Out of Kiev in the low morning light we go. Heading east into the rising sun. Riding towards Russia. I’ve been here a few times now and I must admit to having a bit of a soft spot for it. I like the Russian attitude. I like their spirit. I like they way they wave their middle finger in the air at the world and go their own way. Fuck you! And they probably would too given half a chance. While we’re checking all our paperwork and making sure there is a yellow warning triangle over that 2 inch coffee spill, and that French policeman is checking I’m carrying a hi-vis vest that can be seen from space, and that I’ve got my breath tester and warning triangle and safety pants on, the Russians will just jump start some 20 year old planes covered in dust and bird shit, strap some random ordinance on, take off from some derelict airstrip and fuck the lot of us.
Anyway, stop for petrol and randomly run into the main KTM dealer in Ukraine. He looks very surprised to see an Adventure more than 10 miles from a mother ship nipple.
You can see the surprised look on his face. He waves goodbye and roars off up the road before the bike can brake down on the forecourt.
We stop at some random spot selling 10ft Teddy bears and I go to order some lunch. My Russian/Menu reading abilities are not quite there yet .. and I wonder why the bill is so high … before we’re served with enough food for a party ..
I’ve only ever travelled into Russia on tourist visas before .. or more exactly ‘auto-tourist’ visas. These are restricted to max 30 days though so no good for us this time. We’re going in on business visas this time but we were warned they might question why we’re on bikes. Turns out they couldn’t care less. Fill out the customs forms (2 copies, and put in exactly what it says on the V5) and you’re away. 2 hours is a new record and we’re through. 2 hours, HORAH. We can get to the hotel and look around. Time for a sauna.. or a massage.. or a swim .. or … or… we could spend 4 hours looking for insurance.. I hate saunas anyway .. let’s go and try to get a piece of useless paper from a sweaty old nana in a roadside shed… that’s a much better idea. We go to shed/nana No1. She’s got the prime spot just inside the border post. She’s bound to know what she’s doing. I’ll be in and out before she knows it .. a situation I’m sadly very familiar with … I’ve done this before, but not at this border, it’s always been easy enough.. until now.
We’re going to be here about 60 days but she seems to be incapable of counting beyond a month so we go for that instead. Or we try to. She tells us to wait outside and she starts wrestling with the computer and making phone calls. It’s late on a Saturday afternoon which probably isn’t helping. After about 90 minutes she gives up and tells us she can’t do it. Fuck. She gives me some random instructions to some place 20km up the road, possibly in a cafe, possibly in a underground graveyard .. or maybe in a tree house.. yep, that’s probably it.. a tree house.. about 15-20km away … should be obvious. So, that’s 2 hours done, we still need to waste another 2 before we can feel we have had the full experience.
First place we try is some sort of asylum with scary drug fucked people wandering about in wife-beaters. Then after a few more km we see a tree house … only it’s not in a tree. It’s just a wooden shed perched on top of a bus stop. There is a big buxom nana leaning out of the window looking down at us. If she leans out just a little bit more the whole lot is going to land in the road at our feet. We consider that for a moment. My mate thinks being crushed under a big Russian nana isn’t such a bad way to go .. We run up the back stairs and into her lair, give her our documents… and wait.. for about an hour … before being told it’s impossible… again. Apparently a squirrel has chewed through the soggy piece of string the computer system is connected to. “Are there any more nana’s we can try please?” She points out the window just down the road to a shed where another dribbling little bloke in another wife-beater is standing, putting 50% of his drink in his mouth and the other 50% down the front of his vest. Perfect.
So off we go to Nana No3. By this stage we don’t care what we get, as long as it says insurance on the top of it. This nana/pop combo don’t have a fucking clue. I think it’s their first day on the job. In fact it might not be their job at all. Perhaps they just came in to steal the beer. We sit in front of the computer and play a game of insurance scrabble. This involves coming up with any random names, numbers and dates that fit in the spaces on the screen and let you move through to the next page of questions. At the end of the process we’ve got a piece of paper that bears as much resemblance to reality as a Donald Trump tweet but who cares. We’ve reached our 4 hour threshold and we’ve got ‘something’. We celebrate with handshakes and cake.
before chasing the sunset to Bryansk. Travelling by road through Russia frequently has a very low ‘wow’ factor!
Another sprawling city with shit traffic and a million traffic lights. I decide to test the sensitivity of the local police by dodging round some cars at some lights. Turns out they’re quite sensitive.. I get pulled over and I’m wondering how my brand new Harry Potter insurance document is going to stand up to scrutiny. He’s got a job to do after all. Getting stopped doesn’t fill me with dread the way it does at home. All it does is send my wallet running for the hills for fear of being gang raped and left open and bleeding in a ditch. My advice, for what it’s worth, is show them respect. Take you helmet off .. take your plugs out .. shake their hand .. say hello.. smile .. listen .. be polite. Works this time anyway. Quick look at the passport and we’re on our way up some bombed out streets to our hotel. I booked the wrong hotel… that turns out to be the right hotel… I should have booked the hotel down the road where my Aussie mates are staying. Theirs doubles as a knocking shop, has rooms with huge round beds, mirrors on the ceiling and a receptionist that implies their bike might not still be outside where they left it in the morning.
I booked the one up the road by mistake, with secure parking and mattresses with an almost 0% seamen content. My bad.
Wake to the sound of bells and wander down to the church next door in the sunshine. Stick my head in the door, go inside… feel the change in atmosphere .. listen to the chanting… smell the air… step into someone else’s world.
Get on the road to the capital, easy riding for a few hours, then get anywhere near the city and the traffic just turns to shit.
We filter for about 50km and stop at an ‘Express’ pre-bland just to let ourself blink. Russians are pretty good at letting you filter to be fair. Especially the ones with the big flashy shiny machines that they don’t want a pannier scratch down the side of..
Then out into more and more tightly packed and random traffic. You have to be aggressive in this stuff, anything else is a sign of weakness and will be punished mercilessly. I especially like the 8 lane sections with entries and exits on both sides. It’s like someone is trying to plait the traffic, everyone moving left and right and fighting their way to one side or the other. Get to Moscow late afternoon and play dare with all the traffic for an hour before getting to the hotel. Moscow traffic is total shit. White lines are just there to imply a general direction of traffic, not to separate it at all. Still, all safe.. just another lovely day on the road