Thanks to a new project by Google Maps, travel buffs can experience traveling the Trans-Siberian Railway from the comfort of their couch.
Google Russia, in partnership with Russian Railways, is offering free "virtual journeys"...
...along the entire Trans-Siberian Railway, beginning in Moscow at the Yaroslavsky Rail Terminal and ending in Vladivostok, a port on the Pacific Ocean.
The video shows the view from a train window on the rail route that spans two continents, 12 regions and 87 cities.
The entire trip takes days to complete and Google has provided audio entertainment for the virtual journey.
The YouTube video doesn't have any sound, but Google's Trans-Siberian Railway page provides numerous soundtracks including the sounds of the rumbling wheels, music from a balalaika, Russian radio, audiobooks of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, Gogol's Dead Souls, and Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov's The Golden Calf.
Google Maps' Trans-Siberian Railway site also includes an interactive map that will show you where you are in your trip and bookmarks for you to jump to different sections of the train's path.
Get a taste for what it's like to travel the Trans-Siberian Railway in the video from Google below.