Past Latvia, Estonia to Russia

Border crossings are just not as complicated as they used to be once the EU came into being.

During the first coffee stop shortly after leaving Riga, some of the group contemplated swapping their rides for something a little more ‘traditional’. Alas, 22 000km’s/14 000miles is a bit of a haul on a small horse carriage…. They chose to stick with their faithful BMW’s.

The first two-night stop of the tour was in St Petersburg. Riders enjoyed a fully guided city tour and a visit to Peterhof by hydrofoil on the Finish Bay.

Riders enjoyed a quick stop in front of the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, the largest museum in the world.

Alas, this did not occur without incident as report by one of the riders on the tour, Geoffrey Smith:

“Our last morning in St. Petersburg, we rode from our hotel over to the Winter Palace and the Hermitage Museum. No big deal….

I was riding with our medic on the trip, Mike Meyer, who is 6’7” and 270 lbs. We were the last two to leave so are riding together and we became separated from the rest of the group. We go past the grand plaza of the palace, passing two cops sitting in their car, turn around, come back, pass the cops, go another 1/4 mile, turn around and come back, looking for the rest of the group. At this point, one of the cops is out of his car and motions us to pull over, which we do. He resembles with an amazing accuracy, the pillsbury dough boy. Everything is round, except for his beady little eyes and the fact that he is not happy. He says to us “Documents”. No problem as I am totally organized. I give him mine. Mike says that he doesn’t have any, they are with the group. Pillsbury keeps saying “Documents” and Mike says he doesn’t have them. At this point, I am convinced that Mike is history. Fortunately, I will be able to continue my trip as my documents are fine whereas Mike will be digging ditches in some gulag. All of a sudden dough boy turns to me and says, “How much drink”? It’s 10 in the morning and while I know the inner workings of the grape, I don’t mix it with riding my motorcycle. Being totally honest, I said that I had two glasses of wine last night. Beady eyes is now completely ignoring Mike and focusing on me. He points to the back seat of the patrol car and tells me to get in and takes my driver’s license. For a brief moment I wonder what the weather is like in Siberia. We go back and forth which in itself is strange as he appears to speak no English but seems to understand what I am saying. Meanwhile, Mike has called Janis, one of the tour guides who speaks Russian, to get his butt over to us. Janis arrives and it is obvious that he has been down this road before as he is very respectful and appears to be quaking in his boots. Janis is a good actor. The “policeman” says I have to go in front of a judge tonight and hear my sentence and at this point I am so pissed off I say “Fine, let’s go.” Wrong thing to say. All of a sudden a breath analyzer comes out and they tell me to blow into it. As startling as it may sound to those of you who know me well, I have never been stopped before to have this happen. So, I blow into the machine but it is about 3″ from my mouth. The reading comes out .03 alcohol content, which is total BS as it has been over 15 hours since I had a glass of wine. Meanwhile, Janis and dough boy are conversing. Janis then turns to me and asks for my bike papers, which I give him. He takes the papers over to Mike’s bike, fumbles around, comes back and gives them to the policeman, who starts to go through them again while sitting in the front seat and I am still in the back seat, not really able to see what he is doing. All of a sudden, Mr. Blimp gives me my bike papers and tells me to walk across the square to the group and have Janis ride the bike. We are out of there in a flash and Siberia is a distant memory…..

Now, the back story. I did not know that when you breathe into a breath analyzer, it should be right up against your mouth. These two cops had me blow into it from about 3 inches away. What I did not see is that they put a drop or two of alcohol on the mouthpiece so that alcohol with my breath is blown into the machine which causes the high reading. Janis knew about this and saw it going down hill fast and took the chance that a well-placed $100.00 bill would change the direction of this tale so he put the money in my bike papers and give it back to blimpy…

Needless to say, it will be a long time before I can even look at a can of Pop and Fresh dough…”

During the free day in Saint Petersburg, the riders enjoyed taking a hydrofoil trip over to see Petterhoff which was established by Peter the Great as a summer residence for himself.

During the Second World War Peterhof was completely destroyed but was compleltey rebuilt during soviet times. It is most well known for its beautiful golden fountains.

We stopped at a great Italian restaurant for lunch which turned out to be a very eventful stop. It was here that we were filmed and interviewed which was aired on the local news station (as per the clip on the previous blog page) that evening. The monument in the town square is that of Ivan Milutin, the merchant and mayor of the city from 1861.

Something that I have always enjoyed about riding in Russia as a foreigner is the friendliness and desire of local riders to stop and want to talk. During the scouting tour we had many local riders and clubs stop to come and talk to us about our trip and our thoughts about riding through Russia. This was a local rider in Cherepovets that we had a chat with during our stop.

The bikes cause an immense amount of interest from all the locals in many of the towns through which the group ride.

The local constabulary stopped by to take a look at the bikes and have a chat with us. We had parked on the side walk due to limited space, which they had mentioned was not the right place for us to park. No harm done, we got several pictures with the officer and had a good laugh.

Getting interviewed by local TV in Cherepovets. Each of the riders on the trip (in this picture it is the couple from Indonesia) were interviewed by the news reporters.

Janis snapped this great shot of The Transfiguration Cathedral reflecting on the Vulga River, the longest river in Europe.

Lunch stop on the way to Rybinsk

Rest in Rybinsk

Riders enjoying a wonderful sunset over the Rybinsk Sea which is one of the largest man made lakes in the world.

Tour leaders enjoying the last of the sunset after a long day in the saddle.

This was the groups destination for the evening, an upmarket yet rustic log cabin lodge in the middle of a pine forest. Verizhitsa made for a peaceful and relaxing stop for the evening.

The group enjoying a few pre-dinner cocktails on the restaurant patio overlooking the beautiful lodges gardens.