Note … route maps now updated in the Trip Data section

14.07.09

Yakutsk was kind to us. The weather was warm and sunny and had been like this for a month. When I say warm and sunny, I dont mean warm and sunny by extreme northern standards, it was warm and sunny full stop. About 20 hours a day of sunshine, and every day around 30 degrees.

Yakutia is an unusually warm region (in summer) for the Russian Far North (its typically 10-15 degrees warmer than Magadan in summer) and for that reason its the only real pocket of decent population in the far north. The climate in all the Vilyui river towns we travelled thru so far in Yakutia was all very agreeable and the only harsh climate was the Mirny diamond mining region, particularly in the north near Aikhal and Udachny.

The Yakuts are a curiosity. Certainly they are an attractive bunch, much more so than some of the other nationalities we have seen along the way. No-one really knows where they came from our how they found this pocket of good summer climate in the far north of Siberia, but the legend (and perhaps leading theory) is that the Yakuts were once part of the Genghis Khan realm. Their language is Turkic and similar to the Tuvans and Kirgiz. Apparently the Yakuts or the leader of the Yakuts did something to displease Genghis, and he banished them from the Mongolic realm. The only place for them to go was north, and they settled alongside the Lena and Vilyui rivers, out of reach of the Khan (probably displacing the native Even and Evenki reindeer herders and forcing them further North into the tundra).

And so you see once again, the history of a nation pivots around this one man, Genghis Khan. Almost everyone and everything from the Caucasus, thru Central Asia to Yakutia is connected to him and the history he created. Its a remarkable legacy and has been a constant theme among the nationalities I have met starting way back in the Caucasus in mid April.

Several hundred years later, the Russians arrived in the form of the great cossack explorers / conquistadors. Vilyuisk and Yakutsk were settled by the cossacks in the 1630s – and Sibirsky Extremed in 2009! Yakutsk now is a relaxed town with Russians and Yakuts totally mixed together. The diamond region in the west was predominantly Russian, and the Vilyui towns were almost exclusively Yakut.

Most of the Yakuts in Yakutsk are a cosmopolitan blend, including Russian, Tatar, Yakut and even Chinese blood – In large part because the Lena and Vilyui rivers were also places of exile in the times of the Tsars and the times of the Soviets. All sorts were exiled to the region and once here, there were no ethnic barriers. All were equal in purgatory.

– – –

We were met early in the morning by another Artyom, his one was a Yakutian motorcyclist on a Hayabusa. He was going to take us to the jet wash. The bikes and luggage were filthy. After that we would look for a battery for me.

Only my bike wouldnt start.

It took us an hour to get it going, this time it needed a car battery to kick it over. We washed the bikes and headed for the Yakutsk bike club’s mechanic to see what might be around. As it happens he had one battery. It was a gel AGM battery. And with a very minor tweak, it fitted my bike – in the proper spot. It was awesome, firing the bike up instantly. The battery was a spare the chief mechanic had bought for his sportsbike, but was happy to let me have it for 2000 rubles (45 EUR). Done !

It felt stange to have a functional bike. I had been on a heart and lung machine for the last 1200 km – needing constant jump starting.

The evening was spent having a barbeque on a big hill overlooking the Lena with Bolot, our host Artyom and his girlfriend Katya. Awesome Yakutian nature and scenery.

– – –

15.07.09

Tony and I finished general maintenance on the bikes. I needed to get some argon welding done, and my sunglasses were in for repair at the watch repairers. The welder refused payment, preferring a foto next to my bike. The watchmaker too refused payment, despite having tinkered with the hinge on the shades all morning. I pleaded with him for a bill, but he adamantly refused. I have really grown to love Yakutia and its super people.

Everything was ready for the next stage – the Kolyma Highway from Yakutsk to Magadan. Our final task in Yakutsk was to check out the permafrost. It is pretty hard to imagine permafrost just 2 metres away when its baking sun and 33 degrees. The standard route is via the Permafrost Institute, who have a tunnel down into the ground, but there is a new alternative. A Yakutian tour operator, Planet Yakutia, has taken over a formerly secret soviet complex of tunnels into the hills on the edge of Yakutsk, that had been used for food storage … an ideal refrigerator … just run a train line into a hill, and 2-3 metres into the hill its -20 degrees year round.

Surprise surprise, Mr Yakutia, the Tsar of the Road of Bones, Rayil, had access to this tunnel complex, which was being turned into a tourist destination. He took us there in the evening. Dressed in thermal insulation (and sweating like pigs) we passed thru the three doors that provide insulation at the entrance to the tunnels. In the space of a few metres, we had gone from +30 degrees outside to -6 degrees inside. The temperature warms up in summer mainly due to the amount of visitors to the complex. Every time doors are opened, warm air rushes in. If the doors were kept closed, the temperature would stay steady at about -20 … the average year round temperature in Yakutsk.

Inside was a network of rooms and tunnels, all walls and ceiling covered with ice crystals – just from the moisture from visitors breath. Some rooms stored ice carvings from a recent ice carving competition, others had wedding registry rooms (the hottest thing in Yakutsk is to get registered in the permafrost), and an ice bar. There is talk of making an ice hotel there in the side of the hill … but unlike the swedish one, it could be open year round. Perhaps the most remarkable thing of all about these tunnels, is they are not ‘underground’ as such. You dont go down to visit them. It’s just a door in the side of a normal everyday hill – the tunnels are at ground level.

It was a fascinating end to our brief Yakutsk stay.

– – –

16.07.09   “Мой друг уехал в Магадан…”

Alarms went off at 8:30. Rayil was coming round to pick us up about 10am and we had to pack everything up from Artyoms apartment. By midday we were ready to go, having refuelled our sim cards, wallets and stomachs for the journey ahead. Final task was to refuel the bikes – but not before a TV interview for Yakutsk TV. They breed them pretty adventurous up here and love a good adventure story.

We eventually left Rayil and the camera crew at the ferry port – he had plenty to get on with. He is in the middle of buying and equipping a big Ural truck to provide cross-river transport for yet another Road of Bones expedition. This one is a Hungarian project to drive a 1970s Cadillac Eldorado convertible to Magadan. Sounded like a Hungarian porn movie shoot to me.

As we departed I noted we were just short of 129 degrees east.

The ferry (barge) across the Lena took one and half hours … the Lena had grown! We pulled in opposite Yakutsk, on the Eastern bank of the Lena about 2:30 in the afternoon. Once on the road, we made good time. I dont know what Tony had taken but whatever it was it worked. A few days to relax in Yakutsk and time to put the horrors of the sandy stretch behind him, and his confidence was back. I couldnt shake him.
We were riding as a pair again, at 100 km/h down the Kolyma Highway. This was the first federal road we had been on since arriving in Irkutsk, over 4000 km ago.

The road was a little better than the Vilyuisky Trakt, but only a little better. There were still long gravelly sections, the odd sandy patch, yet Tony was unshakeable. That gave me a lot of confidence for the days ahead and I was pleased he had got his motorcyling mojo back! I suspect the falls in the sandy section near Vilyuisk had shaken him a bit and had affected him for the next day all the way to Yakutsk.

We stopped for fuel in Churapcha and food in Ytyk-Kyuel. About 7:30pm we arrived at the end of the road. We had covered 392 km in 5 hours, and 45 minutes of that were food and fuel stops – an average of 92 km/h … not bad for the Kolyma.

I had been warned about the next stage – the ferry across the Aldan River near Khandyga. There is one, sometimes two a day if you are lucky. Safran had told me to budget a day for the crossing. In a sign our luck had changed since the Udachny / Aikhal days (when if it wasnt for bad luck we would have had no damn luck at all) the evening ferry had just loaded its first vehicle when we arrived. 10 minutes later and we would have been stuck till at least the next morning.

Like the ferry across the Lena at Yakutsk, this boat did not go directly across the river, but wound its way upstream to the nearest village, though the network of islands that fills the Aldan. It was another hour and a half on a barge … second time today. It was well after 9pm when we disembarked and headed off for the 40km run to Khandyga.

In Khandyga we filled up the bikes, hit a store for some beer, noodles, crisps and water and were about to head off when a bunch of Dagestani guys in a car insisted on driving us round in search of a place to stay. The local dormatory hotel was full but they had another idea … a local b&b type place. I couldnt believe this place when I saw it and neither could Tony. Khandyga is a bumfu@k town in the middle of nowhere, yet the people who rented us a room, Yuri and Lyuba, had an amazing set-up. Modern clean rooms and proper European bathroom. It was yet another tired dirty bikers fantasy come true. Next morning we discovered someone had even scrubbed our boots clean which we had taken off and left, Russian style, just inside the front door

We were now 135 degrees east.

– – –

17.07.09 Дорога на костях

“Road of Bones” (Doroga na Kostyakh) is a term given by the Russians to the roads built by Gulag labour between Khandyga, a former major river port before the road to Yakutsk was built in the last 10 years, and Magadan.  As most people already know, the terms road of bones was used as the gulag prisoners who died during construction, and reports are of hundreds of thousands at least, had their bones and bodies just used as landfill for the next section of road.  Quite literally the corpses were bulldozed into the road.  As a point of interest, the Russians dont really use the term at all.  To them it is all the Kolymsky Trakt.  Its only in the western imagination that the term ‘Road of Bones’ conjures up all sorts of images of  harshness and misery, and adventurism.

The original summer through route ran via Kyubeme (now deserted), Tomtor (accessible by motorcycle only in August and early Sepember), Kadykchan (now a ghost town) and then south to Magadan via Ust Omchug. There was also an all weather spur up to the gold mining town of Ust Nera from Kadykchan connected to a zimnik (winter road) from Kyubeme to Ust Nera. There was an additional road up from Magadan to Susuman and Kadykchan via Atka and Orutokan. The whole lot was originally all built in the 1930’s and 1940’s by Stalin’s Gulag system.

This last section when combined with the original road from Susuman down through Ust Omchug to Magadan is known as the ‘Kolyma Ring’ and is the heart and soul of the “Gulag Archipelago”, made famous by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. It was on or near this ring that dozens of Stalin era Gulags existed in the 1930’s, 40’s and early 50’s, only to be abandoned after the deaths of Beria and Stalin in 1953.

The zimnik from Kyubeme to Ust Nera, once the roughest part of the route is currently being upgraded to all weather road status. The Russians have declared one route to be worthy of Federal Road status and have been spending money upgrading that particular route with road widening, new bridges etc … that include the two most northerly alternatives.

Because the road thru Tomtor is really only rideable on a motorcycle in August or early September, we were going to try the northern variation thru Ust Nera, check out the current state of play regarding the upgrading of the old zimnik, and then revert to the original road direct from Kadykchan to Magadan thru Ust Omchug.

My initial plans had been to take the new road (further east) after Kadykchan so that I could get to and beyond Omsukchan. But have just heard Mac Swinarski has beaten us to that by a week … he has just ridden from Magadan to Merenga, which had been my target, and is currently battling to get further. For me there is not a lot of point being the second bunch of guys to get to Merenga. So we head on to Magadan and will sort out flights to Khabarovsk, where we will meet up with a bunch of Russian adventure bikers headed for Sakhalin and also Terry, another Englishman who will join us for the ride home. We had also planned to meet up with Chris Scott there for the ride across the BAM and thru Mongolia and China, but unfortunately Chris has been tied up with publishing deadlines.

We were ready to leave Khandyga about midday when a storm cell passed overhead. We headed for the market and a cafe there, where were filled ourselves up, grabbed a bag full of pirozhki for the road and waited out the rain. It was 12:45 when we finally started the engines and got the wheels rolling. Rapid progress was made thru to Tyoply Klyuch, a decent sized town. We pressed on at 100 km/h passing Razvilka, a tiny settlement with no commercial premises.

The scenery in this region was particularly pleasant on the eyes. The was the first mountains we had seen since the shores of Lake Baikal.

But the Sibirsky Extreme juggernaut was brought to a shuddering halt by roadworks. The road between Razvilka and Kyubeme was being worked on, and all traffic had to halt while they worked. It was now 2:30pm, and their afternoon work shift was 2pm to 4:30pm – we had 2 hours to wait. Half an hour later a pair of Muscovites touring the country in a wazzik rolled up behind us. They had had their wazzik modified with extra fuel tanks, a couple of beds etc. The Wazzik is a phenomenal, flexible,
competent platform. Modify it at will. Just dont expect it to look beautiful.

We chatted to the Moscow boys and another half hour later another wazzik rolls up – a route bus serving the communities along the assorted roads of bones. We all waited and waited and waited. I chatted to the guys manning the road barrier about bears. They had seen one 2-3 weeks ago, but nothing so far today. Thats good.

Finally at 4:30 we were again underway … and we shot off towards Kyubeme. The scenery was stunning and we stopped many times for filming and photography. It was 7:45pm when we finally made it to Kyubeme, or where Kyubeme should be on the map. The former town of Kyubeme was across the River, on the start of the southern route of the Road of Bones. The townships and road are now abandoned and the only remnant of Kyubeme is the broken bridge and the petrol station. After some fotos at the old bridge, I shot up ahead to the petrol station and filled up. Tony wasnt behind me. He was when we left the bridge two kilometres back, so I rode back to try and find him and sure enough a kilometre down the road Tony was pointing to a flat front tyre, thru a swarm of mosquitoes. We hadnt had this problem since the Anabar Road. I suggested he ride slowly on to the fuel station and we fix it there where there were at least a few other people to chat to, and a small concrete slab. By Kyubeme we had topped 140 degrees east.

We fixed the tyre and chatted to the rough guys around the fuel station. I asked when was the last time they saw any motorcyclists. A week or two ago they had seen a group of three Polish guys and some time after then a lone motorcyclist of unknown origin … but he thought also Polish. The group of three I suspected I knew who they were. There are two hardcore Polish groups in the region at the moment trying different routes to extremes. One, as mentioned earlier, led my friend Mac Swinarski, flew straight into Magadan and recently got to Merenga and was last heard battling to get to the coast with the help of tucks. And the second group took the Trans-Siberian Railway across to Chita, and rode up to Yakutsk and the Kolyma region from Chita … I was pretty sure the 3 Polish guys the Kyubeme fuel station had seen was that second group. But the lone motorcyclist? Who was he? I texted Safran back in Poland and he confirmed the three would have been the Polish group, but he too had no information on the lone rider up ahead.

Tony’s front rim had a bad ding it it from hitting a large rock at 100 km/h and we borrowed an axe from the fuel station guys, using the back of the head to bash the rim back into some sort of shape. By the time we finished chatting and bashing and repairing the tube, the two wazziks from our roadworks delays had caught us up and also fuelled up. Anyone moving in this area has to stop at the Kyubeme fuel station.

As we prepared to go, a tracked military type vehicle chugs into the fuel station. Finally at about 10pm we were underway again. It was 265km to the next properly inhabited place, Ust Nera. we had ridden 250 km since Tyoply Klyuch, the last inhabited town. We were in the middle of a 500 km long stretch of uninhabited wilderness, and the fuel station at Kyubeme was the only sign of life, apart from road workers camps. If I had known it was this empty, I would have bought more piroshki for the road in Khandyga.

Now we were on the northern branch of the road – the old zimnik – winter road.  As recently as 2005 a friend attempted this route, but it was impassible by motorcycle.  Since then the Russians had been working on the road, building bridges, widening and grading it and initial thought were that it was in excellent shape. Rayil back in Yakutsk had told me that apart from Winter and August, its really the only road possible now, with the abandoned southern (summer) road decaying more and more every year.  This year, 2009 is the first year the upgraded zimnik was now fully operational (bridges still being built in some places).

By 11:30 pm we were in fading twilight but still progressing at high speed. The road upgrading was recent and accordigly the surface was reliable. Despite the fading light we had been powering on at 80 – 100 km/h and had covered 130km in the hour and a half since leaving Kyubeme.

It all came to a shuddering halt at some brideworks over the Selerikan River. A new bridge was built and being surfaced. The bridge workers had blocked the entrance to the bridge at both sides with heavy equipment such that not even a motorcycle could squeeze thru.

A couple of drunk road workers approached us and said the road is closed until the morning. On seeing we were foreigners, they came back with 1000 rubles each and they would let us thru. We scoffed. They tried 500 each. Again we shook our heads. Vodka?

Well we had two bottles of beer in Tony’s luggage unused from the night before, so we offered those. They scoffed. Tony went to the other end of the bridge while I tried befriending the drunks. Tony returned 10 minutes later and said a senior guy at the other end wanted to see our motorcycles. That was great news. I explained that to the drunks at our end of the bridge and assorted shouting went on from one end of the bridge to the other and eventually one guy jumped into the cab of a roller, and fired up the diesel engine. Before moving it, he reconfirmed that we would still give him our 2 beers. We said yes, at the other end of the bridge.

Eventually the roller moved and we squeezed thru and onto the 200 metre long bridge, rolling gently towards the other side, and the other road block, We stopped there while they checked out the bikes, and we agreed to let them take fotos. They tried in vain to get the camera working but it appeared to have a flat battery. Meanwhile Tony was digging into his panniers for the two beers. He found one, while the other had leaked. We gave them one beer while the budding camera men went back to their camp a few hundred yards away to source a new camera.

About an hour after we arrived at the bridge, all the photos were taken, and the second roadblock was removed. It was now 12:30 (middle of the night) and we had an hour of mosquito bites for our troubles. It was quite dark, largely because thick rainclouds had gathered. Rain began falling soon after we began moving. We still had an hour and a half on the road at least. The rain was just a storm cell, and we passed it in 20 minutes. The road was not quite as good once we hit the old northern road between Ust Nera and Elginsky, but we pressed on, eventually making it to Ust Nera at 2am. We located a local lad driving his friends and their girlfriends around in the middle of the night and asked where a hotel might be. He led us directly to the hotel and by 2:15 am we were safely in a hotel room in downtown Ust Nera. We broke out the instant noodle packets and took advantage of the kettle in our room.

– – –

18.07.09

We woke late … around 11am, and had a few jobs to do. Tony needed to get his rim bashed again. There had been another big rock at high speed between Kyubeme and Ust Nera. We went to the town’s shino montazh guy, who took to it with a selection of sledge hammers until he was satisfied. I meanwhile had gone searching for a cafe, and found a place selling chebureki … I bought 6 and returned to Tony. I had also located a bankomat and scored some extra cash. We needed it. It was expensive up in these remote regions. Everything from food to fuel to hotels were all chewing thru our cash supply.

It was 3pm by the time we were underway and refuelled. We had eaten 4 of the chebureki for brunch. Artik was the next town on the map, 130 km down the road. If we wanted to get all the way to the next fuel on our route at Omchak, we would need to top up with the 5 – 6 litres we would burn thru on the way to Artik. The road from ust Nera to Artik was very scenic, following a river, with cliffs on the left and river on the right.

When we got to Artik, the fuel station was bare. Out of fuel. That and the late start meant we had to change the plans, and I decided our target for the day would now be Susuman, 40 km off our route, but a place where we could easily find a hotel, food and fuel. Artik also had a police checkpoint on the road, it was the last town in Yakutia. The time changed again as we left Yakutia. We were now 11 hours ahead of London. We had crossed Yakutia by road, from Lensk to Artik. All up we had ridden over 4000 km in Yakutia alone, all on dirt roads (apart from in the towns of Mirny and Yakutsk). We passed 145 degrees east as we entered Magadan province.

The road to Kadykchan was pretty uneventful, and each town marked on the map we passed I searched for shops or signs of life but most were deserted. The afternoon was spiced up when Tony got his second flat tyre of the Road of Bones. This time it was the rear. We stopped and were set upon of course by mosquitoes. An hour and several dozen bites later and we were again underway.

Kadykchan had been one of the largest towns in the region with over 15,000 people, but 13 years ago was abandoned – apparently in the space of a few hours.   The story goes that at some point the town lostt its electricity and heating system and in this part of the world in mid winter, that spells death.  The town was abandoned and its people moved to nearby Susuman and the Magadan region.  Tony and I wanted to check out this abandoned city and take a look around. As we began to see the city on our left, I noted the other road of bones route turnoff to our right. Its an unassuming turnoff marked only by a post with three cubes on it. I couldnt resist, I turned down there and followed the road for a few kilometres.

It was getting dark and we needed to get into Kadykchan and get some fotos so I turned around, crossed the main road and we made our way into the ghost city. It was indeed eerie, and everytime we stopped we were swarmed upon by mosquitoes. Abandoned shops, apartments, buildings – some with old belongings still in there – made for a surreal scene. The buildings themselves were in relatively good condition and it was clear the abandonment was relatively recent. At 9pm and with the sun still shining we pulled out and headed back to the main road.

From here it should be a quick ride in to Susuman … 80 km … but nothing is ever so simple on Sibirsky Extreme. A dozen kilometres down the road and Tony’s rear tyre was flat again. we have the process of changing the tyre down to a relatively quick 10 minutes or so, its all the getting the luggage off, and on again, getting the tools out, and assorted cleaning and so on that seems to mean every tyre change takes an hour out of the travel progress.

Finally underway again and we zoom to within 8 km of Susuman, when again Tony’s rear end lets the team down. Tony tried limping into town while I rode ahead and sorted out a hotel and some beer and instant nooodles. I returned to find Tony almost where I left him – he was still by the side of the road, about 7 km from Susuman. This was the 4th puncture of the road journey so far from Yakutsk. It was getting ridiculous. The tyre Tony received from Leon seemd to be cursed!

We made it gingerly into Susuman soon after midnight and checked into our palatial suite, where the beers and noodles tasted like heaven.

– – –

19.07.09

I awoke Tony at 9:30am. We both could have done with more sleep, but it was 600km to Magadan and there was nowhere worth stopping the night in between. We needed to get going by 11am. As if out of a movie script, we brought our gear downstairs to be confronted with yet another flat rear tyre on Tony’s bike. A small nail was the culprit this time. We did the old flat tyre shuffle for the 5th time since Yakutsk, then headed off for some breakfast and finally hit the road about midday.

The first 40 km was backtracking road we covered yesterday until we reached the turnoff for what the locals call the old road. Whichever route is getting the most maintenance is called the new road, and whatever is not is called the old road. Almost immediately on turning south down the old road and it was apparent that this road would be a lot more fun. Tony hooted with joy as we climbed into the mountains that it reminded him of the Welsh forestry roads from his car rallying days.

We were having a ball on these roads, until 80km or so down the road when Tony’s rear tyre again went flat. We took it out, pumped it up and found no leak. We dammed a small stream to make it deep enough to immerse the tube and still no sign of a leak. After 30 frustrating minutes of finding no leak and with the tube still inflated, we decided we didnt understand the problem, reinserted the tube, inflated it perfectly normally, and rode off.

I was a little frustrated with myself as this was one area in which I hadnt done enough research prior to the trip. At the time of planning my priority had been to get to Merenga, now I wanted to know more about the Gulag region thru which we were passing. The Gulag histories are not ones encouraged by the local Magadan government to be promoted to foreigners. There are no signs to former gulag camps, and local tour companies are discouraged from organising gulag tours. Some knowledge about the location of some of the better preserved ones would have been great, but I didnt have it.

I had a few settlements marked on my map but they didnt exist any more and we didnt come to anything resembling a village or town until Kulu, almost 100km down the road. The first properly inhabited place was Omchak, where fuel was available but we pressed on towards Ust Omchug. Midway between Omchak and Ust Omchug, again Tony’s tyre was flat. What was it with this tyre? This was the 6th flat on the Yakutsk-Magadan road. Again we went thru the process, and again no leak. Tony said it had gone down on the road reasonably quickly. And we were unable to pump it up, yet when we take it out, and pump it up there is no problem, and not even a leak. Infuriating! Especially when you spend an hour getting savaged by the most aggressive mosquitoes on earth. For good measure, we changed the valve, pumped it all up and rode off again.

Fuel and food came at Ust Omchug. It was now 7pm and we still had 260km to go to Magadan. We powered on for 3/4 of an hour, before yet again Tony had another flat … the 7th now in 3 days. For the 3rd time in a row we were unable to find a leak. And despite being unable to pump the tube up when it was on the bike, it now happily pumped up.

From here on Tony seemed to have taken some sort of motorcycling viagra. He sensed my frustration that we were late and despite the fading light, zoomed off at over 100 km/h. There was still 100km until we hit the main road to Magadan at Palatka. I gave him a km or so start so I wouldnt swallow his dust and then set off after him. I hadnt caught him as I usually did within the first 10 minutes or so, so I stepped up the pace. I wasnt even seeing his clouds of dust. Before long I was at full speed, hampered slightly by still having to wear sunglasses. My visor was filthy and I had refused to take my helmet off to clean it while Tony was changing his 7th tyre – lest my scalp also get savaged by mosquitoes.

I began seeing dust clouds, a sign that Tony had ridden here within the last minute or so and powered on to reel him in. 100 – 120 km/h slowing down to 80 for the corners but still I was only getting clouds. I hadnt seen Tony ride like this all trip. The dust cloud grew thicker as I finally sensed I was catching the source, but when I did catch the source it was a 4wd van and not Tony. I zoomed past and was relieved to see the dust cloud going on ahead. Tony was racing ahead but I still hadnt seen him. Finally at a curve in a mountain I looked across the valley and saw him about 300 – 400 yards ahead.

For the next half an hour to the main road at Palatka, I chased hard but could not reel him in. We had just ridden at insane speeds to finish the last 150 km of the Road of Bones. I spoke with Tony on finally catching him while he waited for me on the asphalt at Palatka and he said he just was in a groove, and was reading every curve like a book. It was his finest riding of the trip. I was dumbstruck. I had been unable to catch him over 100 km.

At Palatka we hit asphalt and from here to Magadan 80 km away was asphalt highway … the first asphalt highway since Kachug, 250 km from Irkutsk, 6000 km ago. We cruised into Magadan just after sunset, the first real sunset we had seen since somewhere near Irkutsk as well. We were heading south and further away from the solstice. By the time we reached Magadan it was dark. The first real darkness we had seen since Ust Kut.

As we rode over the top of a hill and into Magadan, the Maska Skorbi (Mask of Sorrows) monument was lit up on a hill overlooking the city. It had to be our first stop. The monument is a moving tribute to those who lost their lives under the gulag system. Like many Russian monuments, the closer you get to it, the more powerful it becomes. The ultimate power to move comes from the small bronze statue behind the concrete mask of a small girl on her knees, weeping.

I called Prokhor, a local contact I had been given from a 4WD enthusiast in the area. Prokhor met us at the mask and led to his garage. We garaged the bikes and headed to the Magadan Hotel in the centre – via a beer shop of course.

We had left Yakutsk on Thursday afternoon and arrived in Magadan on Sunday Evening. Tony P, an OAP from west London, had just ridden the 2100 km from Yakutsk to Magadan via the Road of Bones in 3.5 days. And that included no less than 7 tyre changes!