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Sibirsky Extreme

After Romania

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by Jonathan  14 – 04 – 2009

I felt I should add a short blog entry to mark the end of the Eastern European part of the trip. After I left Walter and Marcin shortly after Calafat in Romania I headed north west on a highway that is not yet marked on Google maps but runs along the Danube.

I would post photos here but like I’m having difficulties with an old computer that crashes everytime I try to add any. The latest photos can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/everywherevirtually

The roads in Romania were not as bad as I was expecting. To be honest the roads in Bulgaria were far worse. I was actually quite upbeat about the new highway until I got to the city of Tumu-Severin where they deteriorated rapidly. After Tumu I took the highway through the mountains to Timisoara. This is when things became tiring. It’s about 200km’s but the EU are currently undertaking a vast road rebuilding programme here and so most of the top surface of the road has been removed to leave gravel, grooves, dips, hollows and pot holes. I spent most of the time on my foot pegs and smothered in clouds of dust. It was great adventure riding and the whole reason I was doing the trip.

It was fast dawning on me that I was losing time and I was projected to be pretty much in the middle of nowhere by nightfall. With a couple of grands worth of camera kit and bike gear I didn’t fancy camping out alone. Not for fear of people but wild dogs. On 3 separate occasions I had been chased out of town by packs of wild dogs running lose. Often I would see them foraging in the rubbish that was tipped at the side of the road. The last thing I could afford would be a dog bite.

I pressed on and thought that a stop in Hungary would be the sensible choice. After breezing through the Hungarian customs I had a renewed energy and thought I would check out Budapest. By midnight I was exploring the city. I stopped to refuel and get some food and it was at this point I thought why dont I just continue to my base in Austria.

I have a love of long distance riding and a hankering to do an iron butt challenge. After an excursion into

Preparation, Sibirsky Extreme

The last leg for Jonathan

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I arrived in Linz a day after my girlfriends birthday. It was my intention to be there on her birthday but after 22 hours and 1000+ km’s of riding it was just not possible. Nevertheless she was pleased to see me. I wrongly assumed that now that I was roughly in the centre of the universe as far BMW Motorrad is concerned all would be well and I’d have an easy journey home. Ironically this is when my problems started. The first problem was the chain. It was “slapping” and jumping about a little more than I felt comfortable with. It’s done 16000 miles now but I still expected it to be doing fine especially considering I have a Scottoiler and cleaned it daily.

The chain had loosened quite considerably and it was then I realised that I had lost some tools when my tent went overboard in Wales 3 weeks before. Not a problem I thought. I’m in a big city and know my way around. I visited Hein Gericke the next day for some supplies and as I was leaving I noticed the rear tyre was going flat. Great! My plans of an early departure were dashed. It turns out BMW Motorrad Linz is about 100m up the road from Hein Gericke and the tyre was completely flat by the time I was parallel with the showroom. My dirty battle scarred F800 GS mirrored the shiny new one on the other side of the showroom glass.

If someone had told me of this I would not have believed them. You could not have staged it for a bike to get a puncture outside a BMW dealership. As it turned out the valve had separated from the inner tube. A casualty of some of our dirt track riding I suspect. It would appear that without the necessary clamps the inner tube was slipping within the tyre. BMW also offered to sort out some warranty work and do some software updates so I was resigned to the fact that I wouldn’t be departing on this day.

During my few days in Linz I made a point of visiting Thomas Wonderka. He is a Flickr contact and also interested in Bikes. We met for a coffee and when we left the F800 Celebrity effect was in full swing. A bus load of Thai Tourists had disembarked from a nearby bus and loved it so much they each wanted a photo in turn with the bike. I had to send my girlfriend off at the airport so I had to speed events up a little by suggesting a group photo.

The following day was sunny and I was packed and ready to make my way to Bochum in Northern Germany. I thanked the Elischak family for their generosity and hospitality and after a slight delay from the temporary loss of my mobile phone I was once again eating up the kilometres. Bavaria is a truly beautiful and varied part of Germany. I could have stopped a 100 times to explore and take photos but I really had to make the time up. By early

evening I was in the forested hills of the Rhineland and with the sun setting in the west the land took on a mystical appearance. By 9pm I arrived in Bochum and was greeted by Stephanie Kotalla. She was a neighbour of mine who used to live at my apartment complex in England and only last year moved back to Germany. Once again the hospitality was exemplary. The BBQ was already running and fine Turkish bread and Campari with orange was waiting for me. We have a lot to learn in England. On this whole trip a recurring theme has been the warm welcomes and great food we have received along the way. I was initially concerned about the security of the bike as it was going to be on the street of a Northern European city. In my view a lot riskier than parking it up in the Balkans.

Once again my concerns were allayed because a Turkish Gentleman was guarding the parking area and was very interested in where I had come from and where I was going to. I gave him a Sibirsky sticker and some Euros for his time and he was happy to pose for a photo.

The next morning I had a bit more time to play with and stopped to take some photos of the area. By lunchtime I had reached Ostende in Belgium and took a short detour to sample some traditional Belgian food. Moules-Frites :). On exiting Ostende I spotted another BMW dealership and they had the new F800 R but I had no time now and had to press on to Calais. I made good time and breezed through customs and the channel tunnel, Even managing to do some filming which was of a better standard than my first attempt when leaving the UK.

I had two appointments. The first was with Walter’s girlfriend… (now, now. Nothing like that!) I had to drop off some of Walter’s excess baggage and let her know all was well. The second meeting was with Tony Pettie and his partner Marina. At very short notice (of which I am deeply apologetic) they provided a wonderful dinner, drinks down the local pub and a very comfortable bed for the night. They offered me breakfast too but I struggle with the concept of breakfast so settled for a very nice coffee instead. Tony is integral to the Sibirsky Extreme Project as he is the next rider to join Walter after he emerges from Kazakhstan and into Russia for the push North East towards Lake Baikal and Siberia.

After a few photos I was once again on my way but instead of zipping up the motorway I deliberately continued the Sibirsky ethos of staying off the beaten track and was rewarded for doing so. Quite by chance I happened upon the oldest windmill in the British Isles and later on in the day while riding up the old Roman Road of Watling Street came upon 100’s of Harley bikers. They were attending the funeral of a close friend and fellow rider and were sending her off with an escort. It was quite a sight and a fitting tribute. 2 hours later I was home and felt a changed person. Positive, enlightened, eager to explore some more and of course sad that I could not continue East. Still. better to be left wanting more.

It was a privilege and a pleasure to ride with Walter Colebatch and Marcin Safranow and to have met all the well wishers and supporters both here and along the route.

Preparation, Siberia, Sibirsky Extreme

Meanwhile in the West…

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Saying Goodbye from Jonathan Fox on Vimeo.

After I left Walter and Marcin it initially felt very strange being alone. In contrast to their ascent into the mountains and subsequent fall in temperature my day became ever hotter as I took an unmarked road west across Southern Romania from Calafat to Turnu-Severin. I was surprised by the interesting architecture of the houses and found this area of the country to be a delight. The Danube was never out of site as I made my way onwards to Timisoara. Progress was slower than I had anticipated because Romania is currently undergoing a large road building program. Some of it is finished but there are long sections of gravel and potholes. You can be cruising along at 50 or 60mph and without warning the good road runs out and you find yourself on a dirt track. Approaching surprise off road sections above 100kmh is a new experience for me 🙂

I reached TimiĹźoara in the early evening and was pleasantly surprised by what I saw. Wikipedia describes the city as “Little Vienna”, because it belonged for a very long time to the Habsburg Empire and the entire city center consists of buildings built in the Kaiser era, which is reminiscent of the old Vienna. TimiĹźoara is an important university center with the emphasis on subjects like medicine, mechanics and electro-technology. An industrial city with extensive services, it was the first mainland European city to be lit by electric street lamps in 1884. It was also the second European and the first city in what is now Romania with horse drawn trams in 1867. There are numerous claims that Gustave Eiffel, the creator of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, built one of TimiĹźoara’s footbridges over the Bega.

As dusk began to take hold I found myself in the open country again. I toyed with camping but was mindful of the fact that every time I stopped I was always seem to attract stray dogs who were often hostile to my presence. I must have stopped 3 times to take a photo and each time a snarling dog or 5 would appear from a rubbish heap at the side of the road or from an alley in a village.

I looked at my map and felt I could easily get to Hungary and press on to either Budapest or Bratislava. With a firm resolve and a can of red bull I fired up the F800 beast and got going towards the Hungarian border. I also had the small issue of only possessing Euro’s. I had a finite amount of funds left and so I thought it best to take all the cash from my accounts instead of having a situation where a card was rejected. That way I knew the score. Ideally I needed to get to the Eurozone but I knew I didnt have enough fuel to get me to Slovakia. I managed to negotiate with a kind lady at the Shell petrol station to give me fuel for Euros. It was a win win deal 🙂

By midnight I was rolling into Budapest. I felt I was not doing the city justice by riding through it so late but figured I would be back in a touristic capacity as It is very close to Austria. By now I was totally in the red bull zone and eyed Slovakia and Austria with renewed vigour. I had been riding since 10am and it was now well into the small hours. I decided that although boring the Autobahn was the safest place to be and as I entered Austria picked up a vignette for the bike. They only had a 10 day option but considering some of the fees I’ve had to pay at borders recently I reckoned €4.50 was a steal.

I lost a few hours to delirium and can’t remember the journey from Vienna to Amstetten (recently made infamous for all the wrong reasons by Josef Fritzl) A flickr contact in the area told me that section of Autobahn is infamous for people falling asleep and crashing due to either its design, the distance between rest stops or perhaps strange energies.

To cut a long story short I arrived in Linz at 7am and was warmly welcomed by my girlfriend and her family. I was offered a warm shower and a warm bed and for me Sibirsky Extreme Europe was almost at an end.

Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Sibirsky Extreme

Day 3

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Day three – Widooie (Tongeren) to the Schwarzwald

We said our goodbyes to to Thierry, Francoise and Norbert around lunchtime and bid farewell to the castle in Widooie. It was a perfect day of wall to wall blue skies and sunshine as we rode the few short kilometres to Holland and Maastricht. Even at this early stage we were beginning to notice discrepencies in how our resepective Sat Nav’s calculated the route. Mine was less problematic although  the garmin’s propensity to tell you to turn left or right after the actual turn was really making navigating hard work. Walter’s sat nav gave up after a short time and drew a single ‘as the crow flies’ line across Europe to Ancona. We decided at this point to enter smaller towns that we knew en-route. As it happened the route we took was very picturesque and great fun on a bike.

For anyone that is looking for small foray onto the continent you could do a lot worse than head down to the Belgian Ardenne. We also took the opportunity to stop at the Spa – Francorchamps race track that is used for the Belgian Grand Prix tucked away in the Belgian Ardenne. I have this thing about the Saarbrucken triangle. It’s like the Bermuda triangle except the only thing that goes haywire is the garmin. It sent us around in circles and the only way out was to use the Autobahn. Eventually we managed to get off the autobahn and continue from Luxembourg into Germany, then France and back into Germany.

We arrived into Baden Baden around 9pm. Baden is a very wealthy town and there were casino’s and spa’s a plenty. Not the sort of places for two grubby bikers. We set the sat nav to seek out a campsite and in no time we were headed into the forested hills for a campsite that was 19km away. The 19km turned into 22km and then we we stopped to double check the route the sat nav said 15km to go. We should add that it was pitch black, the road had snow at the edges and there were many switchbacks.

Eventually we reached the town of Enzklosterle deep in the heart of the German Schwarzwald and after a few failed attempts to find a room we managed to find room at the Inn and some food despite it being after 10pm.  But sadly no internet.

Sibirsky Extreme

Day 1 – Sibirsky Extreme 2009

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Jonathan 29-03-2009

Well I finally got underway and left Cheshire at 6am. I rode west and then took the A49 south towards Shropshire and beyond. I had put a predetermined route into the sat nav and enjoyed the twisties all the way down to Touratech. It was a day of sunshine and showers and generally very enjoyable riding weather with the odd rainbow thrown in.

I arrived just before lunch and the usual suspects were there. Friends from UKgser, people I’d met at last years event and the staff at Touratech.

I got the camcorder and camera setup for Walters talk on the Sibirsky Extreme project. I had intended to do one of the Touratech off road rides but I arrived a bit late and had other duties to perform.

By mid afternoon I had a realisation. I had unknowingly made a sacrificial offering to the road gods… Somewhere between Cheshire and Ystradgynlais I had lost a bag. It was a decathlon dry bag on top of my right pannier. It had my tarp, one man tent and my andystrapz in it. Not expensive kit but a pain in the arse nonetheless. I was hell bent on traveling light and so this meant I would have to go home and get my big tent (home being 200 miles north) I could have purchased a cheap tent but I had other things to sort out.

After a fine evenings entertainment from the legendary raconteur, adventure motorcyclist and male portion of team nutkin aka Austin Vince I managed to secure a bed for the night inside Touratech. Austin had also managed to gain access to Fortress Touratech for the night. He slept beside me on the floor and there was no funny business… honest Lois. There was the 5am incident though where he had nipped outside and got locked out by the self locking door. it was -3c out there and I’m not sure how long he’d been out there. Austin you owe me now 🙂

After a hearty breakfast and some fine tea we were ready for the off. The cameras were rolling and with Billy (biketruck.com) and Austin on the mic it was the finest send off anyone could ask for. It was a great feeling and what adventure motorcycling is all about. I recommend everyone should do it. There have to be some sacrifices but the rewards are great!

Les Wassel from HID50.com joined on the ride out and he accompanied me all the way back to Cheshire. We stopped to have a brief chat and decide when we would regroup.

I felt it would be fitting to have a symbol that would reflect on the days proceedings and act as a talisman for the days and weeks on the road ahead. Walter, Myself and Les felt the first sign from the road gods just didn’t have quite the right ring about it…

So as Walter forged on alone to London it was left to Les and myself to find a better sign. 2 hours later we think we found it and with due pomp and ceremony at the roadside we stamped our seal of approval onto the talisman by furnishing it with a Sibirsky Extreme sticker 🙂

Walter, just so you know there will be no more adoration and homage to the Colebatch name once we are out on the open road. 🙂