Vladivostok(Russia) to Sokcho (South Korea)
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I left Vladivostok in the rain after saying goodbye to the three Marcus’s and Peter, a great bunch of lads. My mind was completely and utterly preoccupied with my front tire. I was praying it would hold out till Zarubino, it was only 200km away and 90% of the journey was on asphalt. My big worry is that I would have a deflation and wouldn’t be able to reset the bead with the compressor.
There are almost no signs as you’re leaving Vladivostok to tell you which way you’re going but because it’s on a thin peninsula as long as can see the sea on either your right or left side you have to be heading north, south would put you in the water very quickly.
There were several police checks leaving the area, not surprising when you consider the amount of freight that comes through Vladivostok, but all only wanted to see the passport and the vehicle import document, so no hassle but if you’re coming this way give yourself plenty of time.
I got to Zarubino around 12:30. At which point you start handing out cash like it’s a wedding. First off its 250R to a clerk, some form of a tax which allows you into the port. No problem. Then you get to the passenger terminal and pay 700R which is the Terminal tax. Then a woman who looked very like my mother came out from one of the main offices and asked for my paperwork. I’d no idea who she was but I’ve a rule of thumb which is worth sticking to : “Always trust someone who looks like your mother, except if it actually is your mother”
[As I’ve written it, I’m already doubting it! )
She vanished with my stuff, came back with some forms for me to sign, then more forms, then lots of waiting.
Some friendly customs guys came along and checked through the bike. I’ve a bunch of stickers on the back of the bike, one of them is from Canada, so this dude who was just standing there starts arguing with me and the customs guys that I wasn’t from Ireland, that I must be from Canada. I pointed him to the other stickers….and said “So am I also from Ireland, the Czech republic, Germany, Utah, Cody, Nevada, Route 66” …but because the Canada sticker was on the Reg plate he wouldn’t shut up. I could see a seed of doubt growing in the customs guys heads.
I was thinking to myself….”Who is this f
ucker!...and why the f
uck wasn’t he drowned at birth and why doesn’t he just f
uck off”, he was just a guy waiting on the ferry with nothing else to do. I pulled off the Canada sticker..and said “Now!....happy?” and uttered “you bollix” under my breath.
(to pronounce bollix right in a true Dublin accent say it like this... Baaaaa-Leeeex)
With that done the customs guys seemed happy and let me through. I went over and rode the bike up onto the ferry, unloaded my carry on bag and then went back to the ferry terminal to go through customs again as an individual. I kept saying to myself “Dude, you and the bike aren’t out of Russia till you’re in Korea!”
Customs and bag check was a breeze, and then I went on board. I’d taken advice and got a first class cabin, which is a cabin with 4 beds, a sink, and a microwave. Otherwise you can find yourself sleeping in an area with up to 12 other passengers on the floor. With the boat journey scheduled to take 22 hour I said I’d treat myself.
The ferry was supposed to leave at six, it eventually pulled out at nine but then went back to pick up two late arriving containers, so at 11pm we were still at the ferry dock. I got talking to several Russian guys who were working in south Korea and we shared a bottle of Vodka.
I’ve a story about Vodka which is probably worth putting in here:
When I was say sixteen of so growing up in Clondalkin, like most lads my age we went knacker drinking at the weekend. It normally involved knocking down a 2L bottle of Cider and if you could stomach it, maybe a can of two of tenants on top of it. Then we’d head off and go to the rock disco and head bang the night away, while not doing that we were looking at women, given the crowd I hung around were all “Rockers”, (long haired lads into Heavy metal) we mainly just looked at the women, and they looked anywhere but at us.
I’m off the point, it was a bank holiday weekend coming up and there were three good nights planned but I needed a way to get fairly drunk three nights in a row, and I came across a 1L bottle of Blue label Smirnoff. I bought 2L of 7up to go with it and said, “Right, that’s the f
ucker sorted”
Anyway on the Friday night myself and Finan o’ Hogan and some other lads were meeting somewhere (the details are sketchy for reasons which will become clear!) so I went up to my room in the house, the mother was out, and started mixing the vodka and 7up. It tasted a bit nasty but was ok and after about 20minutes I’d half the bottle gone. Not being in the slightest bit drunk I said to myself “Jaysus, half a bottle of vodka gone and I’m not even merry!, I must be a hardened drinker” (Back in those days, to get called a hardened drinker was a compliment). I mixed the rest of the Vodka into the last of the 7up and headed out of the house drinking the remainder of the mixture as I walked up the road.
By the time I got to the top of the street I finished the rest of it, so with fully 1L of Blue label Smirnoff I was walking in the direction of the Lough and Quay pub where there was a teenage disco. Not surprisingly I never made it. I got another 400 hundred yards without collapsing and my buddies spent the rest of the night looking after me.
Finan took me back to his place and tells a great story of how on this night his house was full of O’hogan’s who were having something of a 20 year family reunion. And sure enough there was Hughes, stuck in the corner puking into a bucket for the whole night telling everyone who came near him either that he loved them or to f
uck off.
I remember going home the next morning still mouldy with gargle and looking “shook”. My mother greeted me in her thick Kerry accent with the words “You gobshite!, you do that again and I’ll cut your throat in six places”
Many years later I can’t even smell vodka without getting flash backs but these lads had shared some of their food with me so I felt obliged. ()
I stopped early so things were good but looked out the back of the restaurant to see that we still hadn’t moved.
The good news was that none of three other beds were taken in my cabin so I’d the place to myself and after watching the movie Ghost town on the lap top I headed off to sleep. What time we eventually left at I don’t know.
Day 2 Zarubino to Sokcho
Breakfast was at eight on the ferry, and let’s just say it wasn’t something that caters to the western palette. I walked up to the viewing decks and had a look around, there’s nothing visible on any horizon. The closest country is North Korea and the ferry is taking a very wide berth from it.
I went up to information and asked what time the ferry would arrive today, and what they are saying is 3:30pm. There was no way I’d make it Seoul so what would happen now?
We pulled into a well manicured harbor and after getting through customs and immigration control ....
(I was the first Irish guy they’d seen coming through that border crossing apparently, because on all of their cheat sheet lists of how to deal with visitors from various countries…Ireland wasn’t on any of them!!!!!.... I looked around for someone to give a high five to….first paddy through!!....woo hoo!!!!)
....Wendy Choi gave me a call and said I could stay in the drivers hut till 2am which would be the new time we’d be leaving for Seoul, yep 2 am!....jeez!
Later!
Oisin
