I am now in Riga, and I am now on a rest day at last. As I said in my last post I was worried about time, so I have been cycling every day since I left Berlin. That has been 15 days on the bike. In this 15 days I have covered 1583km, that is almost 1000 miles. This puts my total up to 4536 miles. I would say I have 8 cycling days left, 4 to get to Tallinn and then a further 4 to get to St Petersburg. So things are looking good. I just do not know how long I will have to wait in Tallinn to get the visa sorted. If it is going to take more than 4 or 5 days then I may change my plans and just cycle to the border then hop across the Finland for a bit. I just do not know yet.
Anyway changing the subject, here are some interesting facts I have worked out about my trip.
1. I have not used a phone since I left the UK over 3 months ago now.
2. My home for 2007 will officially be my MSR Hubba tent. I have worked out that it will be the place that I have stayed in for the most nights for the whole year (56 nights so far and assuming that I still make it out to Africa traveling for the rest of the year from September).
3. I have not been for a wild poo yet, I have always seemed to be near facilities when I have needed to.
4. I have started talking to my bike like she is a person.
This is what has happened since my last post.
Sunday 10th June (Day 69)
After I finished the last post I walked back to the campsite along the beach and stopped in a bar for a beer and this is the view I had.
Monday 11th June (Day 70)When I set off from the camp site in the morning I bumped into another cyclist. He is also from England and on a Dawes touring bike with Altura Dryline panniers. It would of made a great advert.
It turned out we were both heading in the same direction so we cycled together. I thought to myself that I may of gone a little bit fight club. I noticed that I had started to talk to Georgia (my bike) so I wondered if this dude was a figment of my imagination. Anyway we had some interesting cycle tracks with not much room for error.
This was also quite a momentous day because I passed the 4000 mile mark.
But some of the roads we cycled on were the worst I have ever cycled.
This patch work of filled potholes really killed my ass. Every one was like a harsh speed bump. I swear that if they took all the tarmac that has been used to fill the pot holes and spread it evenly across the road, there would be enough for a really good surface. Any way at the end of the day we ending up in Malbork which has a cool castle.
Tuesday 12th June (Day 71)Do not know what it is advertising, but it is the smurfs and it brought a smile to my face and memories of the staff conference 2005 and Dartmouth regatta 2006.
An uneventful day really but we found a nice camp site at the end of the day by a cool lake where we went for a little dip.
Wednesday 13th June (Day 72)About 20km into the ride I heard a little ping come from the back wheel and another spoke had gone. Unfortunately it was right next to the other one that I failed to get fixed in Berlin. 1 is ok but when 2 next to each other are gone then you start to get concerned, especially while carrying heavy panniers. Bloody European cobbled roads
Quite a good celebration considering that this day was the 3 month mark.Thursday 14 June (Day 73)
Because of my back wheel we set of early to Gizycho because Ian's cycling book said there was a bike shop there. On the way I noticed that I started to have a bit of a bumpy ride so I looked at my front tyre and found this.
Good job I noticed on the way to the bike shop and not after I had left it. This was the back up tyre I had resorted to using because that new one had gone a bit like this as was seen on the previous blog. But once at the bike shop the dude fitted 2 new spokes for me whilst I put on a new tyre on the front wheel.
All of this, tyre, replacing the spokes and I thought I better get a couple of spares came to 42 ZL. About 8 pound, can not complain about that. I was so happy to have spare spokes. The day before Ian had explained what this funny little bit attached to my frame was. For the past 3 years I have had the bike I have always wandered. But now I know. It is to carry spare spokes. How cool is that. I love touring bikes.
Soon after this we went our separate ways after 3 1/2 days of cycling together. I made a push for Suwalki near the border and Ian continued to cycle around the lakes. It was really good having a bit of company for a few days.I got to Suwalki and found a small camp site. Basically it was some guys garden who has a guest house and cabins. I thought it was going to be a quite night, but then I saw a couple of motorcyclists turn up, a Scotsman and an Englishman. It made me think of "Long Way Round". So I ate dinner with them and had a fews beers as you can see.
It turns out that they both live in Finland so I seem to be building up quite an address book for that part of the world.Friday 15th June (Day 74)
I knew I had a big ride ahead of me so I got up early, 3:45am to be exact. Not the best thing to do when you are a little hung over from the night before. I only had 5 beers but that hits quite hard when you are a little dehydrated from covering a 100km earlier in the day. Anyway I saw the sun rise a bit then set off.
I crossed the border into Lithuania just after 6am.
Quite a challenging day because not all of Lithuania's roads are tarmac. So I had about 12km in total cycling along loose gravel. Hard work on a loaded up touring bike. Quite technical, my wheels where digging into the gravel and I was sliding about a bit.
Found this amazing hostel in Kaunas at the end of the day. It was in some old Soviet peoples housing tower block. Here is a shot of the toilet facilities to show how classy it is. I just love the plastic taps and the way the same water point is for the sink, bath and shower. But it only cost 6 pounds and it was my first night in a bed for over 2 weeks.
Saturday 16th June (Day 75)Set off early in the morning with another big ride ahead on the way to Panevezys.
Followed a really nice river on a road that hardly had any traffic.
For lunch I was very happy to have a little slice from home.
But obviously I had more than just chocolate. I got to Panevezys just before 4pm. It being Saturday lots of the places were closed including the tourist information. So I just checked into the nearest hotel. That is right, a HOTEL. 14 pound for a room with a view like this.
Sunday 17th (Day 76)Had a gentle day this day. For the past 4 or 5 they had all been 100km plus. So I only aimed for a modest 70km. A good day because the wind was behind me and made it really easy. I stayed in an amazing guest house by a lake in Birzal
Monday 18th June (Day 77)Aim of the day was to cross the border and get to Riga. The first section was on some really nice roads.
The border crossing was cool because it was only on a minor road so it was just 1 guy in a shed
Again I was caught in a thunder storm. I got soaked but soon dried afterwards, I have really enjoyed seeing all these thunder storms.
I got to Riga at about 3pm and found a nice hostel.
There are some cool guys in my room and the hostel gives out free tickets to the Roxy nightclub so you can probably guess what happened next. There was 8 lads altogether, quite a mission. I ended up staying till closing which is 5 am. The sun had already been up for 2 hours by this time. One of the other guys got friendly with a Latvian girl so there was a few of us in search of food and we stumbled across another bar that was still open. I was just standing out side and heard some shouting and turned around to see a fight break out. That girl the dude got friendly with, well her friend was having her hair pulled rather savagely, which then caused her boyfriend to rush in and slapped the other girl round the face quite a few times. This then caused the original attackers friend to come rushing in with a series of flying kicks against the guy who was slapping her friend. Whilst we had been walking to this bar I had been talking to the dude that had rushed in to slap the girl. So I thought it best to attempt to sever all ties and turned to start talking to some random people in a effort to dissociated myself from them. What do you know, it was a guy from the west country, Taunton to be exact and he now lives in Finland quite close to Helsinki. I am going to have to buy an address book with an extra few pages in the F section for Finland. He was there with his work mates and what do you know, one of them who I have also got a contact for in Finland is moving to Plymouth in 3 months time. How cool is that.Tuesday 19th (Rest day Riga)
Well I have been asleep for a lot of it because I only got to bed at 6am. But I have had a little walk round and saw a couple of sights
The plan now, few more beers with the guys tonight. Another rest day tomorrow. I will probably see a few more sights tomorrow since I will not be spending hours in front of the computer screen updating this. Then on Thursday start the 4 day journey up to Tallinn following the coast. I will get to Tallinn on Sunday and go to the Russian embassy/consulate first thing on Monday morning to sort out my options.
A question people, if it is going to take a long time to sort out, it may become economically inviable (in time and money) to finish in St Petersburg. I want to finish in St Petersburg. But I do not want to be hanging around in Tallinn for any more that about 4-5 days. If I do then it could put the Finland trip off. But with all these contacts I would like to spend a bit of time there now. Up to a week I would say depending on when I finish the ride and where. Will you guys be upset if I can not get into Russia and only get to the border?
I will know more on Monday.
Cheers
