The End

After getting a new chain wheel and chain for Marcin's bike in St. Petersburg we had no more problems with the bikes and quickly passed Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The last days were very cold and rainy, so the riding was no pleasure. We were looking forward to getting home and doing something else for a change. And here we are. With many nice experiences and memories, hundreds of photos and a few additional kilos on the hips. No surprise after sitting for four months and 25.000km.

It was a great trip. And now it's time to move again.

Kazan and St. Petersburg

I forgot to say that we had more problems with Marcin's motorbike, but with the help of some angels in the beautiful cities Kazan and St. Petersburg we could solve them and keep going. More about this when we get home and our fingerrss are no longer frozen.

Racing home

We left Russia yesterday and Estonia just a few minutes ago. We should be in Bytom in two days. Would be great to have more time in the Baltic states, but it is already so cold here that we are happy not to be here any later.

Russia is sooooooooooooooo big...

... and so nice. We really like this country and its people. It is totally boring and terrible and absolutely no fun to ride on the bikes on this Russian Autobahn towards the West with its terrible traffic, but whenever we stop we meet nice people. In Tomsk we met my friend, ate great food, were lazy and had our first and only Russian banja session - this time it didn't burn! Also we did some little things on the bikes and after relaxing days we moved on to Omsk. Waiting at traffic lights not knowing where to drive someone from the car next to us asked if he could help us. And this nice guy not only let us use his internet in his office, but also took us to a friendly biker and mechanic, who did a lot of nice things to our motorbikes. They are running a let better now. I don't think we we would make it home without this help. Also he invited us to stay in his house, which we did and had a really nice evening with him and a few more guys. Photos of all this soon... then 500kms later Marcin's chain... this rear wheel with teeth.. i have no idea what is in English - it lost all teeth and he couldn't ride any further. The first car that passed us was a truck. Marcin was screaming and waving his arms (I think he was just having a fit) and so this truck stopped. Since they were on their way home and it was empty, these nice people took us to Ekaterinburg. I rode my bike another 120 kms to Tiumen following the truck, then I was frozen from head to toe and had to give up. So we put my bike besides Marcin's and comfortably rode to Ekaterinburg in the warm truck cabin. Since the hotel close to the BMW center asked for an ridiculous amount of money we decided to spend the night in front of the BMW center. The next morning we were welcomed with tea and coffee.. how nice. The people there were really helpful and friendly. Since it would have taken at least 4-5 days to get this new part from Moscow we finally got a similar one from a different BMW motorbike. They made it fit onto Marcin's bike and we could leave the same day! So we made our way to Kazan. Yesterday Marcin's bike started to suddenly switch off when riding. We don't know why it is doing this, but he is putting in new spark plugs right now and hopefully it stops doing this afterwards. Otherwise we need a new plan. If the bikes keep running we'll ride to St. Petersburg and on towards Estonia.

Omsk

After having had two fantastic lazy days in Tomsk with my friend Tanja we unfortunately had to get back on the road. Now we are in Omsk, and just met a really nice guy who let me use a computer in his office. I better don't keep this computer occupied to long. More soon when we're in Estonia.

Russia. We passed the Baikal Lake and Irkutsk yesterday. Heavy traffic and dense population along the road.

Mongolia - about to say Goodbye

I uploaded about 10 pics into the webalbum.. so if you follow the photo link you will find them.

Unfortunately the computer cannot connect with my camera anymore, so more photos when we're back home... or maybe from Russia.

Tomorrow we will head towards the border, then home.

We're planning to be in Europe around September 10. I have no idea if we'll be able to get through Russia that quickly, but I hope we do. On September 16 I will be back in Munich. Only three weeks of travelling. I can't believe how quickly this trip passed...

On the road again

Well, actually we're having a day off today. But we reached asphalt and Ulanbaatar yesterday. Today we'll just walk around town and tomorrow or the day after head towards Russia.
We had an a great time in this vast country, and I will definitely return. Before getting to Mongolia we heard the wildest stories about the roads, or better tracks, and how it would be difficult to get water and petrol, how boring it would be, nothing to see.... none of this turned out to be true. Or maybe were just extremely lucky by picking our way around all difficult areas and towards the nice places. We never had any problems with petrol stations, the motorbikes were good mooded and apart from my rear suspension, which is about to retire, we had no mechanical problems. We didn't even have a flat tire. We didn't break any bones, had no crashes... and so we cannot come up with exciting life-threatening adventure stories. At the moment I cannot even upload pictures - I have to go for a walk around the city - but I'll try to do that later.

Moeroen

We made it up North to Moeroen. A little town about 90km from Lake Khoevsgoel which is supposed to be really beautiful. We had some nice days riding through an always changing landscape. No problems with petrol, we're still healthy and we enjoy the riding here. Sometimes the gravel and sand can get a little bit annoying, but we had no mud yet, which is supposed to be the worst that can happen to a biker here. It will rain here in 5min, so I better go. We have to stock up our food supplies... In about 10 days at the latest we should be in Ulanbator and I'll try to write more then. We just met two Aussie bikers who told us where to get a nice Schnitzel in Ulanbator. We can't wait to get there.

Altai

We didn't expect to find internet.. and it's just a very short stopover.. but things are still going well. Last night we were lucky and met two nice Irish guys in a tiny broken Fiat, who sold us some of their petrol. Otherwise we would have probably ran out of petrol in the middle of nowhere. We have changed plans and are now trying to go to Uliastay, somehow up to Lake Hoevsgoel and Karakorum before riding to Ulanbataar. So it will take a bit longer before we get there. Maybe two weeks. And my rear suspension started leaking oil. I am slightly worried. People are VERY curious here but in general also very friendly. No photos today, we have to get going, only about 1 hour to sunset.

Off the Road

The total eclipse was amazing! We watched it from a pass, mountains all around and an Owoo (stone pile) next to us and had a fantastic view. It's so strange, this sudden darkness and the ring of light around the moon. Just before that we were invited into a jurte and drank a nice milk product from some animal... we couldn't find out from which. People around here are Kazakh, so the Mongolian dictionary doesn't help. And they don't speak Russian either.

To get a few more seconds of the eclipse we rode about 30km off the main "road". After about 5km I regretted having had this idea.. lots of sand, deep gravel. I was more sliding than driving. But we were rewarded with a beautiful camp site next to a river in a wide valley with yaks, goats, camels, horses, quite a few jurts, not too curious people, an eagle above our heads and many many other birds of prey. At this nice spot we waited for the eclipse day to come, were extremely lazy and changed our tires. Hooray. Since then riding the bikes is at least 200times more fun. Michelin T63 - we'll see how long they last, but now they are perfect.

We'll do some food shopping here back in Oelgij and then head towards Chovd, past the Gobi desert and onwards to Ulanbator, which is about 1400km from here. Of which 1000km are without asphalt.

Oelgij and the eclipse

We are in a little provincial town called Oelgij now. So far we have had good "roads", even about 40km of asphalt. As long as it doesn't rain it might be ok here. We'll see. We've heard about the raods about any opinion somebody could have. From No Problem to Impossible. The whole range.

Unfortunately knowing some Russian doesn't help here. Just hands and feet. Last night we had a friendly Mongolian visitor coming over to our tent. Since he didn't want to go away we gave him some tea and some of our spaghetti. Poor guy, he obviously thought it was terrible food.

Now we just got our first Mongolian money and are ready to ride a little bit towards the West now. Just about 80kms. There we'll wait for the eclipse tomorrow. In the afternoon there will be a total eclipse visible here, so we decided to stay one day longer in the area. We'll just try to get a bit closer to the mountains. Otherwise all good and more news from Ulan Bator. We are planning to be there in around 10 days.

We are in Mongolia!

Siberia I

Two days ago we arrived in Barnaul, so we are back in Russia. Finally! After spending 8hours and the night at the border. We were missing a document, stating that Marcin is allowed to ride "my" motorbike (it is registered in Germany on my name). And it is simply not enough that I am there, saying that he is allowed to do so. After hours of waiting, filling in forms and the same boring procedures as on every border I started complaining because the sun was setting and it is no fun to ride here after dark. So after about 5 hours I asked the sour faced border officer if we could camp at the border. And to my surprise he left his little office and 50 people waiting, met us behind the little office cabin and was quite nice. He showed us a room where we could sleep and another officer gave us a HUGE watermelon.. later we were drinking some vodka with them and spent a few hours talking. In the end we got all the papers we needed and after a night in the customs control zone garage (where they store the "bribes", i.e. watermelons, apricots, eggplants, paprika they take from the passing trucks) we entered this really nice part of Russia.

After Almaty we were expecting boring countryside in Kazakhstan, but it turned out to be a quite enjoyable ride. The landscape changes constantly, hills, not too hot, thunderstorms in the distance, we even found some rocks that would be good for climbing and bouldering. We met a couple of motorcyclists, that were already preparing for a huge biker meeting that will be at Lake Balkash on Sunday. Coming back to Russia was for us almost like being in Europe again. Even the landscape looked very European. Like Europe without people.

In Barnaul we met two German motorcyclists (www.jeansontour.blogspot.com), one of which we had already met in Tajikistan. So we knew they were also heading towards Mongolia and will take the same route in Mongolia, and it was a nice coincidence that they were staying at the same hotel. They showed us a very nice friendly motorbike garage, where we changed our front tires, changed the oil and I got a knew chain kit on my motorbike. It looks like brand new. Apart from the shattered plastic thing above my front wheel.

In Kazakhstan I had another flat tire. The tires are so worn off that they are easily pierced. We fixed it on the side of the road, the sun burning down on us, no shade at all anywhere close... so we start riding again and I am looking down on my newly fixed tire, to check if everthing is ok, and I don't see Marcin stopping right ahead of me in the middle of the road. Something was lose on his bike. When I looked up I got a heart attack and I guess he did too when I crashed into him :) It was the permature sudden death of his rear tire. We fixed the tube, and he wanted to keep riding on the old tire. It worked - for about 4 kms, then he had another puncture and finally put on the new tire that we have been carrying for about 12000kms now.

Almaty and towards Mongolia

We got the visas for Mongolia this morning. It's another hot humid day in Almaty and we will hopefully leave the city tonight. The local Office for Visas and Registration promised to return our passports this evening with a two week extension of our Kazakh visas and we have an appointment in the afternoon with BMW. They should by now have a new suspension strut for Marcin's bike. So things are looking well at the moment. Marcin's motorbike sounds a little strange, so there might be some bigger problems coming up. But not yet... unless we find some reason for this strange sound later at BMW.

Unfortunately Kazakhstan is a huge country and we will have to cross about roughly 2000km of flat, plain, hot and I suppose quite boring land before we reach the Russian border. We have heard, as always, different opinions about the road. We'll see...

Through Kyrgyzstan to Kazakhstan

After fixing Marcin's bike in Dushanbe we rode along the Pamir Highway through Tajikistan to Kyrgyzstan. With the second suspension strut about to break we chose the better road and crossed some nice passes, the highest one taking us 4655m above sea level. Finally we found some quiet spots in the mountains, perfect campsites, not too many people around, just a few marmots lurking behind the rocks. It was a nice change after being too long in Dushanbe. Tajikistan was one of the most beautiful countries we have seen so far, and Kyrgyzstan turned out to be equally impressive. Mountains everywhere, but the country is a fair bit greener than Tajikistan and with yurts, yaks and high plains it starts to look like I am expecting Mongolia to be like... We had a full day feast with a (huge) Kyrgyz family, eating two goats (cut into pieces in front of our eyes) besides many other things and drinking freshly made kymys (fermented horse milk). I didn't expect a goat to taste well, but it does! I took a lot of photos, so tomorrow I'll try to get some of them online. While you see only Daewoo cars in Uzbekistan, you will hardly see any other cars than Mercedes, Audi, VW or BMW in Kyrgyzstan. I was always wondering where all the cars from the 90ies have disappeared to. Here they are. Unfortunately we had to leave Kyrgyzstan because my visa was about to end and an extension wasn't really worthwhile. So now we are in Almaty, Kazakhstan's former capital. Waiting for the next suspension strut to arrive at BMW. Tomorrow we will hopefully get our registration done, extension of our visas to Kazakhstan and get the visa for Mongolia.

Still in Dushanbe

Marcin has his visa for Kyrgyzstan, but we are still waiting for our extension for the visas for Tajikistan (otherwise we would have to be out of the country within two days), our registration (a terrible procedure that every tourist has to go through, which takes between 10 minutes and 3 days, invented just to annoy normal people) and our permit for the Pamir Mountains. And our spare part should be there tomorrow morning. Hooray. Hopefully we can leave this (ugly) city tomorrow.
I put some more photos online.

More news

Marcin just read in the internet that Polish citizens need a visa for Kyrgyzstan from July 1, 2008! Not good.. because he doesn't have one. Hopefully we can organize this tomorrow too. Lucky he had a look at the website of the Kyrgyzstan embassy, otherwise we would have noticed at the border to Kyryzstan, not being allowed to enter.

Dushanbe

We are still in Dushanbe. Tomorrow morning we'll investigate Tajik bureaucracy and try to register in this country. That is something you have to do in all ex-Soviet countries and which we haven't taken seriously so far. But in Tajikistan you should, as official fine is something around 500US$ if you don't - though I wonder if anybody has ever paid this much. Then we will request an extension of our visas and if that is granted we will hopefully quickly get the GBAO permit, which we need for the Pamir Mountains. Without this permit you are not allowed to travel to those areas.

Last night we were walking around Dushanbe, as is always advised with a camera dangling around our necks and a lot of money in our pockets through dark streets at nighttime... and at a large monument in the city center we sat and drank some juice, when a nice policeman came over and very friendly talked to us, asking if we could buy him and his colleagues some food. Maybe some bread, sausage and coke... :) And of course we did, because he was really nice, polite and even asked if we wouldn't be angry because he asked us for this. We thought it was quite funny, so we had to get him his sausage.

Someone told us about this before, that the militia in Tajikistan is quite unique in their way of nicely asking about some money, because they just don't earn very well. And really, this guy went to the shop with us and picked those few things, that cost maybe 3 US$. He didn't ask for more, nicely thanked us and walked away.

So far we have met very nice people in this country. It would be great to stay longer, and we have both decided that we want to return in the nearer future. It is definitely a great place for hiking or climbing, we feel quite safe and have not had any problems yet. Several times people invited us for food, gave us apricots, invited us to pick fruits in their orchards, gave us bread and sweets, allowed us to camp behind their house and so on. The roads are (still) a very special experience, but a little army of chinese road builders is here to change this.

Mountains, mountains and more mountains

A quick summary of what has happened the last few days: in Tashkent we fixed our motorbikes (almost) and then had to leave the city quickly, because we really didn't want to stay in a city any longer. It was hot, still around 40 degrees Celsius, and we rode towards Tajikistan. Finally... we have been looking forward to this country for quite some time. Uzbekistan is nice, but Tajikistan has mountains... a lot of mountains. Basically it consists only of mountains. So we crossed the border just before Pendshikent and on the border met an Austrian motorcyclist. He told us about a nice place called Seven Lakes, so we went there together and found the most beautiful quiet campsite between mountains on a blue lake, no people, high mountains surrounding it. Lovely... but the roads... I am having constant heart attacks. And on the way up (above 2300 meters) we found out that a computer fan is not an adequate substitute for a motorbike radiator fan... but with a few breaks Marcin's bike made it up there too. Going up is one thing, coming down another. I first dropped my bike having a little heart attack and then rode it into some rock at the side of the bend... well, nothing happened to me or the bike. It was just a little difficult to get it out of the rocks again :)
Anyway, after that we were prepared for Tajik roads... they are great. Great exercise for our motorcycling skills. Yesterday we went up to around 2800 meters on gravel roads, with all sorts of gravel. Small, big, loose, solid. The most exciting part was a tunnel. All we could see was a totally black hole, a big gravel hill in front of it, a deep water hole and as far as you could see into that tunnel you could not see the ground, only water. Lots of fumes coming out of the tunnel, very bad smell. And very loud noise too. We waited for a car to come up that tunnel, and it was about 50cm deep in that water. Some workers in front of the tunnel told us it would not be good on the motorbike, but other motorcyclists went through the tunnel before us. Since there is actually no other way to get to Duschanbe- coming from Pendshikent - we had not much choice.. and it turned out to be fun to go through a dark (but not pitch black, there were a few light bulbs hanging around) tunnel, where you cannot see how deep the water is. With hidden holes and hills. After that we camped in the garden of a nice Tajik family and today reached Dushanbe. Not the nicest city, but well... more soon! Photos in a few days!

Sunday

Our parts have arrived in Tashkent. With some luck we will get the customs procedure done tomorrow and hopefully be able to fix the bikes afterwards.

Still waiting

With some luck our spare parts arrived in Tashkent tonight. Tomorrow we will start another try to get hold of them.
And I saw a woman behind the steering wheel of a car! The first one I saw in Uzbekistan.

BMW in Tashkent

Two days ago we reached Tashkent. 20min before they closed I reached BMW Service, the only BMW garage in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Marcin didn't. 200m before we got there his motorbike turned off and didn't want to be restarted. The fan of the radiator had died a sudden death and a fuse popped... so he had to push it the last few meters. Today we will hopefully be able to pick up our spare parts from the airport, and with the help of one of the guys from BMW we will hopefully be able to take them immediately and not have to wait around for days.
As it turned out, it is impossible to get the proper oil for my suspension fork in Uzbekistan, so we (several people from BMW here and me) spent most of the day yesterday searching for an appropriate substitute. With some luck we'll be able to organize it until tomorrow and then I can fix my bike too. Hooray. Without Christian's support from Germany we would be in deep trouble here. But as things are, I am quite confident we'll fix our mechanical problems soon. Once that is done I'll upload some photos of the last few days.

Samarkand! Hot, mountains in the distance.. and we got a haircut for 75c each.

Revolution in Buchara

But only in our stomachs. No more food I haven't prepared myself. The motorbikes are still running well, apart from their suspensions. But the spare parts will arrive in Taschkent Thursday night and we will hopefully be able to fix them soon afterwards. I have heard rumors that it takes several days to get things through customs, I just hope it isn't true. Uzbekistan has amazing sights, of which I'll put a few photos online once we arrive in Taschkent. Here in Buchara it has something around 40 degrees Celsius (felt 50) and we are being boiled alive. We have asked quite a few people if it is really true that you can have several wives here... the answer is: YES, if you can afford it. In return we are always being asked if we are married. Most of the time we tell the truth, and Marcin is being offered to be helped finding a wife. Because it's really time for him with his 32 years. And I get pitiful looks, because women older than 25 have no chance of getting married any more. Too old.

Motorbikes

In Beinju in Kazakhstan, just before the border, we noticed that Marcin's motorbike has a little problem.. but since we were already so remote from any place with a chance of being able to fix it, we decided to keep going. After 170km gravel road it looked like this...

I really don't know what this is called in English, but since Marcin spread all the oil that was once inside this part on the road, he looks quite funny when he hops along the road like on a rubber ball.... (no more attenuation of his suspension)

Also he complains about some funny sounds.. but so far his bike still runs well apart from this jumping thing.

On my bike the suspension fork is leaking oil, so that has to be fixed as well.

Since we can only pick up spare parts from Taschkent, we'll keep going and hopefully with the help of Christian and the ADAC will be able to pick up some parts there. Since Taschkent is a fair bit away from here, the plan is to visit Chiva, Buchara and Samarkand on the way, then hopefully pick up the parts from Taschkent, get the bikes fixed and head down south towards Dushanbe (Tajikistan).

Nukus, where we are having a day off from riding today to check the bikes for more damages, seems to be the capital of Karakalpakstan, a somewhat independent state with, as I was told, different culture and also language from the rest of Uzbekistan. This region is the area that was most heavily hit by the consequences of the dying Aral sea (which used to be quite close but is now far away). And we did feel some consequences too, when a little sandstorm hit us one night. (Sand and salt is what stayed behind as the water retreated...) It was extremly noisy inside our tent and in the morning there was sand EVERYwhere... even between our teeth. Mniam mniam :)

I'll try to put some new photos into Picasa in a minute..

Uzbekistan

During the last few days the landscape around us has changed quite a bit and we have really entered Asia and left Europe behind. The border to Kazakhstan is just about 100km from Astrahan, so after having one lazy day in Astrahan we left Russia for now. But we'll be back... It didn't take too long cross the border to Kazakhstan. Leaving Russia was no problem, we didn't have to provide any proof of registration, and strange enought, the guys there were even really nice... and on the Kazakh side the border officers were quite friendly too and even helped with filling in the forms. The first maybe 50kms of Kazakhstan are still in the Volga delta, and the water, horses, reed and clay (?) houses made quite a nice scenery... after we left the delta behind, the landscape changed to steppe, and everything was flat, dry and the roads just straight for hundreds of kilometres. Besides a few bad parts we have so far had the best roads since Germany on this trip in Kazakhstan, contrary to what we heard before... most of them brand new. On our way through Kazakhstan we passed one city, Atrau, and it is amazing how those new cities are quickly growing out of nothing (but with money from oil and other ressources). It might not be very objective, but cruising along the countryside I got the impression that Kazakhstan has a lot more dynamics and positive atmosphere than Russia.

Also we met some nice animals along the road and crawling over our tent...

It was large! very large. Larger than my hand including fingers...

After a few nights in the steppe in Kazakhstan we spent our last night in Beinju (little place with nice Basar), where we met a German cyclist. From Beinju to the border and about 120km into Uzbekistan the road is just a gravel road. In Russia we were told there would be no proper roads in Kazakhstan, which proved to be totally wrong. In Kazakhstan we were told there would be no proper roads in Uzbekistan. Which proved to be totally wrong. After those 120km of gravel road we were again on brand new roads... and since we are back on asphalt we have found that Uzbekistan actually has a quite good network of roads. But I am not complaining about good roads... I think this will change rapidly once we get to Tajikistan.. but before we can go there we have to get over some little problems... which I will write about in the next post. To get into Uzbekistan took a few hours, but in the end people were nice and let us into their country. And here we are...

phone and photos

From tomorrow we will be back on #1 on the satellite phone. If we manage to cross the border without getting any registration in Russia..

and there are a few new photos in Picasa!

Astrahan

On our way from Rostov-na-Donu via Volgograd (we only touched the outskirts) to Astrahan we met millions of mosquitoes, sandflies and Brian, who is cycling on his own from California to Hong Kong. It's definitely worth having a look at his website http://www.briansride.net/ It was great to meet someone who speaks English. While we were talking to him at the side of a long long straight road to Volgograd (that was before we met the mosquitoes, later it was impossible to stand anywhere longer then 10 seconds, as the little nasty insects were just waiting for victims) some more people joined our roadside meeting. They were on their way back to Volgograd from a biker meeting somewhere around Rostov. We we're thinking about going to Volgograd to meet those nice guys from the photo again, but unfortunately our visas for the Central Asian countries are for a fixed period of time and will expire in the near future, so we have to get going.... and went past Volgograd. As you might see on the photo, motorcycling is not that popular with girls here. But I was told there actually are three girls in the Volgograd motorbike club.


A few more notes from here:
people are really nice when we are on our motorbikes. While walking around here in Astrahan not looking like Kosmonauts, i.e. without all the gear and the motorbike clothes, we had a really hard time yesterday trying to find internet. We actually didn't. No one wanted to help us. Not even wanted to talk to us.

The militia has been nice most of the time and so far we haven't been asked for more money. Once we had to show all documents again and wait around, but most of the time they are interested in what we are doing and let us go after a little chat or even help us to find a nice spot for camping or the right road. Two days ago a taxi driver drove for about 20kms ahead of us, leading us through a beautiful countryside back to the main road - free of charge.

So far we haven't had any problems with petrol, there is a basically a petrol station in every little village, and the motorbikes are doing well. I'll try to change the oil on my bike today, and I think we should give them a wash too and a good check up. I don't want to get stuck somewhere in the middle of nowhere in Kazahkstan. Tomorrow we want to leave Russia and I think from now on things will start to get a little more exotic and different... and the roads will be worse...

So far food is no problem either. There are little shops in every village with essential foods and we often eat some soup or dumplings at the side of the road. Lately we have seen a lot of dried fish... but I don't want to have anything to do with it!

I am trying to get used to the fact that women are not being shaken hands here. Most people take notice of me and at least nod towards me, but some just outright ignore the person at the side THE MAN. I think this will not get better for the next few weeks :) good training for my patience. Harrrrrrrrrr.

With those absolutely crazy drivers!!!!!!! here I have already seen more car crashes on this trip than in the rest of my life. Today our taxi driver almost killed us. But that was not our first accident here. The day after the banja burnt we were staying with this really nice family in Rostov. So these nice people borrowed a car to show us the city... and yes, it happened. We caused a car crash. So first the house burns, next a car crash. We are seriously considering not staying with nice people any more.

We are using the satellite phonenumber 2 now. All good and on the way to kazakhstan

Russia

Yesterday we arrived in Russia. After only 4 hours and endless filling in of forms (in Russian only) we were finally allowed to cross the border, after a nasty border officer forced us to pay him 50EUR! Not nice, and next time I will not pay, but after 4 hours of filling in the same forms again and again, because always something wasn't right we gave up... just after the border heavy storm and rain welcomed us. When I stopped at the side of the road, it was raining so heavly that I unfortunately didn't see the police that was waiting close by... so Marcin was led to the office, where a rude guy asked him to pay 200EUR (we did nothing at all wrong). He wanted to take of his number plates from his bike (but we strongly opposed to that) and I had to wait outside in the rain with several other police guys. But they were really nice those guys, and while Marcin was being tortured (noo.. he just had to sit and wait really, the guy thought that would make him pay this ridiculous amount of money, but we have more time than them :) ) I had a quite funny time outside. One of them spoke a little English and they were quite curious, one had even lived in Munich for a while (but spoke no German!?!). So in the end I think they told the other guy to let us go... Marcin wasn't so happy, but I think it was a funny event. Anyway, after hanging out there for quite some time we had dried and the rain stopped, so we went to Rostov-na-Donu and here were are now. We asked a nice person at the side of the road (with bad traffic jam) where we could possibly find a hotel. And he took Marcin with him to make phone calls and well, it was all too expensive so we ended up staying with him and his family. It is amazing how nice people are here and everywhere along the trip. Sure some funny ones as well, but in general most people are nice and want to help. In Ukraine we did some food shopping and as always when we stop somewhere some young guys walked up to us and asked some questions about the motorbikes. The standard questions are how fast they can go, and the second question is either how much petrol they use (if older person asking) or how much they cost (if younger person asking). Well, one of the guys was particularly happy to look at the bikes and after talking a little he asked us to stay with him for the night. Shortly after this his mum walked out of the shop, and she was really really nice, so we decided to stay and it was extremely nice. We left the bikes on their property (with a watch dog) and went for a little walk around the small town. When we were just on our way home, the nice mum called to say the house was burning. And it was! She was heating the Banja (sauna) for us, which was right in the house, and unfortunately the wooden walls started to burn!!!! Firemen came with a water hose and it was of course huge excitement, smoke everywhere...... in the end I think it was only a not too big part of the wall that burnt, but well.. we felt really sorry, because somehow it was because of us.
Tomorrow we will leave Rostov and ride towards Kazakhstan. Maybe to Volgograd first, but then it is not that great to go to larger cities with the motorbikes, because we can never leave them anywhere without one of us watching them. And to walk around in heavy motorbikes clothes is not that comfortable. So I guess on this trip we'll take time to drive slowly and see everything on the side of the road, rather than walking around. And hopefully in Central Asia hotels will be affordable, so that we can leave the bikes every now and then and do some sight seeing together. Apart from that, the motorcycles are running well so far. I dropped my bike in the mud once. That must have looked quite funny but I got a heart attack (almost) because it felt like ice skating on a 280 kg heavy ice skate, that will squeeze you if you are unlucky enough to get some body part between the thing and the ground... well, it wasn't bad at all, but I really dirty afterwards :) Since the people we are staying with are expecting us to be home soon I better go.

We are in Ukraine. no problems at the border yet. somehow everybody seems to like motorbikes.

We are in Moldova! sunshine, hot and so far beautiful

Slovakia, Hungary...Romania!

We have crossed Slovakia and Hungary and are now in Eastern Romania. By lunch time we should reach Moldova and hopefully will be able to look for a place to sleep in Ukraine tonight. So today we will cross the first real borders... Romania is absolutely beautiful! we havent taken enough photos yet, that will have to change in the future. More stops, more photos. But once we reach Kazakhstan we will have more time, now we are still trying to catch up the time we had to wait around in Poland. The roads here are interesting. Sometimes perfect condition, sometimes potholes that would definitely throw us of our bikes. Drivers are totally crazy here! Only the main roads are paved, most other roads are really really muddy or deep gravel dirt roads. Not exactly what I prefer with this heavy heavy heavy big ship I have to steer around... we are getting more used to riding with luggage every day, but still I have slight problems with turning around on small spaces.. and since one of us always has to stay with the bikes it is not easy to just go shopping or walk around anywhere. And Marcin is waiting, so I better dont make this too long. Next internet hopefully in Russia.

We leave on Tuesday!!

Finally, Marcin's passport arrived and we are almost ready to go. Tuesday we'll leave. From then on you can get it touch with us via email on our regular email addresses or send text messages on our satellite phone. Here's the link again for the free SMS: http://services.thuraya.com/sms.html

We have two phone numbers. We'll either use
number 1: 0088216 213 611 40 (most of the time) OR
number 2: 0088216 213 611 41 (ONLY in Russia and Mongolia)

We'll post which number we will be using. We'll start with number 1.

Since time has run away, we'll try to get to Kazakhstan as quickly as possible. Though we got the information that it would be easier to cross the border to Russia coming from the Baltic States we'll try to take the more direct way through Ukraine. And hopefully they'll let us in...

My passport arrived! hopefully we will receive Marcin's on Monday. I am more than ready to leave now finally...

Karte

click on the map to see a larger version

some photos from Bytom and Ladek Zdroj http://picasaweb.google.pl/b.misselhorn/Poland

Sleeping and eating in Poland

Good news. Marcin's passport is already in Poland and he will hopefully get his visa for Uzbekistan within the next few days. By that time my passport should be here with the last and most important visa I was still missing - the one for Russia. And then we're ready to go :)

Last weekend we did our first little trip with boxes. Even though we took only half of the luggage we will take on the big trip, we already had the size of two Fiat Maluchs. Hopefully our bikes will not end like this one

< ---- (not my photo, stolen from the web)

Who wants to see some pictures of our last weekend can have a look here:
http://picasaweb.google.pl/b.misselhorn/ClimbingInPasterskieSkaly

Marcin changed the look of his aluminium boxes a little as he was testing their shock absorbing abilities. I shouldn't say too much about this, it probably won't take too long before I follow his example.

In the meantime we changed hobbies. Instead of climbing and running we now enjoy eating&drinking combined with hibernation like sleeping. We have tested about every (communist style and normal) restaurant in the city and surrounding areas...

Poland

After having made a big mess in my parents' flat we left Munich on April 23 (last Thursday) to go to this lovely place on the left ;)

Just kidding.. of course it doesn't look like this everywhere here. Actually the countryside is really beautiful and...

.

..spring has arrived here too.

We will probably have to wait for our passports and visas until around May 14, so we have some time to think about where to go from here. Either directly to Ukraine and Russia or via Slovakia, Hungary and Romania....

hooray i can send messages from the satellite phone into our blog!!

Munich

We have said goodbye to London for the next few months and are now getting the last pieces of equipment in Munich. Around April 23 we'll leave Germany and hang out in Poland until we have received our passports with the visas for Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tadjikistan and Kyrgyzstan.


This is just a VERY little part of what we intend to squeeze into those tiny boxes you can see on the right side of the photo.

18 days in London

No visas yet. But a whole lot more equipment piling up in my parents' flat in Munich. On April 2 I will fly home for a week and take my motorbike into pieces, change some parts, get the tools and spare parts we might need on the trip, go to the dentist, get the last vaccination and hopefully finish and survive the marathon in Freiburg.

Satellite Phone

I forgot to mention one thing - we got our satellite phone yesterday!
With the help of Christian's colleague Laura and her sister Carolyn (THANK YOU!) we got a Thuraya satellite phone from the States, where it is about 50% cheaper than in Germany. Not that we want to constantly hang on the phone, but unlike most people think, calling from the satellite phone isn't expensive at all... and yes, I love the idea of annoying people that have to stay at home and work from some beautiful remote place somewhere along the way.
And anyone wanting to contact us while we're on the trip can send free texts to the satellite phone from http://services.thuraya.com/sms.html

Preparations - only 5 more weeks in London

5 weeks before we leave London... and still a gazillion of things have to be done before we can start our motorbike trip. We're planning to leave on May 1 and return some time in October. Starting point will be Poland and from there we're planning to go to: Slovakia - Hungaria - Romania - Ukraine - Russia - Kazachstan - Uzbekistan - Tadjikistan - Kyrgyzstan - Kazachstan - Russia - Mongolia - Russia - Estonia - Latvia - Lithunia - Poland - Germany. Looks like a nice little round trip on the world map - about 25.000km :)

From what I have heard so far the roads in Kazachstan, the other Stans and Mongolia are rather dirt tracks than roads. So it'll be an interesting experiment with Marcin not having ridden a motorbike for the last ten years and me having no offroad experience.

Two years ago I was thinking about which motorbike to buy for such a trip, and in the end I decided to get a BMW F650GS Dakar. But since going on just one motorbike is no option we're going on the BMW Eurasian Twins - two Dakars. Which has the advantage of reducing the amount of tools and spare parts we need to take. After several phone calls to Touratech and BMW and endless talk to people who know something about motorbikes and many who think they know something about motorbikes we decided not to change much on the bikes. We'll leave the catalyzers where they are and will simply destroy them with leaded petrol in Mongolia. And worry about it afterwards, if we fail to get the bikes through the next emissions check. A foldable gearshift, extended sidestand, a cigar lighter plug thing for charging batteries and a few minor modifications should do.

Our largest worry for now are the visas. With the help of an agency we hopefully get them in time, but we haven't heard back from them yet.

Other main things that remain to be done are getting some vaccinations and medical insurance, deciding which tools and spare parts to take and which tyres to use and getting some more equipment including motorbike clothing and doing those few little changes on the bikes.

So that's it for now - in the next posting I can hopefully report on some colourful visas in our passports...

Zwei Monate

In zwei Monaten geht's los! Und bis dahin sind noch ein Haufen Dinge zu erledigen. Wir brauchen 6 Visa und haben noch kein einziges, die Motorräder müssen reisefertig gemacht und Werkzeug und Ersatzteile ausgewählt werden und nebenbei arbeite ich daran, Marcin zu überzeugen, dass Impfungen eine gute Sache sind...
Mitte März trifft, wenn alles nach Plan läuft, das Thuraya Satellitentelefon in Deutschland ein, das Garmin GPSMAP 278 liegt fröhlich in der Schublade und wartet darauf, verstanden und bespielt zu werden.
Nachdem der kleine Norwegenausflug ins Eis vorbei ist, beginnen die Vorbereitungen nun ernsthaft...