We are settling in here in Vladivostok, and if you've read anything about Levi and myself's previous travel you would not now us now. The party pilgrims who were kicked out of a Paris hotel at 4 in the morning, are certainly not the nice American cyclists who keep to themselves in the dormitory of a Vladivostok Language school. Perhaps we are still suffering the side effects of a trip halfway around the world, or perhaps it is that we are still recovering from the month long planning marathon. I think that it is more the strange concept of being in Vladivostok for a month before our trip really starts, it is like we are in hybernation, we have single rooms far down the halls from each other which we each share with the bike of our dreams. We are here simply to train and learn Russian, we spend most of our time reading books on Gulags and the prehistoric Siberian Mosquito, which is not only impressive in it's size but also it's numbers, often smothering small creatures to death in swarms. Sounds like fun. In fact until this past saturday night we had yet to see Vladivostok at night except out our windows.
Besides 5 hours of reading a day, we sit around tinkering with the bikes, the gear and staring at the map, making comments like "so you think there will be a lot of truckstop clubs here?" Occasionally we go out in search of some last minute purchases, like bear spray and gas for our cook stove. Our searches for campstores has taken us into the heart of the communist tenements which may sound unpleasant, but there is something about the 5-8 story high housing complexes crammed next to eachother that has an appeal, each worn down on the outside, but if you manage to get inside, each apartment is really quite nice, in Soviet times they might have been overcrowded, more than one family to an apartment, but now I am always suprised at how cozy and welcoming they are (and I always forget to take off my shoes, at the entry way, oops). In each of these developments there is usually a couple of little playgrounds and a small convenience store, so if you wished you wouldn't have to go out hardly at all.
Saturday, on one of these excursions at an outdoors store we met a Russian guy (Denis, a Russian hippie complete with dreadlocks) who had hitchhiked from, get this, Vladivostok to Portugal, not Porto but Lisbon. We immediately got his phone number and made an appointment for tea the next day. Hitchhiking apparently is surging in popularity in Russia, taking the country by storm, with clubs popping up everywhere. Levi read somewhere that they even have hitchiking races all through out Russia now (first one to the Bering Straight wins!). Denis was able to answer the one great question about this bike trip we still had (besides "will we make it"), there is a part of the road from Chita to Blagoveschensk that with every Russian asked the story changes. "No there is no road there" one said. "No you cannot pass through there, that part of Siberia is not for travelling, trust me I grew up there." said another ironically in Moscow. "there is no road straight through but you can pass through". A map showed several small roads, but not quite connecting the whole way. A Russian government press release said the road across Russia would be paved by 2010, but didn't say that the road yet existed. Finally we had a man who had seen the road in the last year. "Oh boys that was my favorite part of the whole journey, all gravel." he then started to shaking all over mimicking what our bodies would be feeling for 2 entire weeks "I would bring facemasks for the dust boys." Question answered, relief filled us, for so long we had wondered how lost, starved or wet we might get pushing our bikes through bogs or meandering small paths along the Chinese border, instead we just needed a comfy seat and some facemasks. He then started giving us a detailed description of the various sections of the roads through Russia, "Here is Altai region, mountains very beautiful, here between Krasnoyosk and Omsk, biggest swamp in Russia huge mosquitos, very scary" He held out his hands to show they were as big as softballs, probably suck a pint of blood from you each, luckily I imagine that when they land on you it feels like a crow has landed on you and if you are lucky you can kill them with one quick smack from a baseball bat. "This area Ural mountains, you will be happy to climb, anything to get out of the swamp." Perfect.
Classes have started for us finally, we are in a class with 3 South Koreans, who are here as business majors, the Russians and the Koreans apparently have very good business connections and Russian is seen as a great language to pick up. However it is tough for them, the sounds are totally different, and considering that one of our Russian classes is totally devoted to pronunciation, it can't be fun (indeed who does like saying different combinations of 6 letters for an hour and a half each day, do, da, dya, zya-zo, zo-zye-fyu, you get the idea) I have an impossible time with this language I can't imagine what the Chinese and Koreans go through. Classes only last till one at which point Levi and I race up to the cafeteria acquire some questionable 25 cent bowls of Borscht and some great rolls that either contain cabbage, potatoe, "meat", "fish" or cheese. I am usually hopeful for the cheese one, Levi's stomach is still recovering from the fish one. Then we race down to the "computer lab" where there are 5 computers 2 of which invariably are missing either a mouse or a keyboard and the others are usually occupied, so we always bring books, usually reading about 100 pages before one of the computers frees up.
The weather here has been very mild, at least for what we thought we would be walking in to. There is snow on the ground and Saturday night there was quite a blizzard, we went flying down the hills here, Levi and I both fell once and the Korean students we were with may be a little black and blue come sunday. But besides that the weather has reached into the 40's on several occasions (today it is a shocking 48), it is sunny most days and more than anything we spend most of our time dodging puddles from melting snow. Levi and I are now thinking that we will be riding starting on April 15th, give or take (we refuse to start on a rainy day, sounds wimpy I know but why suffer when you can just squeeze in another day of 25 cent borscht). The thought that we might get an early start is thrilling, everyday we look out the window and the bay has melted a little more, and the ice fisherman are pushed a little closer to shore, soon they will be surfcasting.
ellski
It hasn't been easy, but 7 years after hatching this plan in the dorms of Alfred, 8 months of intense planning and 2 months of fundraising and planning with Levi and I both living at my parents house I am sitting in a computer lab in Vladivostok, struggling with the only russian computer and internet that makes dial-up look efficient. Getting the money wasn't easy, working non-stop all summer, still coming up short, we spent months planning and writing emails to anyone who would listen asking for sponsorship and gear discounts with minimal success, we sold T-shirts and ourselves with much better success, although the number of times we were told "So you're just getting everyone else to pay for your vacation" or "So what part of your trip are you on right now?" was mind numbing. However we made it!! On the 24th I got on a plane to meet Levi in London, amazingly British Air didn't even look twice at our huge bike boxes and our other oversized luggage, just checked it all through and said "cheers!". However by the time we reached Moscow we realized that it wasn't going to be the airlines that would be the trouble (or at least so we thought) it would be getting the luggage to the different airports and to the school, each time we had to rent an entire van to carry all our stuff, luckily most Russian taxi drivers were just dying to accomodate for several thousand roubles. Our first trip was from one airport in moscow to the baggage storage in another airport, along the way we were disappointed to see that McMansions had now emigrated to Russia, Thousands of luxury houses surrounded by little russian shacks (dachas). We reached our Hostel and promptly met another lunatic, Adam Contra, who had just finished driving his truck around the Arctic circle of Norway and Russia just for fun, and even more ominous, he was 43 and had done several amazing trips including sailing from Australia to central America, I guess this might not be "The Last Trip" "So why are you on this trip Adam?" " Well I was doing fuck-all watching the economy tank so I sold my house and everything I had and packed the car, you should have seen the bloody Russian border guards when I crossed into Russia with this huge landrover and trailer." YIKES! The next day we met up with one of my friends from St. Petersburg, Erika, who proceeded to take us around the city and introduce The Idiots to dried fish jerky, a smelly but delicious russian staple just look out for jerkified bones and don't forget to peal off the skin! The weather in Russia in total has been unbelievable while we were in Moscow it was like a spring thaw, it was almost exactly 32 the entire time, which comparatively is fantastically warm.
The Idiots
Finally after a nice tour of the Kremlin and such we headed to the airport, where things would really get interesting. We were flying Aeroflot, now I know what you are going to say "Aeroflot!!! the airline with wooden seats and a track record only a mother could love? why on earth would you do that?" But things have improved at aeroflot, they are part of one of those airline partnerships now, that has to count for something. Besides how many reputable airlines do you think flyfrom Moscow to Vladivostok? We managed to get through the 2 rounds of security before check in very well, mostly by taking out the t-shirt and pointing to what we were doing, eventually the security would just give up and laugh. But now came check in, we knew that we would have to pay 100 dollars a peice to get our bikes through, so we were shocked when the check in woman just put them on the conveyor belt and seemed to be just letting us go, we looked at each other "really? awesome!!" however we didn't see the man lurking behind her. She gave him our tickets and passports and he motioned to us "you will have to pay excess baggage fee" at which piont he whipped out a calculator and proceeded to add up our total, which started with numbers like 7 and 23 which made us think it was in dollars, eventually he came up with the total of 23,478 to which our jaws dropped, even in roubles that is quite a bit of money, "now I give you discount" and he put in 15,000, looked around suspiciously and handed us one of the passports and said "you go get the money from ATM, put money in and give back to me" perfect a bribe in the secure airport. Not only thatt, but the ATMs in the gate section didn't work for us so he brought us out the back door to an atm outside (I guess they have a different idea of "Secure Area") and let us get him his money, which he promptly pocketed and handed us our tickets.
The Gear
We took our seats on the flight "well at least that is over, next stop Vladivostok, no more bribes, just one more van rental and we are in the dorms!" Now all that I have said in defence of Aeroflot was forgotten in the first moment of takeoff, when the PA system alternated from way to low for us to hear to that annoying screech when the amp and microphone are too close together. Then came dinner which interestingly enough was fish which still had bones in it, and a salad of shrimp and raw salmon. Daring moves on flying bird with only 2 or 3 restrooms and 40,000 feet in the air. Shortly after the meal was served and we had settled in our seats for a good 8 time zone snooze, it was apparent that we were taking a slightly diverted course "oh must be some bad weather in northern Siberia, we are going to stay in the southern half. A few hours later (things are big in siberia) we were approaching the city of Novosibirsk, essentially completely out of our way. "Ladies and gentlemann" the muffled PA system announced "we are going to make an unscheduled stop in Novosibirsk, we will be there in thirty minutes" at which point there was a loud screech and we were left to look at the babushkas next to us, who also seemed to sense the end was near, one of which to kill the tension started making fun of my curly hair. We together with our new stout friends, spent the next 25 minutes laughing and trying to act calm with sign language, then as we neared the runway not only did the shrieking begin again but red lights started flashing above each of the flight attendants heads no doubt signalling that everything was fine and they shouldn't head to the escape pod. We touched down, safely and proceeded to spend the next 3 hours announcement free sitting on the tarmac. Levi and I only had two concerns, one that they would try and extort another bribe from us for the bikes if we changed planes (can you get reciepts with bribes?) and two that they would try and get us off the ground without telling us why the fuck we were in Novosibirsk. The Russians were stoic, no one complained children didn't cry no one demanded free drinks or anything, it was quite impressive. Eventually the pilot announced "we had some sick passengers" (ha ha I told you raw fish, shellfish and boney fish was a mistake!) and we would be continuing on shortly which, suprisingly was a smooth finish, well again except for the flashing lights (now a common occurence) and the screeching. Oh and we skipped the breakfast. We arrived in Vladivostok at 2 in the afternoon, and couldn't check in to the dorms until the next day so we spent the night at the airport hotel, not wanting to have to rent two vans.
The City
The next morning we saw Vladivostok, how can I describe the impression that this city is making on me? Made up terms like "industrial farming" and "concrete gardens" come too mind. Industry is king here although from what I can gather they don't produce anything. And the cars!! My God the Cars!! You perhaps have seen riots that ensue when the Russian Government tries to up the car import tariff here? Now I see why, not that they need anymore. This parking lot of a city blows the mind, I swear they have taken all the cars in the New York area and condenced them into a city a tenth the size, you are never not negotiating around a car. No wonder when I looked on weather.com for the forcast in vladivostok it was "Smoke". I was later told that this city and the surrounding area is not a UNESCO Heritage Site, but a UNESCO Disaster zone, which makes sense when you look at the color of the smoke billowing from the smoke stacks intermittently dispersed along with heavy powerlines throughout the city. Where better to start a green bike trip!! But there is a certain charm, my mother who loves industrial sprawl would I think enjoy a day or two here, and there is a very nice Tsarist era center with a beautiful port and some nice soviet statues. We love it for no other reason than the fact that we have been dreaming of this city for 8 months and now we each have our own rooms, a very nice Babushka who lives on our floor and the school administration couldn't be kinder. Although as of now they have yet to discover what to do with us and we just have a week to regroup (which is good because it turns out that 15 time zones in 5 days leaves you vaguely ill and on the strangest schedule you can imagine, we are currently sleeping two seperate times a day 3-7pm and then again 11pm-4am).
ellski
In early March Levi and I are going back to school to learn Russian for a couple of months in Vladivostok, Russia we will be living in the dorms one more time, training, packing and learning. Then one day, hopefully in April, we will get on the bikes and start riding, not stopping until Portugal (I could give you the name, but there seems to be some discrepency about whether it is Oporto or Porto, I guess we will figure that out when we hit the welcome sign). Along the way we will be filling these blogs, posting pictures and videos (a new weapon in our aresenal) all on this website as often as possible (I hear the wireless connections in Siberia are primo).
Everyone asks the same questions, how long, which countries etc. We know very little about these questions, we want to stay flexible go with what sounds most amazing, so please send us your favorite town in Austria or your contact in Siberia we might use them. Usually after dodging those questions the person usually hits the really inevitable question, "where the hell did you guys come up with this idea?"
I don't think Levi and I have ever had anything but this idea, I remember that when we met at Alfred, the first day we were talking about doing a semester in Alaska and by the end of the night (and the beer) we had the map out and were looking at Russia (I haven't been able to stop looking at that map since). And by that fall break I already had in my possession "Off the Map, Bicycling through Russia" By Mark Jenkins and we had already spent countless hours staring at the map and talking about routes (not realizing then that there is only one road through Russia, the rest were railroads). Since then it has always been in the back of our minds, every time we got together, without fail the map came out and we would start the fantasy all over again. It was only after walking across Spain that we realized that we could do this trip and how amazing it could be. We have been "planning" this trip ever since, which usually involves one hour in an entire "planning weekend" devoted to actually doing research. Levi likes to bring up the time that he tried to do some research with me and I looked at the map said "Yep, no problem", slammed the atlas closed and went back to sleep.
The bike trip, like the planning, will be unconventional. We may spend days in a small village because the hospitality (and vodka) is so good, or I may force us well off the trail to find a Siberian Dostoevsky Museum or a historical Russian town. And Levi; god only knows where he may lead the trip, I wouldn't be surprised if a Russian truck driver was somehow involved. And my job as always will be to convey these stories and observations to you in the most amusing and straight forward manner. I look forward to it tremendously. I'll see you in Vladivostok!!
ellski
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