Our Greek friend, nick-named Dollar joined us for this Leg. We re-packed our bikes and the Toyota and headed towards the Russian border where we planned to sleep on the 3rd night in the town where the Olympic Winter Games were going to take place the following year.
But a few kilometres from the border we were stopped by the army who informed us that there was a group from Chechnya across the border in Russia who had claimed a part of Georgia for themselves and the border was closed.… Read More
Our friend Rikus joined us on this leg to drive the Toyota.
We returned to Istanbul and immediately headed South, but first had to learn KTM Lesson Number 2, when Pie’s bike, which we jump started the morning, cut-out while at full speed on a main road, which proved that a faulty battery can display symptoms of running out of fuel and the alternator alone is not enough to power the electrics of the bike, it needs a good battery as well, (we replaced the battery on the centre island during peak morning traffic and then she ran perfectly.)… Read More
We had now decided to head for Turkey from where we would enter Syria, and avoiding the town of Homs where there was “a little tension,” would ride through Jordan into Saudi Arabia and take a ferry to Port Sudan from where we would be back-on-track and heading for Cape Town.
But as Peens had to compete in the World Para-Gliding competition in Sopot (Bulgaria) he returned to Romania before the rest of the group with new ignition, and with his glider strapped to the back of his KTM rode over the nearest mountain following the shortest distance route on his GPS only to spend twice as long getting there as the “road” became a track and then it started raining.… Read More
We all arrived in London but were told that due to the Easter Weekend neither of the two containers had been inspected by “His Majesties Customs” and we had to wait. As a result a Ford Van was rented and we drove to see the Isle of Mann via Snowdonia (Wales) and the Lake District.
On return to London a few days later the container from South Africa was cleared and un-packed.… Read More
Deepest lake in the world at 1642 Meters
Holds 20% of the unfrozen fresh water in the world
636 Km Long and 79 Km Wide
Is a Rift Lake hence the depth, ( like lake Tanganyika in Tanzania)
Water Volume is 26 615 cubic KILOMETERS, (yes not a spelling mistake, not cubic metres but kilometers)
Average depth 745 meters
Largest lake by volume in the world
Deepest lake in the world
Oldest lake in the world 25 000 000 years old
Holds more water than all of the Great Lakes Combined
2500 animals and fish species, two thirds endemic to the lake
1700 plant species, two thirds endemic to the area
150 types of snails found in lake… Read More
We always try to het to know the people of the country we are traveling through, getting to know their culture, eating the food they eat at the local places they eat. We went to see a show with traditional music played on traditional instruments, dancing as well as throat singing and contortionists.
We went out for dinner with all the paragliging guys in Ulan Bator and ate in a private dinning room, these guys arranged a place for us to lock-up our bikes.… Read More
We rode into the capital of Mongolia with the rainstorm that has been chasing us the entire day finally catching up and the wind whipped-up a huge dust cloud and for the tenth time today I tasted sand and wiped the dust out of my eyes.
The days ride was a lonely one as I spent most of the day at the back of the pack, I stopped for photos several times before I realised I had no memory card in my camera, then the wind started blowing sand storms and for an hour the visibility was so bad it reminded me of riding in the mist.… Read More
Yesterday while Tex won a trip to the local pannelbeater to have his pannier bracket welded we visited the church in Ulan-ude which was the only Anti Religion Centre which was opperated from within a church during the time religion was banned during the Soviet era, (we are told that during that time different religions would help one another by hiding the other church’ religios items, so how I understood the person telling us, Buddha Temples whould hide Christian Crosses for the christian churches and they will in return hide symbols of other religions.… Read More
This morning before we left when we were waxing our bike chains we discovered that Tex’s pannier bracket had broken from all the vibration and abuse and the panniers had to be loaded in the Land Cruiser
Irkutsk is a very nice city and still have many of the same wooden-framed houses we see in the rural villages. It also has beautiful buildings.… Read More
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