Travel Story: lawrence bransby - russia
The following day was a well-needed rest day spent socialising with our new friends. We were tired and it was good to take a break. The distances we had had to cover through Russia were vast and required long and hard riding; in retrospect, we probably needed another two weeks to do the route justice: time to explore more, to savour the countryside at a slower speed, meet more people, pause more often…
Gareth was still determined to find a route from Archangel to Murmansk following the White Sea coast. A brief look at the map suggests that this is logical - the alternative is a 1,200 mile route which dips far to the south then west and finally north again to Murmansk. But all the small roads seem to end in the wilderness or double back to the main road after heading purposefully in the right direction for a while. We had both seen a "road" that went the whole way but, on closer inspection, it turned out to be a railway track. Whilst pouring over
the map after breakfast, we were joined by about eight Russian bikers, all of whom had opinions about the viability of the route. But the consensus was clear: it was impossible. One told us that a year or so ago 5 bikers from Moscow attempted it but only 2 made it through and one died on the way. I don't know whether that is apocryphal, though. They told us that the topography between Archangel and Murmansk alternates between islands of dense forest surrounded by lakes and swamp. One commented wryly that, when looking at small roads on any map of Russia, one must treat them as little more than pictures on a page: they look good but in reality many of them do not exist at all - just in the minds of the authorities who would like there to be a road there so they draw it on the map – something we discovered for ourselves later in the trip.