Day 28 – Novobinsk to Barnaul

High point: So while Ben was taking a stupid amount of time wandering around Novo trying to change Kazak Tenge into USD a Russian Wedding party stumbled across Martha. What a start to the day – you have to check out the pictures below.

Low point: Really struggling here as there wasn’t one from my perspective. James was horrifically hung over – that was a low point for him. The rest of us basked in his pain.

No point: The pasties in Russia are much thinner than at Gregg’s bakers

Russian word of the day: Ya tebya l’yoo-bl’yoo (I love you)

Authors comments:

It was a slow start. The beers and litre of straight vodka from the previous evening meant the crew were a little hazy. Ross tried to hide the pain but it’s pretty obvious when the big bear doesn’t speak for an hour. James wasn’t able to hide anything. His morning was spent chundering in the bathroom as Ben, Steve and I laughed.

We eventually departed our dorms and wandered outside to find Martha was once again attracting attention. The accommodation was pretty central and must have been near a registry office as a Wedding party were gathering. We obviously encouraged their advances and pretty quickly Ross was a happy assistant, helping the bride into the driver’s seat for the obligatory photo. The video of this is amazing!

Given the late start the amusement and confusion only lasted 30 mins before we were back on the road. We’re now heading south towards Mongolia so weren’t sure how the roads were going to keep. The days drive was around 250km but the roads turned out to be very good. We’re shocked how the roads around Moscow were horrendous but further away from the big capital they’ve appeared to start improving. Martha is having no issues (I probably shouldn’t have said that)

Lunch was once again at a roadside cafe. While Steve was chatting live with Irish radio we found the Russian version of a pasty. So outside of the usual crisps and snickers lunch we also had a pasty. Lovely. Thankfully Berocca and Nuun are saving us in terms of daily vitamins and hydration!

We arrived at Barnaul in very good time and found one of the recommended hotels reasonably quickly. It’s illegal to camp in Russia so hostels and hotels are our only option. You also have to register everywhere you go. I think this is so the state can keep track of you but given it’s all paper how realistic this is I’d put at 0% to 2%. The Ruskies love their paperwork however so this does help us out at the border. Still I’m sure my frustration at the system is pretty obdvious!

Last big positive of the day was the food. Evenings are normally spent trying to find a chicken shop half as good as KFC. At Barnaul the hotel receptionist recommended what turned out to be a steak restaurant! It was better than Gaucho. So happy!

Dave

[flickr album=72157624632849403 num=30 size=Square]