Wildlife

In my last entry I've told you about Cycledad's arrival and departure, but not much about the time in between. The last 7 or so days felt like a little holiday inside the travel, if that distinction can be made.

We planned a nice route along the Tsimlyansk Reservoir, an artificial lake that is formed with water from the rivers Don and Volga. It took us along the city of Volgodonsk (where the two aforementioned rivers come together) and a range of small villages. On the first day, we had some delay because the ferryboat that was suppose to take us across the Don took half an hour to arrive and another hour to leave. We camped in an area with a lot of cane that appeared to be mosquito heaven (especially with our bodies in it). Honestly, I've never seen such a thick cloud of mosquitoes! We cooked as fast as we could (thinking of it, we were a cook and a meal at the same time), hurried inside the tent where we could see the hungry bloodsuckers surrounding us between the inner and outer tent lining. Luckily we were out out of reach. The next day, after having cycled for an hour or so, we met another inhabitant of this area. If you go through this clip frame by frame (my camera has an option that shows you every still), you can see the viper stretching its entire body within a split second. Like this it can make these big, and incredibly rapid jumps:



Lateron that day we enjoyed some fresh 'arbuz' or watermelon at the road side. The seller, a young guy of Central Asian descent that wore army pants and a fisherman's body warmer with many small pockets, gave me the price in English, something that didn't happen before in Russia. After a few minutes a man arrived who had nothing but gold-plated teeth in his upper jaw. The owner ("arbuz: gut biznes!"). He exchanged some words with the seller, and then turned towards us. He introduced himself as 'Alexander' (those of you who have been reading carefully have noticed that I've met with a staggering amount of Alexanders so far) and wanted to know where we were from. He couldn't believe that we were actually from 'Gholandia' (as Ukrainian and Russian people say) and he felt he had to support us. He walked back to the enormous pile of arbuz, chose a fine specimen and walked back to us. "Here, for your trip!" "Thank you very much, but we cannot take this", we replied, but the man insisted. A melon like that easily weighs up to 4, 5 kilos, which is substantial if you carry more than 30 kilo's of luggage already. Finally we reached a compromise: I took a picture of his gift and showed it to him on the screen of my camera. "You see, we take your present with us." He smiled his golden smile. (Picture: eating arbuz, and my father signing to the seller that it's of good quality)

That night we ended on a beautiful dust road from nothing to nowhere, found by my father on the map that we had purchased especially for this area. Made of dried clay and surrounded by loads of silent camping spots, it seemed like a cyclebeast's dream. However, that night it rained. So when we got back to the road the next morning we realised that it had turned into a muddy substance, which was impossible to cycle through. It took us the entire morning to push the cycles through the muck, stopping every 100 metres to peel of a think layer of fiber-enforced clay (thick grass was keeping it together). In the beginning we were somewhat hesitant to get our hands dirty, but after 5 minutes we were scrapping of the mud as if there was no end to it. In fact, there was no end to it.

Our trip consisted more or less of two parts: the part up until Volgodonsk, where we scheduled a day of rest, and the part to Volgograd, the end of our ride together. On our map Volgodonsk didn't seem to be much, but like often is the case, maps can be desceptive. The town is small enough to have no one on couchsurfing.org, but big enough to get lost. It has two centres (an old one with many Soviet memorabilia and a new one, with shopping malls), which doesn't make it easy to orientate for newcomers. We found our way to hotel 'Scorpion' where I asked the girls behind the counter for a room. "We're fully-booked", one of them told me. Wow, a hotel the size of a flat in a town like this... I didn't expect that. In fact, all the hotels she called were also fully-booked. I asked her if she knew of any pensions or rooms, but she had no clue. Then one of her colleagues stepped in and made it clear to me that she perhaps knew something. She called a friend and asked me if 1500 roubles per nights was OK. As we planned a resting day we would need the place for two nights, to I tried to haggle it down to 2500 roubles for two nights. She nodded her head, talked for a little while longer and hung up. "OK, it's 2000 for two nights." When Eduard, the owner of the flat, arrived we followed him by bicycle into the new centre. There he showed us the place, wonderfully located at the 13th floor. I gave him the 2000 roubles, of which he returned 400. I have no idea how we got to the 1600 roubles for two nights, but sometimes a language barrier proves to be an advantage. (Picture: view from the balcony of the Volgodonsk flat)

Of course part of the resting day was used to fix my cyclepants (named 'Marco Polo', something that I didn't notice before, but that's stricking in way since I am following some of his footsteps), and the atelier that we found did an excellent job. By now I could write a seperate storyline, just for the pants...

The next day we continued along the lake that from time to time looked more like an inland sea. The terrain had turned into a mixture of steppe and arable land; mostly dry, with from time to time a small lakes or little stream of water. At one point we couldn't take the path we had in mind, because a farmer had ploughed up its soil. Lateron we were happy that he/she had done so, because the alternative brought us to some spectacular creatures. The video clip of the horses also shows some of the group dynamics of these animals. The stud in front seems to lead the pack with his majestic trot. He doesn't loose us out of sight for a single moment. The others (mares and foals) follow:



And this viper, set into motion by my father:



In Volgograd Sergey, our host, told us that the terrain east of Tsimlyansk is known for its wild horses, and that we should consider ourselves lucky that we have seen them. We certainly do.

The last night of camping together was at the same time the most convenient one. No mosquitoes, the lake at a stone's throw distance for a bath, and enough dry timber to make a camp fire.

The next track on OST 'Cycling East 2.0' is of a singer to whom I have listened to a lot from the very beginning: Nick Drake. Especially his album 'Pink Moon' has songs that somehow seem to suit the feeling of travelling. One of my personal favourites is 'Things behind the sun'. Especially the last couple of lines move me:

You find reknown while people frown
At things that you say
But say what you'll say
About the farmers and the fun
And the things behind the sun
And the people round your head
Who say everything's been said
And the movement in your brain
Sends you out into the rain.



P.s. The Dutch guy that I emailed to convey the regards of our mutual acqaintance in Backchisaray appeared to be right person and after some email exchange he told me about a former colleague of his that's making a similar trip as I do, only then along a southern silk route. His plan is to go around the world so perhaps our roads will cross somewhere on the cycle lanes of China