Impromptu trip to Mongolia

I think I've exhausted all possibilities in this town and decide to leave.
The bearing, I'm led to believe might last quite a few thousand miles, but if it spews its oil out I'll be up the creek without a Ural as they say in these parts.
It's been a great adventure and it doesn't matter to me too much whether I'm on the bike seat, a truck seat or the train.
I only decided to go on this trip a few weeks ago and did no preparation whatsoever! Can you tell?
I'm up at 5.30. Load up my phone with credit, fill up with water and write Mumsy a goodbye note.....and in true Roberts fashion head EAST out of town towards Siberia
 
I stumble into a wedding....or rather drive right through it! They'd put some candles out in the shape of a heart and I rode right through!
What an entrance!
I'm an immediate attraction and may have upstaged the bride 😀and begin listening to 100 pissed Russian pig farmers, trying to speak English...I particularly like the red shoes.....
 

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I'm introduced to several guests, one whom is diesel mechanic...he only likes American cigarettes, Scotch whisky and big yank trucks, of which there are loads over here... but no Macks- he says cos they're too big????
He loves Fleetwood Mac, pink floyd roger Walters and Phil Colins 😡😡😡But not Led Zeppelin!
He asks where I've been and where I'm going...you should go home through Belarus...I reply that I think the border is closed but you can fly there. "What about going through the Crimea and the Ukraine" he'd holidayed there only last year and they were lovely countries. Mmmm i suggest he may be holidaying in the U.S.A. next year..........
 

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The wedding drags on into the evening. Lionel Richtea, Marillion and Prince are at FULL volume. I'm introduced to a bloke who's just retired from the army. In the last 4 years he's done 478 parachute jumps (couldn't figure out why)
We talk about Man Utd, Top Gear, the Grand Tour, Adell, boxing and all in wrestling..... They all seem to be wrestlers, and the one toothed drunk next to him lurching into the conversation every now and again was Siberian's champion for a while.
And then came the moment I'd been thinking about every day, whilst bimbling along on the BMW.
He begins to to construct a sentence about relations between Britain and Russia... This isn't going to be good.... Not here... Not now.......
I head him off at the pass.... And amaze myself I have the balls to say my pre-planned story, straight faced....
"Actually I'm not English...no I was born in Cuba"
Not surprisingly this sparks genuine interest.
"Yes I think my mother was a hooker.... She might have slept with Mr Castro"
"Vodka?" "Ohh Thankyou"
"But she died when I was very young, that's why I don't speak Spanish or Russian.
"Vodka?" " Mmmmm yes it's not spiked is it?"
Lotsa sympathy....
"I had to live with my father"
More sympathy
" Yes I grew up in Wales with my Dad"
LOTSA sympathy!
"Vodka?" " Er make that a double please " 😀
 

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The wedding party leave around midnight in taxis, the musics off and all I can hear now is chairs being dragged along the floor and glasses being collected as the staff glue the place back together.
A chat with the manager in the morning reveals that they were not " all - in wrestlers" .... But "ARM wrestlers"........i'd wondered what the groom and the brides mother were doing amongst the crowd on the top table....
 

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I change the oil every day in the final drive. The drain plug is always full of swarf. But for the first time I'm putting fully sympathetic in. I've never used it before cos you can't mix it with any other oil. But it seems all the vehicles here run on it. There's rows upon rows of synthetic oil in any shop and very little dino oil.
 

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Really great read, love the last minute nature of the trip, hope you manage to keep going.
 
'Elf n savety...
 

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Russians love their sheds!
This is Igor Shalygin from Transit - Baikal- Transit.
He's got at least 3 sheds and cover more area than his whole garden.
I'd love to have a look in one..... Maybe find a low mileage 1940's Ural minter complete with a sidecar drive and machine gun.
But he says he doesn't own a motorcycle so no point looking in here....Well that he's seen lately....
 

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This is the original number for the bike. It's was made in '81 but not registered till '83 cos they didn't sell well in the U.K. at all....
About the only bit of prep I did to the bike before I left was order a much smaller number plate...
White on black is illegal unless the bike is registered before 1973...and this size is very illegal ..making it much harder to read from a distance of course too.... 😎
I have it on good authority that having 3 numbers in a row like this means you are very important and quite probably belong to the.......мафия
 

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Approaching Irkutsk from the west, you come over the brow of a hill and the city is suddenly spread out before you. Quite impressive. It's the biggest place I've seen in a couple of weeks...since St Petersburg probably.
There's even an aeroplane! Wow!
It's rush hour, (if there is such a thing here) raining and has been for the last few hours. The mains roads are ok but the rough side streets are under water, you need a submarine never mind a G/S. Even the potholes have potholes...and those bloody tram tracks......
 

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I have my 2nd near miss today
Bouncing through town at a steady 40 good old Ivan decides to pull across my path and into the Sainsburys car park.
Brake! brake! brake!
Now, not having ABS on this bike isn't a disadvantage cos no matter how hard you pull and stamp on the brakes they ain't gonna lock up! The original single disk and rear drum ain't really up to modern traffic situations.
He sees me just in time and I politely ask him when he took his driving test. 'March 1917!" He replies. "Perestroika to you too mate!" I reply.
 

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I'll be up the creek without a Ural as they say in these parts.

:D I like that. :D

I only decided to go on this trip a few weeks ago and did no preparation whatsoever! Can you tell?

And bloody good on you for just deciding, and doing. :thumb
Too many folk would still be asking inane questions.
 
I have my 2nd near miss today
Bouncing through town at a steady 40 good old Ivan decides to pull across my path and into the Sainsburys car park.
Brake! brake! brake!
Now, not having ABS on this bike isn't a disadvantage cos no matter how hard you pull and stamp on the brakes they ain't gonna lock up! The original single disk and rear drum ain't really up to modern traffic situations.
He sees me just in time and I politely ask him when he took his driving test. 'March 1917!" He replies. "Perestroika to you too mate!" I reply.

I very nearly met my maker in that same area! Hopefully you have luck on your side.....keep it coming :)
 
Travelling on your own you have to rely heavily on instinct, memory and inquisitiveness, especially in a country where you can't read or write a bloody thing. You rely on pictures for everything.
In Russia there's no such thing as window shopping, everything is bolted up...you can't see inside anywhere!
Struggling to find some action in a small town, I come across what at first glance looks like a lap dance bar. There's pictures on the outside of scantily clad girls with flowers draped all over them.
Mmmm ! I secretly gather together what I think might be enough money for a nights entertainment, muster some courage, pull up my collar and confidently follow another bloke up the steps.

It's a florist!
 


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