a trip to the moon

I have left Vladivostok on the 28th of July ( I wanted to do it2 days
earlier but GNU’s engine was overheating and balancing all the numbers
I’ve decided to wait for the next opportunity). That was not that bad
considering that Hans and Volker (the two German Doctors that took it
on 26; and we were supposed to travel together) are still in Seoul, we
had dinner together last night and their bikes will arrive at the same
time with Gnu in Anchorage. So, yes, it was a bit of work on Gnu, that
distroyed my gyps (a lot of hot water to clean the cooling system),
oil, antifreeze and dirt while working on the other parts. Her left
radiator is now amputated, and I’ve used Russian fittings to get a
good circuit with only 1 radiator, she has rubber from a broken
tyre-tube instead of metal springs at the stender, wood (oh, yes, I
can say that we fixed a bike with a sea-saw now) in the handlebar to
connect the hand protectors, and other things. The russians that I
have met in Vladivostok were fantastic, and all the travelers on bikes
confirm this. The level of involvement and help that you get from
them, without anything in return being expected, has no match in “the
western world”. I had cut the gyps on the evening of 27 and in the
morning I rode Gnu for 250 km from Vladivostok to Zarubino. The arm
hurt a bit (it still does), the road was not asphalt the whole way, I
had no map, no GPS, and I felt free and right again, after a few days
of recovery.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 27th, 2008 at 12:16 am and is filed under Russia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.