sales staff could use the minimum amount:  the words "no English."  It was odd noticing that some metro station signs are only in Cyrillc lettering.  One guide later clarified that both Roman lettering and that system were based on an earlier Greek alphabet, which explains why there is limited commonality and also so much difference.

Long after we sorted out work-arounds I realized the best fix would be to hold onto two sets of subway maps, in English and also Russian, and transliterate on your own.  I guess next generation app support would involve character recognition software and automatic translation, or a Jarvis-like AI personality just translating for you, which is almost as practical.  On one frantic solo Christmas shopping outing I realized the only Roman lettering in that station was posted inside the train cars, giving me around 30 seconds to determine if the car was the right one or not reading from the platform to the top of the opposing inside car door.  I found out that I wasn't standing on the right side of the platform but it worked; I just crossed over.

Moscow metro decoration theme:  classic

more of the Metro system

long metro escalators (St. Petersburg's version, which was just as cool)

St. Petersburg metro, equally stunning, with cool murals

Christmas was the first full day in Murmansk, posing a special problem.  We had nothing for either child, and my wife's stance was that since she's Thai they didn't need to receive anything.  Even for me putting it very explicitly she wasn't getting it:  not everything is about her.  The munchkins picked out Legos they wanted but I snagged a Snow White Barbie and Russian fighter jet model and that was going to have to do.  Santa would come through in a pinch, barely, and on the parents side they got an IOU, along with a lame story about us not wanting to carry toys through two travel legs.

It turned out that excuse worked in their favor when two more days of toy shopping in St. Petersburg netted a much nicer haul.  In the world of Legos there is one clear goal:  the "big set."  The one Keo finally did get only cost us around $120, versus $200 or so in the states, and $300 in Bangkok, where toy import taxes are crazy.

I kind of liked the military models myself

It won't really work to convey my impression of Red Square, or seeing Lenin (who looked great, all things considered), or the impressive subway system, or Gorky Park.  Gorky Park was cool, especially the idea of being there, but instead of ice skating we caught the afternoon one-hour ice maintenance break.  That park staff was rude about not being able to use English, unhappy about working through bystanders as translators, noteworthy mostly because almost every other Russian was patient and kind about that.


One favorite destination of the kids was Detskiy Mir, or a children's world mall, a large building full of shops just for kids.  They were taken with the idea of experiencing a "Dino World" play area, which in a way made no sense since it was just like a few others in Bangkok, with slides and trampolines and such.  The several hours that took freed up time to find the only tea I had so far, outside of that Laos Tea tasting outing.

GUM mall near Red Square (Gosudarstvennyi Universalnyi Magazin)

Children's World mall, Detskiy Mir

view of Moscow from Children's World observation deck

Kalani and Sputnik

A second favorite was a space museum.  Per my take and both kids' opinion it was definitely on-par with the Air and Space museum in the Smithstonian, which is no small achievement.  I knew Russians initiated the space race (about Sputnik, and Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space), but I learned a lot there.  Much to their credit that museum covered the American moon landings too, and included the actual space suit worn by that third guy on the Apollo 11 mission.


There seemed to be no crime, nothing really in general to worry about, although I guess pickpockets could be anywhere.  We had our pictures taken with people dressed as characters beside Red Square and they wanted to charge $80 instead of accepting a tip after, but of course we just said no.  That actually turned into an amusing version of a scam since the one guy kept claiming they were performing actors, and that our tip offer of $8 was "piss."  He kept miming himself pissing, funny enough that if I'd acted faster video of it would've been worth a second $8 tip.

with a troupe of Russian actors

That certainly doesn't exhaust what we experienced in Moscow but I'll switch it over to Murmansk.

Visiting Murmansk, the largest city within the Arctic Circle

We saw the aurora borealis, or northern lights, on the very first evening, two hours in, which was very cool.   Keo saw one from the plane, and I did beside him, a green arcing cloud in the sky, a good omen.  It was cold that first evening, around -27 C at the lookout area, down to around -16 F.  If it hadn't been so breezy undershooting clothing required for that temperature wouldn't have mattered, but as it was the experience was intense.  Given how hazy timelines became I could've sworn I picked up a touch of frostbite in Moscow instead, although it would make more sense that the blister at the end of one fingertip came from that first night.  I would take off my gloves to take pictures (not often in that initial cold outing), and if the kids needed help with gear I'd do so for that.

It's impossible to describe the Northern Lights.  So I'll not even try, except to say they're amazing, and to note that camera images don't see them in the same way as your eyes.  The green and other colors are there but not as pronounced as in photos, which can adjust exposure time.  The way they move is hard to describe, hard to even take in really, and different in different forms of them.

this wasn't even one of the more interesting variations of them

again impressive, with a cool pose, but nothing like the shifting forms version

In Murmansk it was only starting early dawn at 10 AM.  The days are four hours long, so fully light at 10:30, and back to dusk at 2:30, completely dark at 3.  The funny part about that near-complete darkness is how barely light it does ever get, straight from a grey dawn to a grey dusk.  As I first wrote these notes in a tour bus (on one of the two-a-day outings) the two elves with me are passed out beside me, the little one snoring, just like her mother.

1:30 or 2 PM, getting on towards dusk

everything was frosted in a way that wasn't familiar

On the first day we went for a snowmobile sled ride, on the second to see husky sled dogs and reindeer.  We went out both evenings to see auroras, lucky the first night but not the second.  There were glitches but all told all went well.  One mitten seemed to have been a casualty, no small loss when there's more - 20 C / -10 F weather to deal with.  We got by on spares, backed up with hand warmer packs.  The stress of losing that mitten took a year off the end of my wife's life, and made for a season's low point for our guide hearing about that, but the mitten did make it back, only stuck between the seats in a tour van.  Keoni explained that in Thai culture if you lose something small it's bad luck related to potential for losing something important.  I can't help but wonder if my wife losing her father to cancer as a child didn't tie back to her obsession over things like puzzle pieces and mittens.

My wife picked up her own case of frostbite from dipping her hand in the Bearing Sea to see if it really was cold (unless I've got the body of water name wrong: I'm not going to Google search everything).  It probably wasn't that cold but it was not at all warm out (maybe -12 C / 10 F).  Coupling that with taking pictures without gloves on with a wet hand gave her a much nastier case of frostbite than mine across her knuckles, dark patches of dead skin that would be healing for the rest of the trip.

Eye put her hand in this water

a real reindeer drawn sleigh at one outing

tea break in a lodge

The rest wasn't exactly what I expected; the town is quite developed.  Except for the bitter cold it could be a small resort town anywhere, and because of the Gulf Stream it's not as cold as it really should be for being that far North.  I suppose it would look a bit more dated and industrial to me if we hadn't just been in Moscow.  The terrain does look a bit strange and eerie, with sparkly powdery snow clinging to everything, so I guess that matches arctic expectations.  That first night as temperatures plummeted every trace of moisture fell out of the air, not as a fog as it would at other times, but as a fine frozen dust in the air that really looked unique.

plaza beside the hotel in Murmansk

The foreigness, rugged beauty, and presence of the cold makes for a cool environment.  As much as visiting the tropics for the first time overwhelms you this does.  But the tropics are almost too well suited for life, with strange versions of plants and insects all around, and this is the opposite.  Back in the mountains in Colorado it was always strange to me being outside below zero (F; more like -15 C), feeling that you would only need to stop and sit for awhile and the cold might take your life, even if well dressed.  Of course gear comes in degrees; I would still go out snowboarding at -10 F, almost as cold as it was outside here.

with Ivan, our Murmansk guide

I had tea with breakfast when I wrote this (Dian Hong I brought) but I'm not focusing much on that subject here, or food.  I tasted vodka once, from the guide, and I could see how that seems to warm you based only on a sip.  That guide, Ivan, was an interesting sort, a basic, good-natured, simple sort of guy who my wife really didn't click with.  I kept translating them to each other even though both really were speaking versions of English, which seemed just a little absurd.



I liked Ivan, and felt bad for him that most jokes fell flat, and foreign tourists just stared at him dumbly while he worked on stirring up enthusiasm.  The Arctic takes one out of their comfort zone, in a wonderful way that relates to experiencing completely novel things, and also in a potentially uncomfortable way, related to not really feeling at home with whatever might come next.


I focused on the kids more than the rest; that never changes.  I mentioned in an Instagram post that my kids are my favorite thing wherever we travel and that really is true.  That focus didn't extend to pulling off Christmas, which we nearly skipped.  The kids took that part really well, that Santa did find them, and that we owed them gifts coming later from where shopping made more sense.  In an interesting twist the Russian Christmas is really celebrated on January 7th, related to that Gregorian calendar adjustment way back when, so in a sense it really wasn't Christmas yet for the whole trip, which did cover New Years, and the typical build-up kept on building.

gingerbread houses (back at the hotel in Moscow)

hair frosted from breathing; it was a bit cool out

definitely wearing some layers

It can be hard to appreciate how special moments like lots of these are for being caught up in details.  Of course that applies almost as well to daily life, without visiting foreign lands or the Arctic.  I see those two grow up every day and I want to save up the time with them.  Even I had trouble completely taking in just how novel things were, but they really seemed to get it, in their own more cheerful way.  Dressing them was a bit of a headache, and being in charge of all the cold weather gear for three people (five, really, but I only actually dressed three, counting myself).  But beyond a couple of slips that part worked out well.  I just kept bringing extra gear along.


We visited a reindeer ranch and husky racing camp, two really cool experiences.  They had a reindeer (Carribou) sled for visitors to ride, and an even more exciting snowmobile version.  The one large-moustached, traditionally dressed snowmobile driver had the rubber-raft-like sled whipping around a football field sized track at near highway speeds.  The dogs were also great, excited to have visitors, and all very friendly.  One of them at the reindeer stop stole Kalani's mitten (the back-up; her better version was still hanging out between the seats of the other suburban).  That dog never would give back a hand-warmer pouch tucked inside to make up for the lighter glove type not being suitable for that intense cold.  I told her he probably thought she was an elf, there to give him a Christmas present, and her interpretation of the event warmed up a little.

caught in the act of stealing a mitten

A second husky racing camp was just as amazing.  I had no idea that Alaskan huskies are the real performance racing northern breed and working dog.  Siberian huskies have evolved to endure cold, and have a much cooler look, but can't handle workload or endurance like their North American cousins.  A friend had several Siberian huskies back in Colorado and they are a really intelligent breed.  One of them was always suspicious of me initially, slow to accept me as an acceptable regular visitor.  We had a nice bonding moment in running a 5k dog and human race together once, putting in a terrible final time because we stopped for 15 minutes in the middle for a water-hose cool-down break.

rides on a dog sled at 5 or 6 PM, in the early Arctic night

We had tea in a samovar on a nice break at that dog camp.  But I missed the guide's explanation of how a samovar works for walking around trying to get Mama Nid out of the van to join that break.  That was probably tea-blog gold he presented in that description; oh well.  The short version, for people who don't know, is that Russian tea is typically either black tea alone (mostly Ceylon, it seems), or that mixed with herbs (as it was that day), brewed very strong by a long infusion process, later diluted to taste.

Murmansk in review

In this round of notes I'm waiting in an airport again to leave Murmansk to go to St. Petersburg.  It's funny how travel alternates being busy and rushed and wait periods.  I'm feeling a bit spent, also normal for the context.  We finally had a few hours of free time the last day in the form of not booking a morning tour and I used the time to sleep in.  That worked out well, coupled with staying up late to pack and prepare.

I keep asking the kids what their favorite parts were, to hear their take and also to help them process it all.  I think a small sled riding slope outside the hotel would rank pretty high.  Keoni made Russian friends; funny how kids don't need shared language to share experiences.  Keo liked a snowmobile ride quite a bit and Kalani loved the reindeer.  I think of the two only Keoni really got what the aurora borealis was.

The Northern Lights were absolutely amazing that first night, at first just a whitish streaky cloud across a lot of the sky that the camera saw as green instead.  Later the colors emerged, and movement, with thinner streaks that seemed thinner shifting and twisting, but I was focusing more on how Kalani was doing in a very, very cold wind chill.  On the third day again a large distant cloud of stationary aurora started things off, transitioning to flowing bands of greenish-white energy patterns, all looking like nothing I'd ever seen or imagined (except maybe two days before).  It looked like something out of the original Star Trek series graphics, but it was real.

the shifting form of aurora was amazing (credit Aurora tours, Dmitry Tokarchuk)

newly built Greek Orthodox church in Murmansk

We did a city tour the last day, and it was really as interesting to question the guide (Roman) about cultural issues as hearing Murmansk history, although that was also interesting.  Of course it's all way too much to summarize, both sets of ideas.  I could sample something interesting from both though.


Murmansk is 101 years old, established right at the end of the Romanov rule in 1916, a year prior to the Communist revolution.  The current population is around 300,000.  That explains why it seemed a lot less like a tiny, remote port city than I expected.  On culture and perspective, he said that a lot of Russians blame Gorbachev for the end of the Soviet Union.  I suppose he played a part but my take was that it couldn't have been saved, and that at most economic reform speeded up what was coming anyway, partly from political causes and economic ones.  I also thought Russian national leadership played a role in insisting on independence to solidify and expand the power they already had.  But what do I know.


Roman mentioned that religious observation is increasing in Russia; the opposite of in the West.  They were in the process of building a large Christian Church, the kind of thing that probably rarely happens now in the US.  The Greek Orthodox version of Christianity seems to focus on icons, saints, and rituals, not completely unlike Catholicism, but in a different form.

I guess my favorite trip experience up to that point would be seeing northern lights, after seeing my kids love all the experiences.  Really they do love local travel in Thailand too, just getting out a little, but in visiting the Arctic you can't miss that the experience is really unique.  This set of travel notes ends here but there was one more city to go, St. Petersburg.  I'll mention a bit about cold weather gear first.

Dressing for the Arctic

In a Trip Advisor forum discussion about visiting Russia in the winter someone mentioned "there is no cold weather, only cold clothes."  After years of living in a ski resort town in Colorado I knew exactly what we might be in for, and made sure we were over-prepared, even prepared for what we couldn't expect.  But how does one dress for -27 C / -16 F temperatures?

The obvious solution is to buy good technical gear, functional heavy parkas, good boots and gloves, heavy hats, snow pants, with insulated underwear and fleece layers for fill.  In short, spend your way towards a complete solution.  We didn't do that.  An alternate path is to use more layers, to skimp on technical gear by gaining the same function through layering equivalent clothing.  We filled some gaps with used clothing; I wore used boots and a used down jacket as an inner layer, the only "new" clothes I bought for the trip.  Keo wore two decent winter coats to make up one very heavy one, both light and easy to stash, a more functional set-up than most of us wore.  Kalani we just layered, using insulated underwear, multiple fleeces, a synthetic-fill vest and jacket, and an outer light shell to make up for no one layer really doing the job.  The approach works but it's awkward.

wearing just the inner layer

Eye also bought a used down jacket that would've made gearing up easy for her, but gave it to her mother since she packed light, not taking my advice to bring multiple jacket layers since her heaviest one would only be fine for the current Moscow-level cold.  I brought two extra jackets I couldn't possibly need and one of those made up that gap for Eye.

Neck gators made a difference; an exposed neck and face at below -20 C / -10 F is a critical gap.  Layering the light stretchy gloves Americans tend to use on grocery store outings under a winter mitten simulated better technical-wear gloves.  All the layering up got old, to be sure, as did trying not to lose parts of a pile / backpack full of gear on warm-up breaks, but it was functional.  One key to success any winter sport participant knows:  no cotton.  We had spent a month visiting most of the Decathalon sporting goods stores in Bangkok and the main issue was gauging just how many layers to use on a given day and outing.  The same would be true in St. Petersburg, but the clothing count would become practical again there.

St. Petersburg

It was going to be nice to ease up that guided tour pace adhered to in Murmansk, to get back to walking around when it worked out.  Of course that would come with a down-side:  covering less ground.

St. Petersburg was spectacular.  Where Moscow was a bit bleak, overbuilt in large-scale dramatic style, St. Petersburg was just awe inspiring.  Whole parts of the city seemed to look like palaces, with lighting fit for Christmas celebration anywhere further accenting what was already impressive.  Barely below zero (C) temperatures felt balmy after the Arctic, and although juggling an extra layer or two and hats and gloves was still a challenge, just a far easier one.


An overall trip highlight came in the form of a circus outing.  Limited availability had us buy more expensive ring-side seats, bumping up an intense experience to the next level.  Keoni shouted laughter in response to a talented circus clown performance, and animal and dancing acts drew vigorous applause from Kalani.  Towards the end two acrobatic segments were so enthralling we have almost no pictures of those, with us setting aside the role of documenting events and just enjoyed them instead.

Oddly the circus being narrated in Russian didn't detract much.  There was a story line about a princess being captured by an evil dark queen that we missed most of, but with dances informing a lot of the content of that story instead of speech the archetypes and standard plot elements came across.

An outing to a ballet the next night was also really a unique experience, masterfully performed, but not enjoyed by all on that level of the circus.  It was a limited scale production, an exhibition of dance sequences from various famous ballets, so not as extravagant as seeing the Nutcracker would have been, but it was probably better for us to catch a lower profile show anyway.


Mama Nid and I watched impressed and interested, fascinated by that high level of grace and athleticism, while Keoni fidgeted, and Eye and Kalani slept through parts.  After a long week of tracking technical gear for myself and the two kids, and double-checking Eye and her mother's preparations, I let up on the attention to attire so much that I accidentally wore a t-shirt to that relatively informal ballet event, a clear faux pas.  It was under a down-jacket layer that couldn't pass for appropriate indoor clothing, so I borrowed a vest from Eye more to cover a warming function and went along with looking out of place.

the wait before the ballet

Walking around St. Petersburg the pace kept seeming to slow, until eventually it seemed like it might just stop, with us frozen in place on a sidewalk.  At the very end in yet another miscommunication a hotel concierge directed us to a shopping complex that was essentially just a small grocery store.  It was probably not that much more than a mile's walk away, a half an hour walk to get there and 45 minutes on the way back.

In Bangkok you can wave your hand at a passing taxi anywhere, any time, but as with some other cities in St. Petersburg you either use the metro, figure out the bus system, or call a taxi.  Or Uber, of course, but we never did make it back to re-upping that SIM credit after that first glitch, dropping Google Maps support along with the rest.  Yandex maps works better in Russia, but the equivalent to that blue dot in Maps, where you are located, wasn't working in the off-line mode.

There are always glitches in traveling but most of the trip details did come together.  By chance we were having a late dinner and experienced a New Year's countdown of sorts before paying out just after midnight at a local cafe.  The toy shopping went well, at a cost of spending a full day of limited time in a mall near our hotel (the Galleria; not really an ideal place for Bangkok locals to spend a day in St. Petersburg given the number of malls where we live).  I bought a second nice pu'er cake in St. Petersburg at a second Moychay branch, which I'll cover more about in a later tea-theme post.

Galleria mall in St. Petersburg

a break from sightseeing to make a snowman

We visited two palaces with garden grounds as a central attraction, mostly a waste of time given how those looked in the frozen winter (Peterhoff and Catherine's palace).  At least seeing different parts of town outside the central city was nice.  We walked straight by two Christmas theme events, one of which I ventured into alone, but we really weren't missing much.  Dozens of restaurants, bars, and cafes looked nice, but we didn't get far with exploring local foods.

Keo at an outbuilding in the Peterhoff palace complex

In one last highlight an overnight first class sleeper train from St. Petersburg back to Moscow made for a great experience.  We've been on some interesting trains in Thailand, Vietnam, Japan, and China but that was the first including private rooms, breakfast service, and a private shower in the two small cabins.  Kalani was so excited that she kept swapping top and bottom bunk locations, but I missed all that for crashing in the other room instead.  I was curious about the television and radio features in the room devices but not curious enough to pass on sleeping through it all.

on the train; Asians really do make that V sign a lot

with tons of luggage, the usual challenge

Back to Moscow

We felt like like Russia travel veterans returning to Moscow, but we still hadn't cracked van shuttle services yet.  After getting scammed that first time, paying just over double a standard rate, we were skimmed for an extra $20 on a shuttle set up by the hotel the second round, on the way to St. Petersburg, on the premise of us running late.

Our driver tried it again in St. Petersburg, squeezing us for whatever extra token amount it was, for an under-one-mile, clearly defined arrangement from the hotel to a train station a ten minute walk away.  But the concierge helping us there really wasn't into it.  Instead of that driver locking us in the car and demanding more for extra baggage cost--a standard ploy--she initiated a stand-off at the hotel.  The standing threat of a move to plan B led him to fold.  It was probably more out of spite than leverage but I took pictures of the cab service logo, the license plate, and him before we even got to that step.

back at Red Square

I'm now a fan of Russia and Russians.  Moscow's residents are on the gloomy side related to sharing commuting space with them but Russians are truly bright souls once you actually do interact with any.  Even that shuttle driver exception was like that mitten going missing for a day and a half; tragic, related to that feeling impossible to overcome (although we had spare gloves), but in the end not meaningful.

Christmas being held on the 7th of January instead meant that we never would see that holiday end, leaving on the 3rd as we did.  Our final night on the 2nd saw really intense crowds pouring into Red Square and that amazing looking mall beside it (GUM), the one with the hot air balloons inside, so we bailed to Arbat street for tourist shopping and a little local food instead.

lots of variations of Russian dolls

We had already snapped up a Russian doll for Kalani in passing (the kind where each fits as an outer shell for the smaller inner ones), but Mama Nid bought ten more in the perfect sort of tourist shop there in those closing hours, bargaining to a good deal as Thais love to.  Or probably from high retail down to medium level retail, really, but generally lower costs than in Thailand made the whole trip feel like a great value.

That part is a long story, about levels of goods and services varying in cost.  A bowl of noodles in a local Bangkok shop costs around $1, and a plate of spaghetti more or less covered in ketchup is more like $8, but Russians seem to have access to a wide range of much better Western foods and other goods at quite fair prices.

borscht!  we went light on the foodie theme though

Thanks

Random Russians got us out of a jam over and over helping with details, at times fixing problems we had directly caused through lack of planning, and I'd like to add extra thanks to a few people here.

helpful Russian woman, breaking form and smiling in the metro

Werabhat Komrat is a local Thai guide to Russia my wife knows, who really made the trip possible in the form we experienced it.  It's easy to see how to manage details of visiting anywhere, once you do the trip, but prior to that very difficult to know about specific problems and issues you need to settle in advance.

Werabhat (Pound), meeting us as our paths crossed in St. Petersburg

One local Moscow guide in particular, Keira Kasmimova, completely sorted out hiring two taxis from the train station to our hotel on short order for local rates, just to be nice.  Her positive karma is strong, for her to be able to snap that shuttle scam streak as easily as she did.  Just using Uber might have resolved the problem before it started, but often things aren't that simple and there can be exceptions.  The problem we kept running into related to carrying a mountain of luggage, in addition to travelling with five people.

Keira calling a taxi; you don't really need a guide but problems can come up

Thanks to Oleg of Visit Murmansk for everything (aka Aurora tours, FB contact and website).  In retrospect Murmansk is a lot easier to get around than we expected, so it's not as if someone is isolated in a remote shipping port village up there, but renting a car and visiting local places on your own is probably not really workable.  Tours help with just getting outside of the town to see auroras, since light pollution from the city blocks that.

A random Russian guy who spoke perfect English talked me through a good bit of the tea in one shop, in the Perlov Tea house, and a bit on Russian tea habits in general.  I think Eye also told his wife an hour's worth of our story in that 15 minutes, losing track of asking for help and information and just appreciating making a local friend.

a friendly Russian guy, and tea shop theme teaser

Roman, the other local guide (photo credit)

Roman Muravitskiy, a guide assigned by Oleg to our city tour, explained local history, the sights, and lots of Russian history and culture.  The aurora outings and seeing a reindeer farm and husky camp were more can't-miss but I learned more about the general Russian perspective from him in a couple hours than I did in the rest of the two weeks.



That'll do it for travel blog summary.  I'll check back in about tea in Russia in another post, since I did pick up some versions, and barely mentioned that tasting event with some interesting tea makers there.