Walter Colebatch, the UK Sibirsky Extreme moto adventure project leader, returned to Yakutia from Baikal. He said good bye to his fellows Tony and Terry, who went back home to England. At that moment, he thought “I still harboured a burning ambition to get to the Arctic Circle in Asia… I just had enough time before the seasons changed to try one more time to get North from Udachny.”
As two months ago, he hit the same route Ust-Kut – Lensk – Mirny – Chernyshevsky – Morkoka – Aikhal – Udachny and finally reached the place just a few kilometers before the Arctic Circle, the place that had stopped him and Tony last time round.
“The river then had been full of water, and rain was falling,” wrote Walter. “Now it was colder, but the sky was half blue. I approached the marker on my GPS that indicated the limit of our travels last time and took a photo. Now it was all dry road. Just 100 metres ahead there was the River … One look told me the river was 3-4 metre wide and at least 1 metre deep. I walked the shallowest part … My arse got cold and wet. That wont work on the bike, especially considering the current as well.”
Further, please, find more of Walter’s travelogue plus the scanned maps of the Anabar Road.
UST-KUT – LENSK
30.08 – 31.08 – 01.09.09
I loaded the bike onto the boat for Lensk at another obscure loading point. As it happened, the boat had to dock briefly at the main river port anyway, next to the Lena Hotel… My boat pulled away into the darkness, set for 1000 km on the Lena.
I shared a 4 berth room on the boat with Valeri, and old truck driver from Lensk. He was clean, didnt drink or smoke, and was about as good a companion as I could have hoped for.
I had been told the ride to Lensk would be two days, Valeri had been told a day and a half. A couple of hours out of Ust Kut and it was apparent that was not going to happen. The engines shut down and the boot moored in the river about midnight. When I awoke in the morning, we had not moved. We were still just 45km from Ust Kut. It was almost midday before the engines fired up again. We had thought the boat had stopped due to fog last night, but there had be no fog since early in the morning. It was apparent there was a bit of engine repair and maintenance going on. I noted only one propeller was turning and when the boat was moving we were making about 17-20 km/h … about the same as the barge had done two months earlier. So I assumed we would also take about 3 days for the journey.
The boat had warm showers for a few hours each day and a galley, where hot meals were prepared 3 times a day. That was a big improvement on the barge. In theory the barge could have cost us about 9000 rubles each back in July … the price for vehicles was 4000 rubles per metre of length. But they didnt know how to account for motorcycles as they are not full width vehicles. I guess they could have charged us half the regular price per metre, but in the end they charged us nothing, and we took the barge from Ust Kut to Lensk for free. The boat I was on now, the ‘Moskovsky 11′ charged 8000 rubles (180 EUR) per passenger for the journey (which included a cabin) … and 6000 for the motorcycle, which was fitting neatly on the front deck of the boat…
..This year is a turning into a great year for horizon widening in Siberia. All sorts of new possibilities have opened up. Routes have been mapped and documented. Mac [Swinarski, a Moto Siberia Expedition leader] was telling me even the locals in Anadyr know nothing about the perfectly decent new roads he found to their city. Only a handful of people know anything about the roads – usually the truck drivers that regularly drive them in their 6WD trucks – and they typically don’t have internet. We found the same with the BAM road and Vilyuisky Trakt.
Most of the locals you ask en route don’t have a clue and know only about the area within about an hour or two’s drive away from where they are. The two Moscow guys we met adventuring across the country in their wazzik (Road of Bones) had expressed great surprise that we had done the Vilyuisky Trakt. They had been been researching Russian 4WD sites for months, and found nothing to suggest it was possible…
..Back to life on the river… A day later, and our boat docked in Vitim, where the Vitim River joins the Lena. Vitim is a real boom town around here. There is a big plan to develop oil and gas fields about 170 km ‘inland’ and Vitim will be the centre of logistics for that. The next few years will see the town grow from a small service port to one of the key cities on the Lena, the same way Lensk grew dramatically to service the diamond towns of Mirny, Almazny, Aikhal, Udachny and Anabar several decades ago.
Valeri, my cabin mate, was telling me that if it werent for the crisis they would have started building the planned road between Lensk and Vitim already. Watch out for that one in the next few years. Already there is a road from the BAM town of Nebel to Kirensk on the Lena, so in a couple of years you would need a boat only from Kirensk to Vitim. In about 6-7 years, you wont need the boat at all to go from Ust Kut to Lensk as there should be a road all the way. (Actually you don’t need a boat now – you can go all the way the long way round via Tynda and Yakutsk.) Plans are to link Ust Kut with the new oil and gas fields by road, which will already be linked to Lensk via Vitim.
02.09.09
About 10am, after 3.5 days on the river, the boat docked in Lensk and I unloaded my bags and then the bike. I had a big day ahead of me. I was going to try and get to Udachny, 770km away, all on dirt roads, by the end of the day. If I made it, it would be the biggest day of the trip in terms of mileage. I had wasted enough time on the boat and had itchy feet. Too much time sitting and thinking, without any doing.
LENSK – MIRNY
I found a fuel station and hit the road. It was 10:20 when I left Lensk. I’d had plenty to eat on the boat over the last few days so breakfast was not required. I would go straight through to Mirny 240 km away.
The road from Lensk to Mirny was in truly excellent condition. Its one of the finest dirt roads I have ever ridden. I sat on 110 km/h the whole way, but if I didn’t have mousse in my front tyre and gearing for low speed via my front sprocket, I would have done most of the road at 130. I stopped on for photographs. The seasons were changing up here already and the trees were bursting with colour.
I fuelled up again on the southern edge of Mirny. I didnt need to – I would fuel up at Chernyshevsky 100 km further up the road too, but there the price would be a lot higher and the quality less reliable. Better to get as much as possible while in Mirny. I sped on to Andrei’s workshop, our trusty mechanic from 2 months ago, arriving at 12:45. I had texted him I was on my way as I left Lensk, but it was a quiet day in the workshop and he was away. I stripped the bags off the bike and just took a couple of much lightened bags – leaving two bags at Andrei’s to collect on my return.
I stopped at the Mirny market place to pick up some Samsa’s for the trip North. Andrei had shown me this little shop, a personal favorite, 2 months ago, and remembered the samsa’s were the best I had eaten in Russia. I took the liberty with time of eating one. I pulled out of Mirny just before 2pm. It would be a 6-7 hour ride to Udachny, 530 km away, assuming I stopped only for fuel along the way.
MIRNY – UDACHNY
The road from Mirny to Chernyshevsky is not as good as the Lensk – Mirny section of the Anabar Road, and party out of respect for the road and partly because I wanted to get accustomed to riding at 90 km/h for the section North of Chernyshevsky to conserve fuel, I slowed to 90 km/h for the 105km to Chernyshevsky. I topped up with 5 litres of fuel there. Now I was maxxed out on fuel. Both tanks dripping fuel onto the pavement. 22 litres ready to burn.
Last time we went up from Chernyshevsky, both Tony and I had both burned more fuel than expected … we had a strong headwind the whole way and rode at 110 km/h … which probably explains it. But I ran out before Aikhal, which is still 65 km short of Udachny, and relied on Tony going ahead to get me 5 litres. This time I wanted to go straight thru to Udachny. There wasnt too much wind about and I was going to try and stick to the more economical speed of 90 km/h by the GPS … which is about 96 km/h on my speedo.
The usual collection of ‘Jacksons’ (terminology courtesy of the brothers Vince) stopped me to ask the usual question in Chernyshevsky when I refuelled and then stopped at the shop for a litre of liquid refreshment, but I brushed them aside. I was on a mission. I had now done about 350 km and had 420 still to go – non stop. I didnt know when it got dark this far North at this time of year, but I was only 3 weeks from the equinox … I guessed it would be about 8pm. I had no time to spare if I wanted to not risk riding in the dark.
Headphones were blaring and I just concentrated on the surface of the road ahead. There had clearly been rain around and some patches of the road were moist, tho so far no rain had touched me today. The first point of interest would be the village of Morkoka. It’s the only inhabited place between Aikhal and Chernyshevsky. It has about half a dozen buildings, a fuel station that seems to only sell diesel (though I would try again to buy petrol when I got there) and I have been told a cafe with rooms.
When I got there, I asked a stopped truck driver where the cafe was. It seems a silly question for someone in the west, but in the more remote parts of Russia, every building and every door looks the same. None offer a hint of what is behind each one. Places like Morkoka dont even bother with signs. There are no visitors here – Just the regular truck drivers who know where everything is. I marked the location of the cafe on my GPS and moved on to the fuel station.
I am compiling a list of waypoints of all the cafes, fuel stations, hotels, water hazards etc I have used, crossed or even seen in off the beaten track Siberia. I think that would be useful. No one needs a guide or guide book if you already know where the fuel, cafes and hotels are.
As I suspected, the fuel station refused to sell me fuel – mentioned something about needing paperwork, coupons or something like that to buy here. I looked inside my tanks to guess how much fuel I had left. My economy looked good. I estimated at current consumption I would get to Udachny with 2-3 litres to spare.
It was always a risk, now that I was travelling alone. When I was with Tony we could take these risks. If one person ran out of fuel, the other could go ahead with the fuel canister. Tony had been Tsar of the spare fuel canister … mainly from necessity. Terry and I both had 22 litres of capacity, due to modifications, but Tony had just the stock 17 litre tank. This was however, compensated with a old 5 litre oil container found by the side of the road, at a cost of zero rubles / dollars / euro / sterling. By strapping that old grey plastic oil container to his bike, he too had 22 litres.
I would risk the ride to Udachny. The signs were positive. I even stopped to eat another Samsa. I had done 300 km since Mirny, in 3.5 hours, including a fuel stop and Samsa break – pretty much 90 km/h on the road. It was 17:30 and I was peckish. 230km to go to Udachny … I should get there soon after 8pm.
It was tougher going after Morkoka. I felt tired at several points. The recent rain over the road had been very recent – last couple of hours I reckoned. Several places I had to be a little careful due to slippery surfaces. If the increasing cold had brought Autumn colour to the trees between Lensk and Mirny, up here there was only one colour – gold. All the trees were close to losing their remaining gold leaves. The temperature was about 5 degrees. I had plugged in my Exo heated jacket in Morkoka. It was the first time I had needed it in almost 2 months. I was glad I still had it. The forecast for later in the week is for serious cold.
At about 7:30pm I made it to the turnoff to Aikhal. I thought briefly about a 12km run into town to get fuel, but I was pretty confident my visual inspection in Morkoka was accurate and I would get to Udachny. I pressed on over the stretch of road that had given Tony 5 flat tyres in one night. Without Tony’s flat tyres, the road was a hell of a lot quicker I thought to myself. Flat tyres didnt seem to be a problem for me, but rain might be.
Since passing the Aikhal turnoff, evil looking clouds were building. At one point drops of rain were hitting me from the edge of a storm cell, but I was riding through the very edge of the cell, and I was through it in less than a minute. I passed several points where Tony had had flats and it brought back memories of being stuck in the rain fixing endless flats. Miserable memories. I put them aside and soon found myself in sight of Udachny. My fuel warning light was not yet on, I had made it in one day. By the time I pulled up in front of the hotel, I had racked up 765 km … apart from 5km thru Mirny, it was all dirt. It was about 8:20pm. (8:50pm by the time I did all the time consuming Russian Hotel paperwork and got into my room).
I was cold. I hadnt plugged in my heated gloves, and my toes felt like ice. It was half an hour in a hot shower for me before I was suitably thawed. I popped outside to grab a cold beer and sunk back in an armchair to enjoy it. Tomorrow I sniff around the Arctic Circle again.
- – -
03.09.09
I slept in till 10am … I deserved it after yesterday. The bike was still outside, but it was bitingly cold. The receptionist said it was zero degrees out there. It was time for an executive decision – I delayed outdoor action in favour of the hotels communal washing machine. I had plenty of clothes to wash; the only clean ones being what was still clean from the Taksimo wash about a week ago. While washing, I had a visit at the hotel from the local immigration police / FSB. They were full of questions about what a solo motorcyclist might be doing here in Udachny. A lot of documents were copied but all seemed in order and things returned to normal.
I emerged around midday to a cold overcast day and headed for the cafe around the corner to warm up. Tony and I had stopped here to warm up 2 months ago after a cold ride up from Aikhal and I remembered this place had the best lemon tea in all of Russia.
About 1pm and I summonned my resolve and jumped on the cold bike, headed firstly for the petrol station. Udachny had 2. Last time I was here one was out of fuel and the other was rationing sales. I went to the one thhat sold us fuel last time, but they adamantly wouldnt sell me fuel without coupons. I turned round and went to the other one. They were selling 92 octane at the huge price of 40 rubles a litre. At the place that required coupons it had been 29.50. I guess thats supply and demand for you. I took only 10 litres. I wanted to have my main 10 litre tank full, but as little as possible in the extra tank. I wanted the bike as light and manouvreable as possible for the assault on the next 20km of the Anabar Road.
400 rubles later and I headed on down the road that had stopped us last time round…
The full story of Walter Colebatch’s breakthrough at SibirskyExtreme.com.
UPDATE: Received the short message from Walter. Think, it won’t be polite to disclose his great plan. I would like just to give an advice. If anyone wishes in the near future to experience the same moto adventure excitement in Yakutia & Siberia as the Sibirsky Etreme had, follow the updates of Walter’s website :))
UPDATE2: In his last travelogue post Walter disclosed his plan for summer 2009. There is a good opportunity for bike travelers to join the motorcycle trip from Magadan to Lake Baikal next year. Walter wrote “It could only ever be a small group, 5-8 people, over 4 weeks. If anyone is interested, drop me a line thru the blog and we will send out more detailed information as we put it together. If we get enough expressions of interest, we will have a serious ride on next summer, Magadan – Baikal.”
Similar Posts:
- Sibirsky Extreme: Ust-Kut – Peleduj – Lensk – Mirny – Udachnyj – Yakutsk
- What is the Vilyuisky Trakt?
- The Kolyma Highway (the Road of the Bones) by Sibirsky Extreme
- Some rates: Ust-Kut – Lensk by a barge, Olekminsk – Yakutsk by a motor boat
- Khandyga – Yakutsk – Mirny – Lensk
