Day 5 - 3/7 – Myshkin to Rybinsk and onto the Sport Hotel at Demino (of course!)

Obviously my blogs are already toooooo long, so I will try and cut down on the twaddle and just give you some pointers.

This adventure tour means that we aren’t staying in the cities and towns but out on the edges, which totally suits me – tho not having access to the internet is a slight pain. 

So away we went this morning – 80km ahead of us.  Generally the roads are sealed but in very poor conditions, with a few tantalising stretches of new surface.  But this morning, just out of town, we turned left onto a dirt road.  But first a feast of smultron (wild strawberry) and blueberries! 

There were more blueberries than smultron and I think the Swedish smultron are a lot tastier.  But the blue berries were great!

Then off through the forest on a dirt track – Karina would not have been amused!  Not only was it a bit hairy riding, the track was lined with stingy nettles, which kept us on the straight and narrow.  There was an option to ride onto the main road or to cut through a small row of villages, so the majority opted for the bush track. 

It was worth every pedal stroke.  Pine forest, birch, wildflowers, then very traditional village life – old dark wooden houses, beautiful but not painted generally window frames contrasted against the bright red satellite phones (one for each of the 3 villages).  This is a government initiative to make sure that contact with the outside world if help was need could be made.  These phones are only for emergencies… 

We stopped in one village to fill our water bottles from a well – its called a Crane Well – a weight assisted pivot arm, one end is a bucket on a rope, this is pulled down until the bucket fills with water, then the weight on the other end of the pivot arm raises the bucket once the tension is gently released.  The water was cold and clear…  and supposed safe to drink, so I did…

On we went – it was only for 5 or 6 km.  But filled with so much of the real Russia that we had came to see.  We had a little of our extreme biking experience – a tiny creek with a narrow bridge, just enough for our bikes and our feet to shuffle across (and no time to photo cos the next rider was right behind me).
somewhere along the ride we zinked in to see an old church - this one not being renovated.  it was right on the banks of the Volga.

Inside there was still faint images of the frescoe wall paintings, one in particular with its halo of real gold paint surrounding Jesus' head.

as we stood on the Volga bank a cruise ship went past and we commented on how much they are missing out - cyclists get to see "off the track" stuff - Yay!!








we had a lunch break in a small village, where the townsfolk must have thought we were a tad crazy by the looks they gave us.




It was in this village that we made use of the GP's toilets!  very kind of them to allow us and thanks to Mark who can speak some Russian.

Then onto Rybinsk, this regions 2^nd largest city – you will have to find out what the largest is, I might be able to tell you later J



It was closed during the Soviet times as it was the factory area for the air force and army machinery and probably other things.  We went to the museum to learn about the hydro dam that flooded a large town just north of Rybinsk.  Started in 1937 and completed in 1940 almost entirely built by hand; prisoners hands that is.  3 major monasteries were flooded – although at that time because of the Soviet era, were not functioning monasteries.  Wooden homes were dismantled, made into rafts with all the personal belonging stacked on top and floated down the river to Rybinsk, where the people were offered tiny plots of land to rebuild.  If government didn’t think the homes were worth moving then the owners had to either sell at half price or move it themselves, while the more “worthy” were paid to move their homes.  Some older residents, who didn’t want to move, chained themselves to their homes and drowned when the water was released.  The tragic thing is that this country is too flat and the dam is only about 5m deep except in the old river bed channels.  And its ability to generate power couldn’t keep up with the demand of the 20^th Century and is only used to add some power when there are high demands.  A typical tragic tale of Russia….  Perhaps, but it’s how we perceive it…

While we were in the museum there was quite a quick heavy shower of rain and this filled up the dents and potholes in the road.

Rybinsk had a grotty run down feel to it… well, in the area that we were in. 

typical city bus - drivers are as scary as all bus drivers are!

Lenin in the town square

We headed off on the bridge over the Volga.  I was sure we were going south then west, but in fact it was north then east, but soon we were in Demino, a sporting complex where they train for all different sports.  There are ski slopes and other stuff and there were some young people skiing with rollers – it looked like hard work…

We locked up our bikes in a small room then back to the hotel for hot showers, a decent meal and a walk around the sports village. 






(btw I have been really well catered for as the only vego on the trip - the least options I have had has been in the flash hotels in Moscow! - otherwise have been getting plenty of protein and variety! - Oh and while I am chatting about the food - there is a lot of fresh salad, soups, mail meal and not often a dessert, so that suits me down to the ground, tho I think a few people have wished for a sweet something at the end of a meal - maybe sugar is not that important in Russia :P)

What animal is this?  We saw a couple of these statues along the way today

Its still the Volga I think

On our walk around the sports village we saw heaps of really nice looking cabins, one really large hall/accommodation and also a bandstand which had pretty good echo in the middle.  Everyone had to have a turn singing, so us aussies knocked out a crude version of waltzing matilda…..  embarrassing when you can't remember the words!

snow machines for later in the year before the snow really arrives

World's biggest wood stack

A few years back a tornado ripped thru this area, flattening a path through the forest.  This is a rather towering wood stack very neatly made from those trees destroyed by the wind.  They are starting to use some of the time now and in the foreground is a stack ready to be lit for a bonfire - rather neat way of making a fire I think!  and it works really well as we found out later on the trip.

A bridge maybe for some sorta snow skiing training ???

And quickly back to see if there is still internet connection and there sorta is!!

(so much for cutting back on the twaddle!)