Day 19-21 – Russia, Georgia

Day 19 – 14 September 2017 – Nevinnomyssk to Salukokoasche (Russia)

A random petrol station as we skirted around Pyatigorsk
Timur’s office – a derelict old petrol station – but our saviour…
…the Black Pearl looking a little worse for wear.
Sam knows how to find a relaxing position on Vera – we’re waiting for one of Timur’s mates to source and shape a Lada oil pressure switch to fix Lyubov’
  • Timur’s wrestling kids

Day 20 – 15 September 2017 – Salukokoasche to Vladikavkaz (Russia)

Not the ideal start to the morning for Amand and Nadia!! Caught on camera crossing a solid white line (NZ’s version of a yellow line) – it equals no passing – some good and slightly worrying chats with the Russian police!
We put the early setback behind us and headed on towards Mt Elbrus, the highest mountain in Europe at 5,642 m.
Sam found a Russian dude cruising around on his bike, he’d already done thousands of kms from the middle of Russia. He’d just spent the night way up a mountain goat road on Mt Elbrus. Sam now had a challenge ahead of him….
Amand and Steve headed off to Mt Elbrus village, down there in the valley, while Sam got high!!
Not such a bad view from up here!
Making smiles!
It was a warm day and the snow melt was causing some cool water features!
Mt Elbrus village – Sam was up on that ridge line behind Steve!
The slightly more relaxed way of getting up the mountain
Looking back down into the valley where Lyubov’ and Nadia were resting up
The views from the top of the gondola were something else
We headed up higher again on a rickety chair lift – not sure this would pass H&S in NZ!
Exciting to have feet on firm ground again….we just had to navigate the ride back down next!!
It felt like we were just about on the moon
We were the only people there in shorts and jandals and we got some strange looks – bloody Kiwis!!
The Caucasus Mountains heading off towards Georgia!!

Day 21 – 16 September 2017 – Vladikavkaz to Tbilisi (Georgia)

Morning view to the mountains from our hotel room!!
A different view of the three ladies.
A lot of people heading to the border!
Fingers crossed on exiting Russia – ended up being nothing like the entry!
Grit and Sprit does the Russia-Georgia border run!
We snuck our way to the front of an extremely long and strange traffic jam on the main highway in the middle of the Georgian mountains…
…a lot of people were milling around at the blockage…
…and a policeman was telling us we could go no further…for now…due to a Red Bull race…
…so Sam took a rest…
…before he started checking out the other bikes…
…and an escape route across a river and up through that valley in the background…after some fun and games we found our way back onto the main highway…just in the middle of the released traffic jam!!!
Letting a random friend have a sit on Lyubov
We finally made it to Tbilisi about 6 hours after we’d hoped and headed into the beautifully lit city
And found (and made excellent use of) the pumping central part of town!!
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