August 26th.

 

 

Many of my family and friends have been worried about my recent heart operation, and how it would react to the physical stress so short a time after the bypass. Well, I feel fine! No worries, mate.. And we met a local “Shaman” (medicine-man) who, very seriously, examined me with mumbling and strange hand movements, and he came to the conclusion:  “There is nothing wrong with your heart. You can continue”. Well, thanks. Good to know.

 

 

We are cycling along the Kolyma river, closing in on the village of Tomtor, and it is beautiful. Even the roads are better. Tomtor is the coldest inhabited place on earth. They have messured a stunning record of minus 71,2 Celsius!

 

 

We now enjoy + 30 Celsius, but it is a strange feeling to know that only a few feet below our feet the land is frozen – and has been for 10-thousands of years. The intense summer cannot thaw the soil more than that, before another winter sets in and freezes everything again.

 

The river crossings are always a spectacular event. We crossed the big river with the missing bridge today, and it was easy. The gold miners in the area make a little extra on the side by helping people over on a home made barge, running on a wire. They used the bulldozer to push our car onboard. “Watch the paint on the car” – is not understood in this country…

 

 

Some of the villages on the map are completely deserted. Gold mining is big in this part of Russia and they dig out huge quantities every year. That is also why the roads are not too bad. They have to keep them in shape so the big Kamaz trucks can carry out the richers.

Other villages are inhabited. Some even has a “Gastenitse” – a guest house. And some of them even have beds, no hot water (or cold for that matter) but good food and sweet, helpful people.

 

 

We have left the region of Yakutia and are now in Magadanskaja Oblast. We crossed another time zone, and live our lives 10 hours before our friends in Norway. This is Russian cowboy-land, but without the cows. We see lots of traces of previous gold mining, and every now and then we spot watchtowers with armed guards, dangling their Kalashnikov carelessly while watching us passing.  A visit to the local “Deli” revealed that they have stocked up more for the gold digger ready to celebrate a lucrative find, than for a hungry cyclist.  

 

 

The service car takes a hell of a lot of beating. But knock on wood, (and we have a lot around us) after the last repair it works. We’ve had a few stops, crossing rivers etc, but sometimes we manage ourselves and other times we wait for a monster truck to help us up. In the last village a man told us to fill up all the gasoline we could manage, because it was 7- 800 kilometres to the next place we could get any. Thanks, mate..

 

  

We have not been bothered by bears so far, but we see a lot of birds – ptarmigan / grouse to be exact and an occasional moose. This will probably change when we arrive at Kamchatka. The landscapes are beautiful and every now and then we are reminded that not everyone made the trip successfully. Crosses along the road are proof of that.

 

 

The mosquito season is (thank God) over. But the tiny little buggers (don’t know the name in English) that you cannot see are biting like crazy. Even the mosquito net does not keep them out. They sneak through the holes. But – we’re in great shape after a couple of months on the road, feeling strong and invincible – so don’t try anything! The old guys are still to be counted!!

 

 

 

 

August 18th.

 

 

Our car, named “FRAM-2”, is our base in life right now, and we really depend on it. It is our home, and we have grown to love her. But… and there is a big but.. The guy who sold it to us has probably cheated us badly. For two whole days the Norwegian flag has waved in the wind on the roof of the garage, and three mechanics have been working on it, to try to get the car in working order. The brakes disappeared suddenly and nearly took out a couple of pedestrians, the gas tank is badly leaking, so is the radiator, most of the electric systems does not work, basic construction has to be made on the wheel system and shock absorbers and a lot of other stuff has to be done – before we can continue. Thank God we found this garage in Yakutsk.

 

 

While waiting for the car to be fixed, we visited the permafrost research centre. Strange place… They have dug themselves shafts down into the tundra, and down there we saw our first mammoth. A complete baby, frozen for 39.000 years. Amazing!

 

 

 

Bye, bye, Lena… We have crossed the Lena river for the third time. First when she was a tiny river, trickling down  from the mountains on the west shores of the Baikal sea, then again a few hundred kilometres further north, and now she has grown to be an enormous lady – that takes one and a half hours to cross by ferry. She now turns straight north, and we head east.

 

 

 

There has been no rain for a few days – and we love it! The roads are not very good, but at least they are no longer flooded. The surface is either rough rubble, soft sand or mud. But the sun is shining, the car is working and we meet sweet and hospitable people every day. Most of the time we are invited to sleep over in private homes. The standard is not always tip top, but who cares – the people are fantastic.

 

 

 

Arriving a large village there was no place to stay, but the Mayor of the place invited us to sleep in his house. I guess we are rather exotic, rolling into their village in colourful cycle clothing, coming from a country as far west as one can possibly come. And as usual the service car arrives hours after us…

 

 

 

We have crossed the Aldan river, and our service car was the last one they managed to squeeze on board. We are now in Yakutia, an area inhabited by descendants of warriors from Djengis Kahn’s army. They squeezed out the aborigines people who lived here, and have stayed on ever since. In front of us we have a huge mountain range with the “road” climbing up to 6000 feet. We are also told that the big river we will encounter in a couple of days – does not have a bridge anymore. The ice swept it away. Well, we’ll see, when we get there. There's always a challange!  

 

 

 

August 7th.

 

 

 

Arne has some problems after skidding off the road and falling down a slope the other day. He broke one of his ribs and is clearly in pain, but he pretends as if everything is OK. He is a hard nail, that old Viking…

 

 

Message from Thor:

“There is no way we can cycle from here. The whole area is flooded and will stay this way for I don’t know how long. The decision is made – we have to take the train out of here, and that really bugs me because I had planned to cycle every single meter of the way. But you cannot always beat mother nature..”

 

 

The car is also giving them problems. Most of the electric system is fu… up and it is leaking clutch fluid. There is no garage in this place and it would be hazardous to hit the road with a car in this condition. The nearest town of some size is “Tynda”. The cyclists will get on a passenger train, and the car will be loaded on an open freight train later that day. Oyvind and Maksim will have to sit in the car all the way – to watch the car, and because there are no passenger wagons.

 

 

The car has not arrived Tynda? The cyclists have been waiting for three whole days now, and there is no sign of the car.. It is impossible to get contact by phone, and they are worried something is seriously wrong. What has happened?  

 

 

Day 4 – and the car arrived!! It turned out the freight train stopped for long periodes at every place possible (and impossible), and it did not run during the night. Then the driver just stopped and went to sleep. For four days and three nights Oyvind and Maksim was confined to the car, with all the problems that gave them. Imagine trying to sleep in that cramped place, or doing your “private business” on an open wagon, waggling through the wilderness, and hanging on to the doorframe of the car…

 

 

The car is now in a garage in Tynda to be fixed, and the boys are back on the bikes, but now they are only two. Tom was called back to Norway on some urgent business, and jumped a train to get to the nearest airport. It was only 36 hours by train to get there.. 

 

 

The road is a little bit better now, not flooded, but still hard to ride. In two days they have managed 200 kilometres. They came to a town with a hotel and wanted to give themselves a treat, so they chequed in and went out for a meal. Coming back late to get a good night sleep between clean sheets they were told to please leave the hotel. They could not stay there! The reason being that Arne did not have his passport. (Of course he did not! It was stolen a week earlier). He told them about the incident and showed them the temporary passporte he had gotten from the police, but sorry mate – no way. So, they had to leave the hotel.

July 31.

After being stuck for two days the police has done their job well. We did not get a clear answer if they had caught the thieves, but they had at least found one some of the goods – and wonders… among it was Thor’s heart medicine, so now we can continue! Also Tom’s passport and some clothes for Arne were recovered.

The people are so sweet and helpful here in Siberia. We tried to find some food with calories and carbs, and one man we had previously met at the train station ran home to his wife, made her make food for us and came back with an excellent meal, consisting of grinded meat baked in sort of pasta, vegetables, bread and the ever present bottle of vodka. When we wanted to pay him for his services, he almost got insulted.

There is hardly any traffic on the road. We are told that all goods (including the trucks) are transported on the railroad from here to the city of Tynda.

We’re on the “road” again and this is borderline ridicules. Bad weater, bad roads, lots of rivers to cross and the bridges are either in bad condition or simply washed away. We have to wade across with water up to our shorts. The car’s engine stopped suddenly when it was midstream with water half way up on the door. We managed to get it out, but the engine would not start. Managed after a long while. The engine now sounds like an old one-piston tractor. The roads allows max 10 km/h speed. We are extremely tired now. We suspect the 80 octane gasoline we bought to be diluted. The car must have a major checkup when we come to Tynda. (If we get there..)    

Weather and road condition the same. We came to a huge river today, and it was a bridge there: 500 meters long, a staggering 30 meters high, but only 3 meters wide – and no railing! Surfaced with wood, Oyvind did not dear to drive the car over, neither did we. On the other side of the river there were some houses and we went to ask them if it was safe to cross. They said “Yes” – but did not want to help us. After long negotiations one man came to our rescue and drove the car over. A nerve wrecking experience.

We have crossed yet another time zone, and are now 8 hours ahead of Norway – and the expedition has come to a halt in a small place called Kunda. It rains, and rains and rains. Not only are the rivers swelling and hard to cross, but since the water is not absorbed in the ground due to the permafrost, even the roads are flooded. We have now reached the taiga, the flat land. People here told us that the road ahead is flooded by as much as 1,5 meter, and they don’t know for what distance it is like this. We are plain and simply stuck here. It can take weeks before the water has evaporated. So, we need to think about what to do. Maybe the people were right about it being impossible?

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Week 3

The locale people keep telling us that it is not possible to go by bicycle to the next big city, Tynda. “- The road will gradually be worse and worse” they say. But we believe that as long as there is a road of some kind we can progress, so – we'll give it a try.

The media has shown a keen interest in this expedition. Our last expedition member, Gorm Lund, still in Norway, who will join us in a few weeks, really feels the pressure. Radio stations, newspapers, magazines and others all want fresh information about the boys on the bikes in the wilderness.

The roads are really getting worse.. And to top it all – it pours down. The surface of the road has for years been neglected and what’s left is rock and gravel the size of your fist. We planned to cycle 90 km today. We managed 34. Even our service car has problems. They can hardly go faster than 15 – 20 km/h - on the best stretches.

What a mess..!! After a long, hard day – completely exhausted, we arrived at a station house along the Bam railroad and asked the uniformed man inside if we could get shelter for the night, but he was “not authorised” to help us. He told us about a village, the next station, about 25 -30 km further along the road. We decided to leave the bikes in his station house, get in the car and try to reach the village before dark. Then, the next day we could take the train back and climb our bikes to continue in (hopefully) better weather.

We were robbed!

In the outskirts of the village we found an abandoned old house and rigged ourselves for the night. A shaggy old dog came in from the rain and kept us company. He was a little annoying, because he barked at the slightest noise, but eventually we all fell asleep. The dog must have slept hard because during the night we were visited by burglars, and he did not notice a thing! They broke into our car and stole some bags and rucksacks, and we discovered that among the missing items, like our permission to travel, two passports, lots of cash, clothes, camera and other vital equipment – the heart medicine for Thor was also gone!! Disaster…

Gorm contacted Thor's doctor and got a crystal clear message from him: “- Thor must absolutely not strain himself without the medicine! If he does – he will die!”

So this looked to be a busy day. We had to report the theft to the police, we had to get our bikes and we had to get medication for Thor – if we wanted to continue.

Almost the whole day went by with the police. The were really pissed off that someone had stolen from us, and they promised they would get the thieves, beat them up and throw them in jail. So – we took the train back one station to pick up our bikes, and carefully ride the short distance back to the village. When we arrived (on a Friday afternoon) we were met by a note on the door saying: “Last train has gone. Office closed. Open again on Monday.”  

After two weeks

We have now settled into a normal routine. Approx 6 hours of efficient cycling every day, cycling for 5 days, resting for one or two. We are a little behind schedule, but nothing dramatically. So far we have cycled the entire length of the Baikal sea and just rounded 900 kilometres. (only 6 – 7.000 km to go..)

After leaving Baikal there has been a change in weather. So far we have experienced coastal climate – rapid changes in temperatures, wind and rain. Now we have climbed a few mountain ridges and the temperature is stabile around + 30 Celsius.

Roads are still bad to cycle on, and sometimes they are not only bad – but disastrous! Just try for yourself to ride 100 km on loose gravel mixed with sand and rocks the size of your fist. If you manage – do the same thing the next day, and the next, and the next - for a few months…

Fresh water has so far not been any problem. Clear cool water comes down from the mountains and there are no human activities here that can pollute it for us. We mix it with sports drink powder containing minerals and other stuff our body needs, and we all feel absolutely fine. No (major) problems so far.

In this area we are told there are many bears, but so far we have not seen any. We keep asking locals how to react if we stumble across one, and we get many good advices. The most bizarre advise was given to us by some loggers we met. They said: “- If you encounter a bear, just bend down, shit in your hand and throw it on him.. He does not like that..!” Well, well. Pulling down our trousers is not the first thing that springs to mind in a situation like that.

We arrived what we thought was a small village looking at the map, but it turns out more than 6.000 people live here. (But there was not one single hostel or place to sleep for us.) The last huge Sovjet building project, the Bam railway, goes through this area and the railway station was massive and impressive. We tried to visit the café in the building, but was stopped by a brisk woman in a white doctors dress. She announced this was for railroad personnel – only! She turned out to actually being a doctor, hired by the railroad, and we asked if she could take a look at Oyvinds’ dog-bite – but no, she was a heart specialist and did not do that kind of work. Well, we said – then you can take a look at Thor. He has recently had heart surgery..? And she took him in, examined him and told him he would live to be a 100 years old. And regarding a place to sleep for the night, she solved it by simply saying: “- You boys can sleep in my place tonight”. We just love Siberia and the generous people here..

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