2007-06-25Grand Russian Traverse - Путешествие новозеландцев по России!!! часть2
Автор: Mark and Jane

Hi everyone,

Just a quick recap: Mark and Jane decide to do an OE. Instead of flying to Europe direct they buy a couple of motorbikes and set about riding 15,000 km's across Russia and Europe.

We made a party at Grandy's house with live blues music, lots of Russian food and of course beer and Vodka. They are keen on their raw salted fish, delicious with a dash of wasabi.

Alexey took us for a ride around Vladivostok, visiting the famous sign where we took our photo. There were also about 8 brides across the road getting their photos taken, later in the day we had a bride ask for a photo with the bikes. There sure are plenty of beautiful Russian women here just waiting for a dashing motorcyclist.

We visited a beach but it turned out to be lots of old crushed bottles and ceramic plates, basically rubbish, we longed for our natural sand beaches on NZ.

We had had an offer of a boat ride on the harbour the following day, but unfortunately the skipper had too much vodka the night before so instead we took the ferry to an island for $2.50 each. We even met a couple of fellow Wellingtonians! On the island we made a fire and cooked a few pork sausages. All of the Russian meat we've had so far is delicious, but ordering is always a challenge.

On Monday we stayed at lake Hanka, only about 30 km from the Chinese border, but unfortunately we picked a camp site near the swamp. Fortunately the mosquito net we made with Jane's Nana and Aunty really did the job and gave us good protection from the hordes of mossies, some the size of birds!The heat that night was a real problem though and we struggled to get to sleep. The next morning we had a nice swim in the lake.

The next night we bumped into Martin Tate again, the honorary NZ consul for Vladivostok, and ended up camping at this farm.

Our Elacin earplugs have been more comfortable than we had imagined and make the tiring wind noise just a whisper in the back ground. A big thanks for Arno for donating a pair to us.

The following nights we camped near a river to catch up on some washing and diaries. This time instead of camping near an open fire, we cooked our tasty Russian meat on our petrol powered Coleman cooker. The cooker has been excellent and we've been impressed at the speed at which is cooks our meals.

The evening we arrived in Khabarovsk we were invited to a 30 birthday party which was a far cry from the mosquitoes and tent, It was almost like a dream. The party went late into the night and we made some lifelong friends (at least as long as the vodka was flowing anyway).

The individual houses in the villages are built out of planks of unpainted wood and seem so run down and drafty that they could belong in New Zealand. On closer inspection though they seem to build a house inside a house with double windows instead of double glazing and an asbestos roof to keep them cosy.

We are now in Birabadjhan and about to start the 2000km section of unsealed mud and gravel road. The main traffic is trucks and people buying 2nd hand Jap cars in Vladivostok and driving them west to sell.

Our next big city will be Chita and we don't expect to see Internet before then so we will sign off for a couple of weeks and we will up date you on our adventures when we reach civilization again.

We apologise for the lack of photos, due to lack of Internet bandwidth we have been unable to upload them. Thanks again for your interest in our exciting project.

Feel free to reply at anytime

Do Svidanya

Please check our website www.russiantraverse.co.nz for recent diary updates.

Mark and Jane.

Russian Traverse 2007