Russian roads: are we fools?

Having caught up with Tony on his life, we got to talking about the Russia trip.

Tony unfurled various sheets of paper: a written explanation of why he was doing the trip; a few pages of internet research and travel tips for driving in and around Russia; a list of towns with three digit numbers next to them (which I'd later learn would be the distance until the next town); and a list of hotels. Wowzies. This guy had done his homework! (Well yeah, it's not his first rodeo!!)

The route was planned: crossing from West to East, starting in Hamina (where the van has been left). The plan is to cross the border into Russia from Finland (from Vaalimaa, approximately 140 miles north of Saint Petersburg) and then travel more or less along the Trans-Siberian Highway to Vladivostok, which is located in a natural harbour in the Sea of Japan. We've agreed we'll veer a little off the main highway at times to take in the towns we pass through.

The route is about 6,000 miles long and Tony has calculated it should take about 14 days (give or take a day or two) to get from Saint Petersburg to Vladivostok. Tony tells me that the time needed to drive across the country has reduced considerably since he and his buds last crossed Russia (in 2011 en route to Mongolia) as the roads - that mostly have a speed limit of 55/60mph - will have been massively improved. I've booked 4 weeks off work so we can spend a bit of time in each town, though Tony says he's heard of people doing this trip in as little as 7 days (driving literally 24 hours every day, sleeping in the car and having very questionable body odour by the time they arrive, no doubt!).

Before 2014, a significant part of the Trans-Siberian Highway was in pretty bad shape but, it is posited (Hmm? Me? Taking literary liberties? Never!), that the roads all the way from Saint Petersburg to Vladivostok are pretty decent and tarmacked. (Tony's mentioned to me a "Road to Hell" - one particular road, from Moscow, if I recollect correctly - that is named colloquially as such owing to the high number of road traffic incidents it has all the way along it. We agreed we'll check it out - with care - mainly to see if it's changed much!) 

Tony's previous travels suggest getting to Kazan (in the heart of Siberia) will be fairly easy and quick from Moscow, mainly along good roads. Things got worse for him from there, he says, and, once past Lake Baikal and Ulan Ude, he remembers that large stretches of the roads were barely more than paths leading through fields. He also talked of "jaw-crunching pot holes" along the way but tells me he's upgraded the suspension on the van so it's in good shape...  Anyway, that was in 2011, so hopefully things have improved... Right?! 

I think we need to go ready to encounter some very poor roads because, although the surfaces are better than they were, the route will pass through large swathes of wilderness, across streams, river valleys and mountains. Tony says rains and fast-flowing rivers can make some parts of the road network more difficult to pass too, so all of this may well slow down our progress. Apparently, Russians say that their country has two problems: fools, and roads. It sounds like we'll get to experience plenty of the latter if we decide to take a few scenic routes on our way. *resists making any kind of joke about Tony being a fool* *really resists....*

A photo from Tony's previous adventures... He refers to this as a "puddle". Should I be worried?!

Russia is also pretty well-known for some of the most extreme weather conditions in the world and so I'm interested to see how these "fast-flowing rivers" will be when we go...! We'll be leaving at the end of February and it will be very nearly April by the time we reach Vladivostok. We're expecting to encounter stifling 30*C heat to bone-chilling -20*C lows. We've kitted up with snowboots and I'm going to be packing my ski jacket and salopettes too. Tony reckons it's probably quickest to drive the route in the winter, when the entire way the road is frozen, so you can make progress without anything slowing you down... Urm... In any case, I'm delighted it's not winter when we're going, and even more delighted to learn the campervan has a heater so we won't freeze to death if we need to stay in it overnight!

So, Russian roads await us... Are we the fools? Time will tell...!