A whirlwind of activity has slowly settled into a daily routine of constant small tasks. Managable tasks that allow the odd moment to relax, have a beer, and maybe even ride my bike. Yes, cycling for the tour staff is never a given, but an occassional reprieve from the daily routine of ensurin...
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Posted July 22, 2010 in Amber Route Blog
Ron rolled into the lunch stop and announced “ At the risk of sounding overly critical, I’m really getting tired of these stretches of sucker pavement”
For the past two days our route has included 20 – 30 kms of gravel road which, at times, has been corrugated and r...
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Posted July 20, 2010 in Amber Route Blog
Church in Estonia
At a small amber shop in Tallinn I stopped in to take a look. I’ve always loved amber jewelry but never known much about, except of course that you can extract dinosaur DNA from bugs trapped inside it and grow a Tyrannosaurus Rex in a jar. The jewelry in the shop ...
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Posted July 19, 2010 in Amber Route Blog
The Amber Route Riders, St Petersberg, Russia.
The Drive.
The short version:
Arrived Samarkand 2 pm on July 4th , boxed bikes, packed van, created slideshow, went to Awards dinner, went to bed 1 am. Woke up 5am. Settled finances with local support, looked up route on google, downloaded Rus...
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Posted July 17, 2010 in Amber Route Blog
Saturday 10th July starts (never dark from 9th really) bright and early with a guided city tour by bike at 08:00 and continued with the welcome meeting at 15:00. The city tour sets us up for the convoy ride out of the city on the morning of 11th, which is smooth and slick. We stop for a group ph...
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Posted July 13, 2010 in Amber Route Blog
It is exactly midnight but you would not know it if you look out of the window. There is still plenty of light out there. I suppose that is what they call here White Nights. It is certainly the first time in my life that I have been in a place where at midnight there is still natural light
We arr...
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Posted July 09, 2010 in Amber Route Blog
Congratulations Silk Route 2010 Riders!
There's nothing quite like being sprayed with champagne to celebrate a grand finale. Okay, maybe this wasn't real champagne, but it was bubbly, cold, and came in a green bottle with that fun gold foil sleeve over the cork. Besides, after cycling and cam...
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Posted July 05, 2010 in Silk Route Blog
Hot.
The road from Mary, Turkmenistan to Bukhara, Uzbekistan has been a tough one. The Kara Kum desert is really hot and with the long days (sunrise 5 am sunset 9:00 pm) the heat is unrelenting. Forty-eight degrees in the shade in one camp. Over 55 degrees in the sun. An...
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Posted July 02, 2010 in Silk Route Blog
Kow Ata Camp
The countries we travel though are great. Many like Turkey and Georgia, have ancient histories and date back to the 4th and 5th centuries. One of the pleasures of visiting the old parts of cities in places like Istanbul, Tblisi, and to some extent, Baku is the charm of the ol...
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Posted June 25, 2010 in Silk Route Blog
My heart sank a bit when I heard the ‘Ferry Overlord’ (I have no idea what his real title is) said there would be no ferry again
today.
“100 percent no ferry?,.. no chance at all?” I pleaded.
“No ferry, maybe” was his cryptic reply.
Aydin, our ...
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Posted June 21, 2010 in Silk Route Blog
