Ulan Ude

Day 106 Saturday 16th July 2011 

We got up at 6.30am and took coffee and a cake for breakfast and we were on the road by 8 o’clock. We rode down the dirt track leading from Yuri’s house to the main road where we met Dimitri and Alex.  The picture presentation was made and it was a most wonderful print on silk that was easily folded and could be stowed on the bikes without damage. Yuri also had prepared a little speech in English in which he said he was glad to meet his English friends and this was very emotional for both me and Mark – I had to hold back the tears as it was such a sad thing to say goodbye to these wonderful people who had given us so much of their time and help over the last couple of days. Our only hope is that maybe one day we can repay their kindness in a similar way. 

The road out of Chita was good and the weather was clear blue sky and sunny as we rode through the forest of silver birches. We hit a few patches of roadworks, some short stretches and some for a couple of kilometres or more but no problem for our bikes as we rode over the rubble, sand and dust, I was just grateful that it had not rained recently and turned the whole area into a heaving mud pit. Further along the route the scenery opened out into vast hilly steppe like grassland and the road rolled gently between the hills but would sometimes catch the rider unawares as a large pothole appeared beneath the wheels with no time to take avoiding action – Ouch !! 

Typical village houses

On the Open Road

As we approached one small off road detour I noticed the headlights of another bike in my mirrors. We slowed down to almost stop to see if the guy wanted to pass the time of day with us but he came past, an American, and seemed intent on pushing on. We passed him resting at the roadside a bit further along and then we all caught up with each other at the next fuel stop where he revealed that he was Howell and he was not stopping in Ulan Ude this evening but was pushing on a further 350 miles or so to Irktusk. He too had used Yuri Melkinov to clear customs in Vladivostok and he had heard of us from Yuri.

We had a pleasant day’s ride to Ulan Ude and had arrived in the city relatively early at around 3pm. We rode past a couple of hotels on the outskirts and found that the inner city had several western style places to stay and we plumped for the Hotel Buriat – a 12 storey modern looking building near to the main city square where the receptionist said that “yes” there was wifi at the hotel so we parted with our hard earned roubles and took the room which, like the Hotel Vladivostok, was on the 11^th floor but, unlike the Hotel Vladivostok, this one was manned (in the old soviet style) by a dizhurnaya which basically means a ‘floor lady’ who is supposed to tend to your every need. The room gave a good view over an areas of Ulan Ude and we could see how it sits in a shallow valley alongside a large river. We showered and relaxed and got out our laptops to catch up with emails, blogs and everything else but no signal.  Mark went to speak to the lady who tends to our every need but she scooted and went into her little kitchen area. Not to be rebuffed he followed her into her cubby hole and she, like a surprised rabbit in the headlights, tried the I will ignore him trick which as it happened worked quite well because our every need was not attended to.

This hotel really rocks - especially in an earthquake !!

Remonstrations with the lady at reception on the ground floor had no solution either so we went off for a look around Ulan Ude taking pictures of the gateway to the city square and then of the huge stone statue of Lenin’s head which sits outside the government buildings. We had a search for a restaurant, found one place but it looked more like a strip joint than a restaurant so we plodded around until we came upon the coffee house Marco Polo which had internet access and a good selection of food.

OLd Style Wooden Chita House

Gateway to Chita celebrationg Road

Huge stome statue of Lenin's Head in the city plaza

Biker Chick from Irktusk who we met in the main square

Ulan Ude at night - shaken but not stirred

We ordered some eats and I caught up with a couple of emails at which time Graham and Brigitte (who we met on the road camping on our first night out of Vladivostok) came into the cafe with Paul (Harti). This, again, was a bizarre chance meeting and so we all sat, ate, drank and talked from which we also found out that Howell, the American who we had seen on the road today,  had travelled with these guys on the DongHae ferry from Korea and all had used Yuri’s services in Vladivostok.

We arrived back at the hotel and had a beer in the tent outside which, after a day under the heat of the sun, was like a sauna inside but at least the beer was cold. We sauntered back to the lift at around midnight and the security guard raced over to us and conveyed to us that our bikes (parked right outside the hotel entrance) would not be safe there and so we should move them to paid secure parking a 100 metres or so away. We told him that we could not ride the bikes because we had been drinking and told him not to worry (but he clearly was) and we went off to bed.

There was quite a lot of noise in the car park during the night but each time we looked out of the window it all seemed to be OK so we put our heads down for the night only to be woken at 4am by the violent shaking and swaying of the hotel – an earthquake no less ! The shaking went on for about 10 seconds or so then the hotel was left swaying gently to a stop. We kept our fingers crossed that this was not going to be a big on me and went back to sleep.