Day 54

I have read many blogs, travel guides and articles portraying the Russian police as pretty much a bunch of corrupt bully boys. Well I say balderdash to that! I made it to Penza today. A medium sized city, so so in appearance, confusing to navigate and with killer hills (not heels) on its outskirts. After much huffing and puffing I found the train station, a thought that this would be a good area to find a hotel. I wondered around the station to see if there was a notice board or map of the city, when two police officers stopped me. After a quick glance at my passport they asked what I was doing.I told them looking for a hotel a which point they said wait! I was a little puzzled but obliged. After much scurrying officers would occasionally pass by and say wait, and buy me some Kvass, a rather nice fermented rye drink, widely available throughout the former Soviet Union (and no, it won't get you drunk as the alcohol content is less than 1%!)

So I carried on waiting, but after a while I got a little bored and thought about leaving. But I was unsure whether to leave as I felt I should do what the Russian police had asked me to do, and wait. I did not know why they had asked me to wait, I thought some bureaucratic thing was afoot. So I kicked my heels for a little while longer until an officer who spoke a little English came up and asked me to go with him. At this point he led me straight to the train station hotel, explained in Russian to the staff that I wanted to stay and showed me to my room! Very grateful at their help (and a little relieved that the waiting was over!) I settled into my room.

My evening was spent walking around town and eating shashlik. Penza has a very long, smart pedestrianised shopping street running through the middle of the city. A good place for a night time stroll and a bit of people watching before bed.

Day 53.

Not so tired today! I pass through a very curious little town. It feels like a cross between Russia, Switzerland and Nepal! I stop for lunch and take some snaps. I head off and later stopped by a curious police officer who wants to know my story. I reach Nizh Lomov, a dusty one street town whose guest house has the world's most lethal, slippery shower that almost kills me. As I lie on the floor staring up at where I was about one nanosecond ago I feel glad that I did not fall in the other direction where the sink is!

Day 52

Tired, tired, tired. Today I feel exhausted. Hills, traffic, dust and heat take their toll. At 5pm I give up and stop for the night. There is still good 3 hours of day light left but I am not interested. I snooze and then head to the cafe. I order a 4 course meal and stuff myself silly while I watch the dinner ladies chat and laugh about life.

Day 51.

A quiet day, caught in a bit of a down pour at one point. I stop at a road side cafe and swap coins with some local lads who like to collect currency. I get a rather cool Yuri Gagarin 1 Rouble coin! Later I am stuck in a traffic jam near a level crossing. I get to the front and the warning lights are on, train approaching! However most of the traffic ignores this and lazily moves on, over the crossing. One lorry gets half way across and then stops, stuck in traffic. This can't be good I think. And then I catch a glimpse of the train. It is moving at an even more lazy pace than the vehicles that surround me. I begin to understand. Everyone spots the train. Space opens up before the lorry, it moves forward and no one follows. The train passes by like a car passing through a herd of cattle on an English country road.

Day 50

 Moscow has 3 concentric orbital routes, I am now out of the third ring. Things are becoming rural again. I amazed at how quickly the affluence of central Moscow is replaced by villages that still have communal stand pipes for water. One does not have to travel far to see the difference in Russian lifestyles. I had always thought sites like this would be common east of the Urals, but not within 100 miles of Red Square. The commuter towns however are still smart, Kolomna for lunch and Ryazan for the evening.

Day 49

Do svidaniya Mockba, but not as quick as I would have like. I think that following The Moscow River out of the city might be a nice way to leave. Instead I end up lost in an industrial zone and trying to navigate through the outskirts without map, compass or much else. I find an escape route after much swearing to myself, but find this road leads to a big road which led to a motorway! I ask a taxi driver, and passers by which way I should go, all point down the motorway. It seems that it is perfectly legitimate to ride a bicycle on the motorway in Russia. However every bone in my body and years of conditioned learning are screaming at me NO!! I CAN'T RIDE HERE, THIS IS A MOTORWAY! After a while I calm down. I soon realise that riding on a motorway is safer and more pleasurable than normal routes! I have plenty of space in the hard shoulder. The road is wide, smooth and straight. I am relaxed and spot other cyclists going the other way. This is actually great fun and becomes one of the nicer afternoons of cycling in Russia. I begin to wish that this road would take me all the way to Kazakhstan!

Fortunately my motorway did not do this...!

Day 48

I like TV towers. I like going up them and seeing the views over the city I am in. Earlier in this journey I went up the Villnius TV tower. Now I planned to go to the Shukov Tower. However due to bad navigation I end up at the wrong tower, The Ostankino Tower instead! Ultimately fortunate as tourists can not enter the Shukov Tower.

Once the worlds tallest freestanding structure, and still Europe's, Ostankino has a viewing deck at 337 meters that gives superb views of Moscow. Peering through the binoculars at a teeny tiny Red Square, Kremlin and Arbat time flies. I consider going to The Space Park, but as it is late it is mostly closed. I return to the hostel and get ready to leave Moscow. I rather like Moscow and shall miss it!

Day 47

Today I go to the Kremlin. I had tried the previous day but it was closed. I explore the Cathedrals and see where Tsars were crowned and buried. Unfortunately, the building I found to be the most interesting to look at I could not enter, The State Kremlin Palace. I peer through the windows and glimpse fantastic stairways, angular strong communist architecture and seals of the former CCCP states still on the wall.

I leave and head to the Museum of the Great Patriotic War (WWII). It is very interesting, filled with Dioramas depicting battles and information boards telling a rather biased Soviet side to the story. I have come to the opinion that if one wants a true and frank depiction of what happened during WWII then the museums of Germany are the best place. There I feel the story of the conflict is not nuanced to depict national interest (or bias) but to my inexpert mind one finds an open and honest account of what happened. May be the cliche that history is written by the victors is being challenged here, or perhaps Germany is not in a position to accord any personal hurrah! to The War, so is free to recount the story without national agenda. Anyway, I am waffling. I have included a couple of the information boards below.

I take a massive walk back to the hostel, and as it is a Friday I think about clubbing. After a bit of research I find a club that sounds suitable so head off. I stop at a few bars along the way, none of which are particularly exciting and find the club, only to find it is closed! Not a peep of that on its website. Other bars near by are open so I try these instead, but they are really not to my taste. It feels a bit like drinking on Broad Street in Birmingham, or Park End Street in Oxford. R and B schlager echos from all the bars. After a while (well half 3ish) I give up and return back to the hostel, only to find the night watchman is asleep and it takes half an hour of door banging to wake him!

Day 46

Today I met Lenin, St. Basil's and the sites around the Kremlin. Not the Kremlin itself as it is closed. I learn the concept of being a "Fool for Christ" as Basil was. An interesting idea, to use ones own ridicule to expose injustice in the world. I also visit the Gulag Museum and a modern art gallery filled with contemporary German art and some rather interesting statues outside.

Day 45.

I spend the morning working on the bike, painstakingly cleaning each chain link with tissues, derailleur, chainrings and anything else I can find. The afternoon is more fun, more exploring the Olympic Park, and its Stadium which is being refitted presumably for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. I finish in Arbat, close to my hostel. I am beginning to really like Moscow!

Day 44

Walking, walking, walking. Not interested in cycling today.  Along the Moscow River, past Cathedrals, Peter the Great, busy streets and Stalinist architecture. Not all but one of the Seven Sisters. I finish in a rather overpriced bar that played Die Antwoord. I move on to the less over priced and far more enjoyable Kamchatka Bar and watch Muscovites go about their business.

A political rant written in December 2014

My name is Daniel John Dispain, a British citizen who has decided to ride a bicycle around the world. As a consequence I will meet many people from many different lands, some of which will have very different ideas to me, some of which will have similar ideas to me. Now whilst in Moscow I met a nice chap and we had a long chat about Democracy. "Russia is democratic" he said. I was curious to see where this was leading. "Russia is democratic. Show me where you do have true democracy? In the United States where you have one party led by a load of fat lawyers, and" there was a little pause here for effect, "another party led by a load of fat lawyers!" Now I left the conversation agreeing with him to an extent. Where is democracy and what is it? By this I mean what does it truly mean to the individuals living in the democratic nations of the west? And at this point please don't give definitions of universal suffrage and the right to vote. I want to know what it truly means to live with "Democracy."

At present in the UK we are 5 months from a general election and the four main parties all tend to follow the same neo liberal paradigm except arguably one is a bit racist, one is a bit nasty, one is a bit useless and one is a bit hypocritical. Do we have a one party system where people no longer vote for policies but for personalities? Images of Farage drinking a beer and smoking appeal to some voters. Not what he says. The two Ed's queue outside Greg's to prove that they are in touch with the common man. No news on what changes New Labour would make in the event of electoral victory however. To an extent it does not surprise me that voters feel disenfranchised and do not vote. But where could this lead?

Earlier in 2014 elections for the EU parliament occurred. Turn out was poor, around 42% for the EU as a whole and 34% in the UK. Of those that did vote many voted for Euro skeptic and extreme parties on the left and right as a protest. The European Parliament is often accused as being poorly run, bureaucratic and inefficient. I personally am pro European, and I feel that bringing people closer together can only be beneficial. I remember as a child the division between east and west in Europe. The Wall, check points between friendly nations. barriers everywhere. That now has largely gone. They lie redundant on the side of the road, boarded up and covered in undergrowth. Monuments to a restricted past. Freedom of movement in Europe and other Co signatories of Schengen can only in my opinion be good. I look at the European parliament with confusion tho. But then I think there must be an explanation for this. Could it be that here we have a parliament that is largely not voted for, and of those that do vote vote for extremists like Golden Dawn, UKIP, Front National, Jobbik, Lega Nord etc. Fill a room with monkeys and typewriters one does not end up with the works of Shakespeare but ends up with shit on the walls, bananas everywhere and broken typewriters (if my monkey based stereotypes are correct). But should I blame the voters here? No, not really.

Where do people get their information on the world and current events? The media I suppose. Friends I suppose, relatives, personal experiences. What nuances are out there that shape a persons mind? Are people really interested in current developments in such and such a parliament or are they more concerned with daily life? Getting to work, buying clothes for the little 'un, looking for cheap deals at the local supermarket. Newspapers in the UK are often read so as to have ones own ideas reflected back and confirmed, there by one can feel good about themselves or outraged at some other current event. A form of entertainment perhaps. Left wing people buy The Guardian, right wing people buy  The Telegraph and The Times, (imbeciles buy the Daily Express). Perhaps left wing people should buy The Telegraph and Times, and right wing people The Guardian (and no one The Express!) so as to get opposing view points. If that would change things I do not know.

I rode through China on my way to where I sit now (Vientiane). Another "Non democratic" nation. It is lovely, the people amazing. Friendly beyond compare. It is not a restricted open prison of evil tyrants oppressing the people as the western media would have you believe. But a nation full of people getting on with their lives. People go to work in the morning, come home in the evening, flop down on the sofa eat dinner and watch TV. A popular Chinese TV show at the moment? Chinese Pop Idol. If only these people had democracy, then things would change! The people of China, Russia and elsewhere seem to me to be just as bewildered with what is happening in the world. Putin is no more representative of the average Russian as Cameron is of the average Brit. And no, Russia is not full of ultra right, ultra orthodox homophobic nationalists. The Russians I met were people just the same as anywhere else, with similar hopes and dreams and just as confused about the world as anybody else. Wonderfully warm, welcome and curious about this foreigner on his bicycle. I don't think anyone really knows what is happening, people have ideas, thoughts, opinions. They act on them (sometimes) but most often people just want to get on.

Day 43

Crazy busy roads! A little rant but why is it when faced traffic jams the world over car drivers forget that they are driving cars and think they are in mosquitoes and start darting about the place in the most unpredictable of manner. Anyway, I made it. Moscow, Mockba, Red Square, The Kremlin and all! I push my bike onto Red Square (no cycling allowed!) and take the selfie. This feels really exciting, it feels like I have covered some ground. From one edge of Europe to practically the other. I have a wander around Red Square, see St Basil's and Lenin's mausoleum. I walk along some of the streets that lead off Red Square and pass a Ferrari dealership, and the plethora of stores that now inhabit the GUM department store. During Soviet times this store was famous (infamous?) as it did not suffer the same shortages of goods that other stores in the USSR suffered from. Hence it would have lengthy queues of people trying to get in to try and buy what was on offer. As a cynic I feel that an element of that tradition has survived as now it is full of elite and very expensive branded goods, again mostly out of reach for the common individual.

I spend my first Moscow evening bar hopping and end up talking to a Chap from Vladivostok about Democracy. More on that later.






The photo is not very good but it is of my first glimpse of The Moscow Kremlin.

Day 42

Getting close now!  I feel a real sense of excitement about the days ahead. I am about 30 miles from Red Square! Istra Hcra to be precise and it feels like the Moscow equivalent to Watford. A commuter town on the edge of the capital, it has all the amenities but somewhat lacking in atmosphere. I am noticing that every time I try to speak Russian Russian women find it utterly hilarious! I guess it must be the combination of the accent, my terrible knowledge of Russian and the fact that I am funny looking!

Day 41

I spend the morning walking around Rzhev to get a better feel of the place. It is here that I spot a tradition that is common amongst the former Soviet states, and that is for newly weds to have their photographs taken next to war memorials.

I trundle on down the M5 however, and make it to Shakhovskaya. A smarter town than Rzhev, and also a lot smaller.

Day 40

Another long day and another long ride. I made it to Rzhev by late evening. I stay in an old Soviet era hotel that I am sure is still bugged and walk around a town that seems to have blissfully ignored the last 20 years. War memorials abound and Lenin still has a watchful eye over the town centre. The war memorials are somewhat expected however. This area and town saw terrible fighting during WWII. Its location close to Moscow and position on the top of a large river gully gave Rzhev significant strategic importance. A quote that I have found gives a glimpse into what life was like here during Nazi occupation,

"In the town of Rzhev there is a concentration camp with fifteen thousand captured Red Army soldiers in it and five thousand civilians," noted a smuggled report of December 1941. "They are holding them in unheated huts, and they feed them one or two frozen potatoes each a day. The Germans threw rotten meat and some bones through the barbed wire at the prisoners. This had made them ill. Every day 20-30 people are dying. The ones who are too ill to work are shot." (Ivan's War by Catherine Merridale—quote from the Center for the Documentation of Contemporary History, Smolensk Oblast)