Well that was interesting

We made it out of Belarus on the train this morning. Before we start we have never met a bunch of more friendly and helpful people. Can do must be the national motto . But... Belarus outside the capital is not geared up for travellers let alone tourists, let alone bicycle tourists. The hotel we spent the night in yesterday was a separate entry to a few floors of a block of flats, managed by what appeared to be the local police station. The sign saying it was a hotel was about as big as a doctors brass plate round the back door. There were no restaurants.

Here is a picture of our Camp

However two days before we had a fantastic time on the bikes. Superb roads, no traffic and beautiful countryside. Lots of lovely interactions with locals who couldn't have been more helpful. Pity about all those yellow signs (the only ones we ever saw in English) saying Border Zone do not enter without permissions. Ted to Sarah " We haven't got permissions" Sarah to Ted "Who cares press on" I didn't like it much and we cycled like the clappers.

Ted told me later that the Foreign Office website says the most common reason for Brits being arrested in Belarus is for infringing the border regulations.
Our time in Belarus gave us the best and the worst days of the trip so far. The best day was when we left Grodno - full of apprehension that the roads would be full of potholes and maniac truck drivers. Instead it was blissful and sunny. All the trucks disappeared to Lithuania and the road was virually empty. We did 120 Km and decided to camp - there was no hotel in any case. We pulled off the road near a village and asked various people if it was OK to put up our tent - we kept getting directed down into the village itself and finally led towards the largest house that backed onto a series of beautiful lakes. We were given the OK to put up our tent and soon were visited by a chap who spoke some English and was the nephew of the owner of the house. Next thing we were invited in to use the loo - by the time I got out of the loo Ted was already ensconced at the dining table drinking vodka. We were plied with cold cuts - it was a birthday celebration of 2 of the men of the family. As the evening progressed they got out the accordion and started singing Polish folksongs ( most of this part of Belarus is populated by Poles).
The next day was probably the worst we have experienced. It started to rain and we kept seeing more of those pesky yellow signs. By 17.00 we were soaked, cold and were trying to find a hotel in a town that seemed to be under a foot of water. We finally located the hotel only to be told it was in the military border zone and we couldn't stay. We had to leave the town. The next hotel was 35 KM further on and we had already done over 100 km. It was still pouring. Brainwave - let's get a big taxi. The elderly lady receptionist in the hotel leapt into action and a taxi arrived - too small for us and the bikes but a people carrier was summoned and we were quoted 20 euro for the ride - soounded like a bargain and we would have paid almost anything at this point - the lady in the hotel was so pleased she kept kissing Ted. Finally we were deposited at the hotel Ted described above - we would never have found it on our own.

It appears that it is not possible to stay in any hotel in Belarus which is less than 50km from any border. Given the uncertainty concerning crossing the border on a Bike we put our bikes on a train this morning and are now in Vilnius in Lithuania. Paradise. We have just had the first hot meal in four days. Shops look like shops. Hotels have big signs up so you can see what it is.

The train journey was fraught with stress. We arrived at the station at 08.00 having sussed it out the day before. Unfortunately the ticketing computer was down. I was waiting outside keeping an eye on the bikes but I could hear a raised voices coming through the window and some woman screeching. I feared for Teddy. After some time I went in to see what was happening - the ticket hall was packed with anxious people wanting to catch the same train we did but the tickets were having to be allocated by hand and seat numbers called off on the telephone - hence the shrieking. Ted finally emerged ashen faced - with tickets - he hadn't dared ask for bicycle tickets. It was even more difficult to get the bikes in this train - higher off the platform and very narrow doors. There was no luggage van so we had to wheel them down a corridor that was several centimeters narrower than our handlebars. As is normal in Belarus the entire occupants of the carriage rose to assist us. The bikes were hoisted on to couchettes taking up 3 seats each. The train was mainly occupied by large ladies off across the border for a spot of smuggling. At the stop before the border there was a duty free facility. The ladies got on with capacious bags that clinked. Once on they distributed the vodka and cigarettes to other ladies to get through Lithuanian customs. Once the customs officer had walked down the train the goodies were collected up again. I think they were also taking over illicit sausages and other foodstuffs secreted about their persons but it was difficult to tell.

Here's a typical breakfast stop. You need to click on the picture to get the benefit. (this is true of all the pics on the blog)

And here's a picture of our anonymous hotel

Here's sarah at Hitlers blown up bunker

And here's a picture of Ted with his girlfriend in the hotel we couldn'd stay in. You can see how wet we were.

Welcome to Belarus

No Photos again it's a bit tricky. This town is transliterated variously Grodno, Hrodno, Grodna etc.

Despite our fears the entry process into Belarus was pretty good. Apart from having to lug our fully laden bikes up four feet to get them on the train. We had to do this four times as we went on two trains, and on each train we first of all put them at the wrong end of the train.

(Sarah) When we finally clanked across the border - marked by a flimsy stretch of barbed wire the train halted and a large number of soldiers/officials got on and turfed us out of the luggage van. We began to feel a little apprehensive - but it turned out they needed to be at the back of the train so they could stick mirrors in the windows to watch the track. In fact the officials turned out to be charming. Ted although he is very numerate is completely incapable of filling in forms and transposes numbers. After 2 attempts at the immigration form the long suffering official would probably have written it out himself except I had borrowed his pen. Once in the terminal building at Grodna we lined up with a clack of ladies who seemed to have bought the entire stock of Poland's Pampers. Again the customs officials were lovely - laughing over the fact we were importing our means of transport. We asked them where our hotel was which involved the entire work force and Ted was whisked away to talk to a colleague on the phone. Perhaps in case I imagined that he had been taken away to have his toe nails removed, a nice man earnestly reassured me he was only talking on the phone. Of course this all took ages, so by the time we emerged from the station we were caught up in the mother of all rain storms. The only way of negotiating the puddles on the pavements was to ride our bikes and hope we didn't disappear down a huge pothole. However, miraculously Ted navigated our way to the "city centre" Hotel Tourist which in fact was 4 Km out. We had little confidence that our telephone booking undertaken in Russian would exist but we were ushered into the lobby - soaking bikes and all.

Despite all this the day was long and stressful. Starting with a series of phone calls to hotels in Grodno. This was the first time we had tried to book ahead and I am glad we did as the first four of the five hotels in town claimed to have no rooms. Looking for room on spec in the pouring rain would have been impossible and we probably would have got back on the train to Poland. I spent the first train journey in the luggage van with a group of people who were in training for the Park bench special brew drinking team, complete with the compulsory drunken lecherous couple. Sarah wasn't there because the was only one seat left.

I was anxiously watching developments through the glass door. All I could see was the male half of the lecherous couple who sprang up at each station and was then catapulted across the carriage as the train jerked to a halt. Several times he seemed to be about to leave the train only to reappear before I could claim his seat.

You don't want to underestimate the problems of finding your way around in a Russian speaking town. The alphabet is pretty scary and often the signs are in some fancy calligraphy as well.

This all sounds a bit grim - but Grodno is not the concrete jungle we thought it would be - the people have been really helpful and speak more English than in Poland. The town is quite small - the size of Wolverhampton and most of the buildings are low rise - built around 1900 in stucco painted pastel colours - I guess it looks a bit like a sanitised version of Havana. We are also sitting in the swankiest Internet caff so far. As it is run by the national PTT it is more Internet and not so much caff but a huge number of stations and fast connections.

You will see from the map that there is now quite a lot of blank space. This probably also means that we may be quiet for a bit.

Another Day off

We have arrived in the Polish lake District and are having another day off. The weather has been becoming hotter and hotter with thunderstorms every evening. We are now very good at predicting where the next bus stop is, as this is where we stop to get waterproofed up. generally putting on the gear makes the rain stop. Last night there was a real humdinger of a storm but we were well tucked up in our hotel/bunker before it started. We are now hovering around the border with Belarus wondering how to get across. Apparently you can't cross the border on a bicycle so we think we will go down to Bialystok and get the train across. Apparently you can't take bikes on the trains that cross the border.We'll see.

In fact we were staying in the former officers quarters on the site of Hitler's bunker - the Wolf's Lair. He and his entourage spent the last 3 years of the war cowering in this site under a screen of real trees and artificial vegetation that they changed with the seasons. My expectations of the bunker was that it would be a moderately small hole in the ground. In fact the site is huge and the bunkers are massive pyramidal structures with the top truncated. They were constructed of concrete reinforced with steel bars. When the time came to evacuate the site they were blown up - but not very successfully - some are more or less intact - very creepy. In spite of signs in 4 languages that they were dangerous structures and not to enter we did venture into some of them.

Accommodation and victualling has been a bit hit and miss. One night we stayed in the front room of some old lady's house and a few nights later when checking into some snazzy hotel in Elblag the manager took one look at my passport and was so amazed that a man of my great age was cycling around Poland that he upgraded us a to suite which was about as big as our flat. In Gdansk we ate like kings on the waterfront. Last night at Hitler's bunker we toddled down to the hotel restaurant to find that it had closed at 5pm As the nearest other food was 11 km away and a spectacular thunderstorm was brewing we stayed in our room and consumed the leftover bits and pieces in our packs. The highlight was a complimentary packet of peanuts from the ferry crossing. The good news was that the hotel bar could provide us with piwa the one essential word in Polish - beer.

You may be wondering how we are managing with only one set of bicycling clothes and one set of clothes for the evening. The answer is Teddy does a lot of washing when we get to a hotel. We bought magic shirts from Rohan before we left and however crumpled they are when we extract them from our packs within 3 minutes they are immaculate. Having said that we are now starting to look a bit tatty. My legs are a varied hue of bruises from purple to yellow and I always manage to arrive clarted with oil from the chain. Ted, having been brought up properly, never gets oil on his trousers.

We arrived in Gdansk on Sunday 10 June

Here we are in Gdansk and are having a day off buying snazzy biking clothes for Ted whilst Sarah sits patiently outside the changing rooms. This is a picture we took in Germany riding down this lovely road. if you zoom in by clicking on the picture you can see that the surface is cobbled and it went on for 20 km nice eh?

Ted was very reluctant to wear his tight fitting yellow plumage but the first day he did suddenly we were hailed by every passing racing cyclist - including 2 young girls. After that he decided to buy another cycling shirt and retire the walking shirt he had been using that inflated in the wind like a Michelin man. When he's feeling really brave he'll put on Daniel's even more colourful shirt on. It is now pretty hot and sunny but luckily we have been going along roads through forests so we are keeping reasonably cool and unburnt.

Gdansk is an amazing place. My expectation was that it would be a grim derelict shipbuilding town but the old town is a wonderful collection of 17thC and 18thC houses and warehouses and even older churches. It also has many nice places to eat gargantuan meals. Unlike most of the places we have stayed in so far cafes and restaurants stay open late into the evening. We were getting very disappointed to arrive in a town at about 18.00 to find it buzzing with activity - loads of shops and cafes open, people eating ices and having beers - only to find an hour later after we'd had our showers and settled into a hotel that everywhere had closed down.

To return to the question of roadkill that has been preoccupying me as I cycle along. It seems that Poland does have some wildlife - at least several dead pine martins, cats, dogs and hedgehogs. The problem is that I have to keep my eyes firmly on the road in front of me at all times, firstly to avoid running into the back of Ted - something I've done twice - with me ending up spread over the road (albeit at very low speed) - and also to avoid running into the cavernous Polish potholes or falling off the cliff of tarmac at the edge of the road.

We are riding about 85 to 95 km a day but we always set off to do about 80. I think my original distance calculations might have been a bit awry. So we find ourselves behind schedule on a location but ahead on distance run. We are now one third of the way to Saint Petersburg. I am probably carrying about 10kg of extra fat but Sarah has none so we need to stop every two hours or so to refuel. Along the Polish coast this was a bit tricky as it was a bit difficult to tell the difference between a bar and a cafe. They all had lots of umbrella but no signs. We finally discovered that pushchairs were a good sign that food and coffee were available. I never thought I would hear Sarah saying "Stop here this looks good there are lots of children"

You might want to know what our duties are;

Ted

Navigation

Communication

Accommodation

Washing clothes

Sarah

Roadkill analysis and commentary

Victualling (she is now fully familiar with the standard layout of Netto supermarkets

Forgiving Ted for not knowing where he is.

Spotting things like Internet cafes and potential hotels

Drying clothes

Medical matters which so far have mainly involved making sure Ted puts on his sunscreen.

Stop press our behinds are now in quite good condition!

We have arrived in Poland and as usual we found the Internet Cafe with only half an hour to closing. I've updated the map so you can see where we are. IF the map link doesn't work for you we are now in Kolobrzeg which is on the Baltic coast of Poland. We got diverted from our route by the G8 jamboree at Heiligodam sp?, which was very annoying. We have had great weather but headwinds all the time. today we just missed a thunderstorm. You can see that our route has been along the coast, which was our plan. However we are getting a bit bored with this so we are setting off inland. Our next big stop will be Gdansk wher we will spend two days and will be able to give a bigger update then. Thanks to all the people who have been sending us encouraging emails.

Finding @ on a German computer

Finding @ on a German computer is the biggest challenge we have had to face so far. It is also impossible (for me) to drive the blog posting process in any language other than German. God help us when we get to Poland. Most of the facts you might want are on the map link to the right of the page.
Today we are having a day off cycling and are trailing around Lübeck looking at churches. Demark was good for cycling but Germany is fantastic with most roads having high grade cycle tracks along the side. We are often tempted to take diversions off into the wilds but this often ends in tears.
By the way to a man who weighs 90 kg and is riding 40 kg of bike denmark and Germany are very hilly.
From now on I will write in black and Sarah will write in Blue
Some strange things I have learned
- there is no road kill in Denmark or Germany - where are all the hedgehogs, rabbits, foxes and badgers?
- there is also absolutely no litter along the roads or anywhere
- so much for a healthy lifestyle - everyone smokes like chimneys and all the restaurants and pubs and this internet caff are reeking - and food is very salty.
- on the otherhand loads of people cycle, including loads of people even older than us.
- Ted tells me that everday each leg pumps up and down 80,000 times - no wonder I've got a sore arse

We are staying in Malente in a house that was used by a Major in the British army as his HQ just after the war. In spite of this the owner insisted on hauling down the Landesflag and raising the union flag when we checked in.

Did we forget to tell you that we are enjoying ourselves. Tomorrow we are off into the former GDR, where things might get challenging.

If you want to see our weather forecast click this
http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day.shtml?world=4846