-> I had not finished this post... so some updates 🙂
Since Moscow we got to the city of Kazan. Beautifull city, with a mix of culture. (Pic below).
Maybe I should describe the roads... it will be faster than explaining what has been happening...
From Moscow... Imagine it's 11.30PM... the Sun is starting to be at its highest... and you can feel the heat from top but also from the asphalte.
You are going uphill... and there is no shoulder, there is not even a line on the sides of the road.
Out of nowhere a truck is behind you, and behind this truck a mix of trucks, cars... Considering that on the other side there is also traffic, you have to get on the gravels on the side. It makes your climbing very slow and tough... you turn your head toward the right, to avoid the big thick smoke from trucks. Since they have a hard time going up because of their weight, they use a lot of gas. You have a nice taste of smoke in your mouth even though you look on the right of the road... but when you look on the side road... you usually see driver's tombs... with their picture, birthdate... Of course you have to know Cyrillic to understand (only Zack).
You finally make it to the top of the hill... to see othershills lined up for you 🙂 In french the expression for rollercoaster is "Montagnes Russes" (translated Russian mountains). Now I know why 🙂
This was around Moscow... Afterwards we had much better roads, with nice shoulders. Some parts are terribly bad (there are at some places 50cm bumps or holes because of the traffic of trucks).
We have now been having very nice flat roads (altough sometimes they do have some very serious potholes...)
Sunsets have been quite amazing ... I can grasp them on my mirror ... if we are ridding late. Otherwise we can admire them.... if there are no mosquitoes or rain 🙂
We met some interesting hills.... the one below was the mother of god hill 🙂 Zack fearless is heading the way
and we even got escorted by the young locals (below)
We passed a series of bumps... I think they were the Urals... We kept asking the locals "Urals" and the pointed in our back... not sure if they understood what we meant 😉
We did have time to share a few drinks with the locals 🙂
We are also now in Asia.
Zack has been our Russian interpreter, Damien the three star cook, and I the tourist / photographer.
Giving a temporary goodbye to Zack in Omsk in front of his hotel.
This is our next challenge:
We planning to cross Russia with this on our racks.
And maybe I just had too much weight.... In two days I had 6 flats, the next day one of the screw holding an essential part of my rack broke.... and got stuck. Damien and I fixed using our engineering skills in the middle of the Siberian forest (with a hunter on our side, who kept asking random question and not understanding how serious the breakdown was for us).
The next day, again in the middle of the Siberian forest, with no bike shops around, four of my spokes broke... Flat tires we had the tools to replace; broken spokes, no.
It got to the point where with one more breakdown Damien would have to pull me just like for cars.
We made it magically to town.... (the last 50km were full of suspense and drama). After going around and asking "Velocipid magazin" we finally found our candy store and are ready to go again.
sorouche
Zoro, keep it up! I am rather jealous and envious that I am not able to join you on this trip 🙂 Perhaps in the future....
Good luck to the team on the rest of the way!
Gajan
this looks like a lot of fun... keep up the good work
Yo Sorouche, where are you? and when r u coming back to Deep River? work misses you!
Hey Pandito,
coming back ????? 🙂
I have a job in Russia now ! 😉
(I am in Ulan Bator...)
Spidermonkey... in the future 🙂
oKaaaaaaaM chetoreeh ??! 🙂
Sorouche - I am envious. You'll have to tell us some stories over a few drinks when you get home.
A wonderful job. Super hlefupl information.