While Tayshet is the official starting point of the BAM, most travelers coming from Western Russia start their journey at Irkutsk, the nearest large city. Irkutsk is on the Trans-Siberian and has trains and, in the summer high season, ferries across Lake Baikal to Severobaikalsk, a large railway hub connected to the BAM.
The BAM railway ends at Sovetskaya Gavan on the Pacific Ocean, but most visitors opt to stop at Komsomolsk and head from there to Khabarovsk in order to rejoin the Trans-Siberian to Vladivostok, to have a better flight connection back home. Another option is ending the BAM trip on Vanino and cross the Tatar strait to Sakhalin where you can continue your journey to Japan.
Sokol tours is a specialized tour operator for Russia. They have an American based office and offer tours along the BAM railway.
When traveling along the BAM, pay attention to the design of each train station. It has an ethnic touch of the former USSR members. It was done on purpose to underline the unity of many cultures living in the USSR. Some of BAM train stations are true architectural art built of granite, marble, and metal.
