PMF Invades Russia

Russians confused at border crossing…

Al and I have made it into Russia and even though this will probably repeat some of the other reports, I thought I’d do another blog – just to keep in practice!

But first:

New female rally driver!

With the departure of the of the Ranger family, (my most sincere sympathy for the whole Armstrong family) I became the new Ranger driver!

Alan and I drove the two cars from Moron, in Mongolia, to Biysk, in Russia.

The first 1000km was at a maximum speed of 50km/h across what looked like the largest quarry anyone could imagine! It just went on and on, over dry creek crossings, wet creek crossings, five-km-wide gibber plains, mountain passes, lakeside sand beds and freezing, deserted plains. Boy, did I learn about vehicle control, preservation and how to curse over flat and/or shredded tyres!

And yes, I managed to almost make the flat tyre tally equal between the two vehicles!

One night I refused to camp in a very windy and cold spot as I couldn’t cook in the conditions. Alan expected me to be crying in the Ranger as we drove on but I wasn’t! We got to a slightly less frigid spot and cooked a passable dinner.

The next night (after the second flat tyre) we stayed with a family at Tsagaanuur, in their little clean, very warm home, surrounded by their goat herd. We slept on carpets on the floor and left next day smelling like REAL Mongolians – goat butter and animal dung smoke!

Crossing the border with the two cars took a long time, but was friendly and efficient. The most time was taken over waiting for the Russian customs workers to have their lunch! At least they were happy with full bellies when they had to deal with two Aussies with two cars full of camping stuff. Maybe they did wonder why each of us had a drawer-full of male and female clothing!

Meeting up with the Ranger’s family was joyful in so many different ways! We love B and D and we’d missed them; having four people in two cars is a bit easier and less tricky to explain than one person per car and now we can get on with the rest of our journey!

Until next time, love to all!