| Wed-May 23, 2012 | |||
| Location: Narva Estonia to St Petersburg, Russia
Lodging: Hotel Moscow Euro: $1 USD = Russian Ruble pyδ 30.098 Gas/Fuel in St Petersburg, Russia: Very cheap! €1.68/l = $2.24 USD/l or $8.28 USD/gal! Weather: Clear blue skies today! |
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| As we loaded up, we smelled gas. I didn’t think it was mine because of my chain cleaning dripping the night before. | |||
| Boarder crossing | |||
| No photos allowed at international border crossings! OK … it’s the same crossing in and out of Mexico from California.
All our Green Cards (European Union vehicle insurance) are not good for Russia. A driving in Russia website says we can get insurance at the border. On our way to the Estonia/Russian border, we meet two German riders who were on their way to the “Border Wait Area”. “What’s that?” we asked. “We don’t know but that’s what they told us at the border.” |
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| Border Wait Area | |||
| Not speaking the language leads to many interesting situations.
Turns out it is a huge holding area ~5 km from border. 59.377532°, 28.154906° All vehicles queue up in numbered lines. The procedure is: 1) Go to a small building window near entrance gate and submit passport and vehicle registration and pay €1.10 and get a receipt then 2) ride down to the other end of the holding area, park, get yelled at in Russian that we were in the wrong line, move over to another line, go to a second small building near the exit and submit passport, vehicle registration and first receipt pay €1 and get a second receipt. Do not lose these receipts they get you out of Estonia. |
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| We ride to the border where there is a line of 30 cars. Martin is leading and rides into the EXIT gate where we were yelled at again! The we park in the wrong area and the guard who yells at Martin takes us to a huge map on the building wall that has directions to the Border Wait Area. We show our receipts and he is all smiles. We ask about Russian insurance but he does not understand us and takes part of our border wait area receipt and lets us go through the first Estonian barrier lets us go in front of all the cars. At the second Estonian barrier we fill out exit paperwork and I notice a spot under my bike. Yikes! It’s me that’s weeping gas! | |||
| Martin is German and has Germany Moto Registration, I’m U.S.A and have California Moto Registration, my riding pal is U.S.A. but has another type of German Moto Registration. All border guards want to know why the moto registration are not the same. Martin gets his exit in 15 minutes. The U.S.A. rider’s documents take over an hour of discussion before they let us exit Estonia. | |||
| Finally we’re cleared of Estonia and allowed to ride across the bridge to the Russian border entry gate. There is only one lane to cross the border. The first gate we show passport and moto papers and are given 2 papers to fill out. The first is immigration entry and the second is moto customs entry. At the second holding gate we fill out the immigration entry document and submit it with passport to the first hut then have our motos inspected. Finally we go to the second gate hut and submit our moto customs papers. Again with the different vehicle registrations everything comes to a hold. The entire border is on-hold for the 3 damn bikers!!! There is no talk of Russian vehicle insurance during any of this. | |||
| The Russian bike inspector gets me out of line and brings me back to my bike. Now the gas leak is making a small puddle. I strip the bike of all luggage, pull the seat and find the fuel rubber hose crushed and leaking. I quickly cut the hose at the leak, insert a brass connector, two hose clamps and we are good! I show the inspection guard and he waves me on. I re-pack, get back into the moto custom line and in 15 minutes approved. We made it! | |||
| All this time there is no discussion of moto insurance. We stop at the first gas station asking about insurance. They sell auto insurance but no moto insurance. Good lord, we are riding into St Petersburg without moto insurance and into one of the world’s most notorious traffic gridlocks and where drivers aim at motorcyclists. | |||
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We’re in the USSR!2 comments to We’re in the USSR! |
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Hard to see how a Harley is the right bike for this ride.
Continued good luck to you Dean, and post some more pix please!
Where are the photo’s ?