Farewell Tour

[monkeyboy]

At 5 they’re back. The magic email appears and it’s game on. This isn’t a game he can stop when he likes. He has to swim into the system until he completely looses sight with land and then tread water. Blindly hitting да on screens full of random letters, having pictures done, entering endless codes in the phone, holding a camera and reading numbers out, signing pieces of paper, giving the phone to a couple of young women to let their fingers blur and set up the government app and the banking app and connecting a sim to the bank account and depositing money in an ATM and then suddenly land appears and he crawls out the water with a Russian SIM, bank account and government account in his name. Just what he always wanted

There is method in his madness thought. A SIM gives him access to Yandex, the Russian Google, with its maps and taxi services etc, plus, if his tiny swede can work out how to use it properly, the bank card will let him book hotels online, maybe.

Job done and we can go. Say farewell. Roll out and never return It’s all easy to say..

Head out of town, past the queues at any fuel station with the nearest sniff of petrol and head east towards Lithuania. It’s warm, sunny and I’m purring along enjoying the scents of the harvest being brought in. I’m genuinely happy and I’m thinking how calm it is. I can see Africa and his mate behind, I can see empty road in front.

Then I stop at a supermarket. The bladder on my back is starting to leek and needs a toilet but the supermarket doesn’t have one. A quick foray into the bushes reveals a hastily ripped opened and abandoned 4 pack of toilet paper and a big curly turd. This must be the toilet then.

 

[monkeyboy]

His mate wants a word. “I’ve got a problem. I’ve got an engine light come on”. Well, actually that will be Africa that has her engine light on. Fuck. That’s given The Twat something to think about. Still, his mate has at least 20 new warming lights on every time I see him and he’s still going. I just hope he doesn’t go “full house” whilst we’re away. I have a quick word with Africa and tell her to get her shit together fast else she’s going home.

Roll up to the Kalinigrad border. There is the line. There is the barrier. There is the farewell point. I will never be at this place again. One last look in the mirrors and it’s gone. Forever.

The Lithuania border is quick. But just as everything is done and the barrier is about to be lifted the young blonde in the booth asks The Twat “How old is your friend?”. He asks her to guess. “70?” No. She looks at his passport and her eyes pop wide open “Is it really true?” “Yes love, yes it is. I borrowed him from The Natural History museum”

Lithuania is a bore. We’re just on the motorway and it’s like we’ve exited Russia into Euro MineCraft. Straight roads, big, boxy buildings everywhere. Everything made for minimum price, style and effort. Eurobland. “Where the fuck are we?” Land.

The baggage is holed up in a sweaty cheap room full of flies whilst I sit outside and watch 2 people squeeze each other’s spots like a couple of chimps. I’d rather be back in Russia to be perfectly honest.

Tomorrow is another crossing into the void. I’ll see you on the other side. Hopefully.

 

[ATT]

So glad to be reading another of your little trips, it always makes me feel 'sane' again.

 

[monkeyboy]

Well that didn’t go quite to plan. We rocked up to the Lithuania border with Belarus and it was immediately clear that Africa and I were not welcome. The bloke got out the car in front and said something to the effect that bikes weren’t allowed. The Twat in his usual fashion just asked Google which said “yes, of course you can bring your motorcycle into Belarus”, and ignored him.

But then 3 Belarusians pulled up behind and got out and said the same thing. They all kept saying “Poland”. So rather than take the word of some sweaty randoms I went to the front of the queue and The Twat asked the guard, who pointed at a sign with a motorcycle on it, and a big red stripe though it. And then said “Poland”. We turned round and stopped at a petrol station 200m up the road. The luggage dismounted and a truck driver immediately shouted “Poland” at them too.

Turns out, for whatever reason, the mighty government of the world superpower that is Lithuania has banned bikes using this crossing. Wankers

And it also turns out The Twat needs to be a lot more specific when he asks whatever feisty AI bitch is on duty if he wants the actual answer. Latvia would be the most convenient, so, of course, it seems it’s a bit of a lottery if you can or not.

So, taking the advice of the locals and making sure to be as specific as he can he asks google “Can an aging, balding, leaking British biker with a milk addiction and a propensity to fart whilst performing even the slightest physical exertion enter Belarus from Poland on his trusty, noisy and extremely potty mouthed motorcycle?”

“Yes”

Excellent.

“But only if he wears pink eye liner and calls himself Carol”

Deal.

It’s a bust for today. The Twat cancels his hotel and in the process donates half the Belarusian GDP in cancellation charges and they point my nose south west towards Poland. We wouldn’t make it to the border until the afternoon and given his passport’s current prowess as a shit magnet we don’t want to start what could be a lengthy process today so we just saunter across the plains watching the weather throw a strop on the horizon.

Our arrival at Augustow is perfect timed to coordinate with the depositing from the sky of 3 times the amount water the drains can handle. Cobbled streets are always a bastard, but cobbled streets under a foot of water are bloody delicious in this heat.

The Twat goes walk about to find some pink eyeliner and he’s struck by a very familiar smell. When he was a kid, his mum used some spectacularly evil foul smelling toxic fly spray. Every time a group of girls comes past it’s like a blast from the past. So either the formula was passed to a perfume manufacturer, or something about Polish girls naturally attracts the flies. ‎

 

[monkeyboy]

Ok. Let’s try this again. It’s cool and wet and a lot of the roads look like people have been up early throwing their washing up water on them. They’re all frothy, white, and slippery. This road will be much safer when everyone can afford dishwashers.

But at least I can’t see any signs telling motorbikes to fuck off and never darken their door again.

Exit from the EU. This should be simple and straightforward. The Twat hands over his Passport and V5, does his fingerprints and photo then watches as another guard comes to look at the monitor. He takes the passport and V5, comes outside and tells him to move me to a holding area out the way. “Please wait. I need to check”. This is becoming a bit tiresome. Brian goes through without incident. Again.

After 30 minutes the guard comes out and asks where we have come from. What route across Europe have we taken. The Twat’s shit magnet is showing no sign of calming down that’s for sure.

His mate thinks it’s because he’s tall. I think it’s because he said his name was Susan instead of Carol. So he just has to just stand there in his pink eyeliner and leather skirt and be smiled and winked at by all the drivers as they pass.

Eventually he is released and we get to the Belarusian side. Going through these fucking bloody wanking shitting Eastern European borders is like watching the The Matrix super slow motion sequences, in super slow motion. Movement is almost imperceptible. It’s like everyone is dead with their bloody eyes open. AhhhhhhhhhHHHHH WHY THE FUCK COULDN’T WE JUST HAVE GONE TO PORTSMOUTH INSTEAD YOU SELFISH USELESS TWAT. WHY OH WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THIS TO ME?.

5 hours. For 3 bits of paper. And just we were about to leave the Doris that had just been right through my panniers decided I needed a X-Ray too. FUCK HIM. I’ve really had enough. I’ve done my time. I just want to get home and spend my retirement sitting in pub car parks telling any other bikes in listening distance just how fucking great I am. Bollocks to this. I’ll do my best to get him round this time and hand over the baton to The Tart in the garage. She’s bloody welcome to him.

And now he’s hanging about playing with his helmet again. It’s getting late and I’ve got to take him over 200 miles to Minsk yet. But all he ever thinks about is himself. He's at a Belarussian fuel station and an English voice behind him asks him where they're from. Which is odd. Two Belarussian lawyers that used to work in London with the Belarussian Embassy. He looks like he's a donor for hair transplants, and she's smiling away chatting easily. Very friendly and pleasant, they have a couple of daughters training to be lawyers too. They've returned to Belarus because of the collapse in trade since the conflict started. Another random effect when the war butterfly flapped its wings.

 

[monkeyboy]

Because he got stung the other night when he had to cancel his hotel, they don’t have any booking for tonight, so we all end up at some kind of kids borstal on the outskirts. I can see their room from the car park. Floors 1-3 are packed with screaming girls slamming doors and stomping up and down the corridors. 4-7 are full of testosterone and young blokes trying to talk with lower voices than their mates while forming fluffy beards from 20 pieces of bum fluff. They’re sandwiched on the 4th floor. Serves the fuckers right. This is all their own fault.

We’ve got a dead day today. A kicking our heals day. The exit refusal at the Lithuania border cost us a day and the knock on effect is that they couldn’t visit the MTЗ tractor factory, like the pair of old saddos that they are. So they spent the day irritating each other like small children instead.

And worrying. Well, The Twat did anyway. His mate doesn’t seem to worry about anything from what I can see.

The Twat is totally consumed with trying to decide his route from here on. His brain is spinning round and round and round. It’s like someone pulling the lever on a broken fruit machine where the wheels never stop. He really wants to go through Russia, but that’s looking increasingly difficult. So maybe he could go up to the top of Finland and enter Russia through Norway just to visit Murmansk, but that’s a 2000 mile round trip. Or he could just turn round and fuck off home back to his comfort blanket of a high vis uniform, a dirty old transit and the familiar sounds of “C@NT.. FUCK.. WANKER CUN@.. FUCKER” from his workmates. But he just can’t do it. It’s all he’s thinking about. He’s reading horror stories of fuel shortages but The Twat is still not discounting that option. The harder and more difficult it is, the more he wants to do it. Has he got a fucking death with or something? His original plan was to run right round to Arkhangelsk then catch a ferry across the White Sea to Murmansk and go into Norway from there. And that's what he really wants to do. He's got the SIM and the bank account to help him. It would be difficult and probably involve a shit ton of waiting about but, unfortunately, that's what twitches his trousers. That's what he wants to fill his memory bank with. He wants to scar himself with trials and tribulations and sleeping in ditches eating mud sandwiches waiting for fuel to arrive. WTAF is wrong with him? Well he’ll need to decide pretty dam soon.

Me. I just want to feel my nose being pointed towards home one last time. I want a life without the pressure. I just want sanctuary. And that’s not helping The Twat one little bit. It looks like he is going to have to decide for himself rather than leaving it to fate.

Still, it could be worse. He could spend every day working inside a giant pencil case at a train station.

 

[monkeyboy]

I woke up in the middle of the night last night and I’m bloody dam sure I could hear big explosions going off. The same sorts of explosions I heard when I was in Russia last year. Way in the distance but BIG booms. It went on for a while. We're not really that far from Kyiv I guess

Or.. it could equally have been the sound of The Twat’s brain finally giving up and terminating his turmoil by exploding. But I really think that would be more of a quiet “phut”.

Either way. I think it’s time to leave Belarus. But, as usual, there is more pontificating and distraction and delaying decisions by just sticking his thumb in his mouth, reverting to a child and going to see some BIG trucks.

 

[monkeyboy]

I’ve had enough of Belarus. Let’s get the fuck out of here. The weather’s shit. It’s 14 degrees and shitting with rain. The road is a constant stream of small temporary diversions made by people who usually make ice rinks. Shiny enough to see your face in and with the grip of a 90 year old Nana. I’m ruining my newly painted nails trying to hang on without throwing The Twat into the woods, though it HAS crossed my mind. More than once. He’s suck a stupid wanker. Riding on fumes on a Sunday morning in a country with fuel stations further apart than Jordan’s knees is asking for trouble. Add in the fact that they only have a few Belarusian Rubles left and that not all places can use card. Well let’s get that right. Everywhere uses card, but not everywhere takes VISA. Belarus is odd. It’s like Russia was a few years ago. It has WhatsApp et al, and not all its banks have been completely cut off the swift system. Some, mostly government affiliated, business use the Russian SibrBank though and are cut off.

And every petrol station he has tried this morning has been Belorusneft which have been giving his card . I’m getting really thirsty now. REALLY thirsty. He’s such a selfish prick. He has a bit of cash but his mate has none, and he’d rather use his cash to feed himself rather than me. But it’s getting to a point he’ll have to go hungry else we won’t get to the border. I can see what he’s thinking. He’s thinking if he abandons his mate then he can buy fuel and food. But just as he’s about to pick a spot to bury his mate at the roadside there is another station with a different name. He gives the Nana his card, somewhere in the background someone does a drum roll, and it spits out a receipt. Thank fuck for that. His mate can live again and The Twat can eat a soggy lukewarm cinnamon bun.

As he’s chewing he peruses the offerings on the shelves in front of him and imagines someone being sent here for provisions.

“Can you get me an old blanket and a dressing gown while you’re there please? And some crowns please. Get 6 because they were out of stock last time. If you’ve got any change can you get me a cat cushion, and maybe a small surprise”

“Ok, she wants a surprise. I’ll get this to show how much I love her beaver. I’m sure she”ll see the funny side”

I’m full up and ready to go but they’re out of the good stuff so he’s fed me 92 instead of 95. This road leads directly east and there are a lot of Russians filling up before crossing back to join the queues in the motherland.

Belarus really is quite desolate and very sparsely populated. There is next to fuck all between Minsk and the Latvian border except wind and rain and a very lonely little town where they test anti-depressants.

Then a shit storm to the border

Get to the border and as he’s getting off the bike The Twat is looking down at the ground. A beautiful, slim pair of ankles enters his frame in a pair of simple but perfect black shoes. He’s completely mesmerised. The simple creature is fixated. He can hear talking but he can’t bring himself to lift his head and find out where it’s coming from. Then a small pair of jack boots enters the frame and the spell is broken. There js a tall blonde and a stumpy brunette vying for his attention. Stumpy is firing Russian at him and pointing back up the road.

“I don’t understand, sorry. Can’t we talk about this ladies ankles instead? I’ve never seen anything like them. They look like they were made by an expert sculptor”

Stumpy turns up the volume and crosses her arms. Perhaps she’s jealous. Perhaps she has “cankles” instead. That’s why she wraps them up in fatigues instead of wearing a skirt. Either way there is no way we’re getting out at the moment.

“I’m fine. I am happy to wait here for hours and just look at those ankles. Take as long as you like”

But no. A driver crossing the other way gets his daughter out the car to translate what he already knew but didn’t register due to his childish man brain’s current obsession. He read about having to register to exit and he tried but couldn’t find any way to do it. So, as usual, he stuck his head up his arse, ignored it and let fate decide the outcome. So back they go to find a shabby hut with a pair of Nanas and a lottery card machine. Twat read it was 5 Rubles for bikes to exit and has 10 in his pocket but Nana wants 25 each so they play the lottery, wait for the request mouse to run all the way back along the line to the bank, have a rest and a piece of cheese, then run all the way back, and out spits our exit ticket The Twat manages to grab a few last longing looks at ankles and they’re through to the border and after a couple of hours back into Latvia.

 

[Engineer]

Fabulous photographs!