Episode 10Sorry, it’s been a while since I whipped L into doing a bit more, but I’ve been having an identity crisis that still isn’t fully resolved. All these years I’ve been quite happy to believe that I was a ‘bean bear’, but lately L keeps calling me a ‘grub’, so that now I am totally confused and don’t know what I am, then L clarified the situation today by calling me a ‘grubby bean bear’. Now all I can say is; who’s fault is that: I’ve been dropped in the bottom of a volcano, fallen out of the car, been sat in places no stuffed toy has a right to be, picked up by my ear, arm or leg, whatever L can grab easiest, is it any wonder I’m a grubby bean bear. The indignities of it all!Anyway, where were we? ah that’s right we were about to enter Poland and so we did. This time a different route was taken that included a visit to the coastal city of Gdansk. Gdansk became quite famous back around 1980 when the trade union Solidarity was formed against Soviet law by the defiant shipyard workers of Gdansk. a big spanner in the works as it were, that would eventually assist in leading to the demise of the Soviet system. The leader of that union later because president of a free Poland, Lek Walenska.We spent a very pleasant Sunday afternoon having a look around this lovely old city. The city was crowded with locals enjoying a pleasant sunny afternoon enjoying the delights on offer. There are several squares, both large and small where buskers were putting on shows for those that cared to watch. Lots of market stalls selling a whole range of things and busy coffee shops and restaurants. even a tourist information office so that we could get a map. L had been expecting a large industrial city and was pleasantly surprised to find such an enchanting old city as this.On the waterfront we came to an area that has a ‘big wheel’ and also where it’s possible to take a boat trip. This area has been done up in recent years to somewhat resemble the ‘embankment’ area of Westminster, albeit on a much smaller scale. Along this stretch of riverbank there is an old wooden crane dating from the early 14th century. It was worked by human power, men walking inside a large wooden wheel. L tried to get a photo but it didn’t come out. It is now the only one of its type that remains in Europe.When D started the car for us to leave, there was a bang. Ah yes! the car up to it’s usual tricks. This time, after an inspection under the bonnet D discovered that the bracket that holds the fan belt in place at tension had broken. Just the thing late on a Sunday evening. It took about three hours work, lots of swearing too, before it was able to be removed and inspected. It’s an aluminium part, so a new one, or a 2nd hand one from a wreckers would have to be got.So we spent a couple of extra days here. Fortunately, although the car was in an area with paid parking during work hours it was also a fairly safe area and could be left overnight while we went off and stayed at a rather nice hostel 15 mins walk away. It was a pleasant enough place to spend that extra time and we enjoyed it.D found a landcover agent with the help of the hostel manager and by the following afternoon we had the new part that D managed to fit in a couple of hours.Just a few kilometres away from Gdansk is Sopot, a favourite beach for the Polish on holiday. Not that too many were on the beach when we visited although the sun had been out and we saw several quite badly sun burnt people. This town has all the usual attractions that holiday makers seem to want. Added to that is one of the most photographed places in Poland, the crooked house, built that way on purpose it houses a restaurant and a Costa coffee shop. The town also boasts an equestrian centre where some big equestrian show was due to take place this week. Driving on across Poland we passed through a lot of forest as indeed we had done in the eastern part of Germany. There are many lakes too, and even fairly small ones seem to have a marina with quite large boats. Big boats of little ponds. There is quite a canal system so they can probably get to lots of other lakes. Although fairly flat it is very pretty. The county looks quite prosperous too with lively business centres, no boarded up shops, houses and blocks of units that are nicely painted and maintained, lawns cut and gardens in bloom.We left Poland and drove across Lithuania, not stopping to do any sightseeing here as we were now behind schedule. the Russian visas started on the 15th July and my lot had hoped to be entering Russia on that date, but we had got behind waiting in Gdansk for two days.Then on into Latvia and to the Russian border arriving late in the day. Luckily there was only a few cars, although there was quite a lot of trucks. The trucks pass through a different section so the number doesn’t really affect us.Took about 50 minutes to clear the Latvian side, goodness knows why when they really only have to stamp us out. In Finland, the last time we crossed, they took about 5 minutes. The Russian side took about 1.5 hours and that’s about normal. Again, goodness knows why, but it’s just how it goes. Most of the time we just sat and waited. My lot did get forms to fill out, which they did only to be told they weren’t filled out right so they had to do them again. Eventually everything was done and we we off, only to stop again a short way down the road where we went in and bought car insurance. It’s one of those ‘must haves’ but one just hopes to hell one never has to make a claim because it’s probably not worth the paper it’s written on. Keep your fingers crossed everyone!The queue of trucks waiting to cross on the Russian side was around 6 k’s long, not the 20k’s or more that were here the last time we crossed into Russia at this crossing.It looks like the new road that was being constructed in stages when we passed this way 2 years ago has almost reached the border, only about 20 - 30 k’s left to go.We made our way northward on very minor roads, sometimes corrugated gravel, through numerous small villages and a few large towns and vast areas of silver birch and pine forest. My lot really can’t work out what all these people do for a living. There is some logging and associated industries but surely that can’t employ any great quantity of workers. There isn’t much in the way of agriculture and we’ve only seen one small herd of sheep and goats, about 25 animals. Near the big city of Velini Novgorod there are large area of potatoes growing, fields of 20 - 30 hectares each (50 -75 acres). The plants are in flower.Since Poland we have been seeing storks on their nests on the tops of lamp posts and electricity poles, but there doesn’t seem to be nearly as many of them as we’ve seen other years when every lamp pole and plenty of house chimneys would have a nest on top. In Velini Novgorod we went to see the millennium monument. This was built in 1862 and commemorates the 1000the anniversary of the founding of the Russian state by a Ukrainian prince. Having just come from Iceland my lot realised that this is about the same time that the Vikings landed in the Faroes and Iceland. Must have been something in the air around then.The monument stands inside the Kremlin (castle) walls that are still being reconstructed. My lot visited this place back in 1998 on their first visit to Russia, it was a June day and much warmer than today. The beach just outside the walls on the lake was deserted this time, crowded last time. On the other hand, this time we could take a look inside St Sophia’s church and admire the icons and frescos even though a service was in progress. We also visited the Archbishops faceted chamber. This turned out to be a mostly re-constructed number of rooms where just one room has a brick vaulted roof. It does contain a small museum with some lovely gold and silver most religious artefacts, and a couple of remnants of 13th century frescos.Now we are heading for Arhangelsk so we are wending our way though more forest. L has noticed that there seems to be no birds at all in the forest. Even in Iceland where there was hardly any trees, even a small copse of them would be full of birds chattering away but here silence reigns supreme. It’s not just forest birds that are missing so are the water birds, and goodness me, there is a vast amount of water all around. Lakes of all sizes abound but not even a duck to be seen, where are they? Have these people been so hard pushed for food in years gone by that nothing is left. Seems very strange that not even a Canada goose has strayed this way, they seem to have made there way over just about all of the northern hemisphere especially the Florida golf courses. There are plenty of pigeons in towns and jays out in the countryside both of which are scavengers.We took some back roads that were very muddy and passed a great many places where they are logging the forest heavily. L doubts that it can be sustained much longer at the present rate. It seems mostly to be left to regrow as best it can and that is very slow in these latitudes where summer is very short and the weeds grow tall very quickly leaving no daylight reaching the seedling trees. Much of the land just stands stagnant once it has been cleared.After Vologda we were on the main road again and it is very good most of the way, over 700k’s, to Arkhangelsk. Only one small section where new work is in progress. In other areas we had come across a great deal of new road construction and modern technology has arrived in Russia, they have invented ‘stoppage’ men. However their signs still need some work, all they have is a baton, about half the size of a pingpong bat, longer handle, that they wave around a bit like the mad conductor, and we’ve supposed to understand what that means. That's when they bother using it at all and aren’t just standing off to one side watching the heavy equipment at work. Just a few have real modern technology in the form of traffic lights and amazingly the average Russian motorist seems to obey that too. That observance is also new is Russia. We have seen the traffic police (DPS) out a lot in some areas. Someone should show them what a real stop/go sign looks like:The rubbish has been collected from the road sides, it is often left pilled sky high in lay-bys and rest areas, and along the new highways the sides have been mown too. Things are improving here. Having been here so many times over such a long period we can now see progress, something that we have often felt wasn’t happening here but this year is different, at least in this part of the country.After days of overcast cool weather with lots of heavy rain showers the day we arrived in Arkhangelsk the clouds cleared and the sun shone brightly. It reached a lovely warm 17C by about 4pm. It is mid summer after all.As we neared the city we passed many pasture fields full of large white plastic wrapped bales of freshly made silage. the point is that we haven’t seen any farm animals for at least 700k’s, and that last sighting was of 3 goats and 2 cows. Arkhangelsk is a large city of about 500,000 people, and it seems quite a pleasant place. There are some lovely old wooden Russian houses, many of them are in need of some TLC but they have so much character, L just loves them. They do tend to lean this way and that all at the same time. we have noticed in many of the small villages we’ve passed through that a large number of the old log houses are now in a state of ruin, tumbling down, and even the better houses are often empty. People must be leaving the villages in search of work in the bigger towns and cities as is the case in many parts of the world.We walked down a ‘showcase’ street of such old houses in the centre of the city. It was a nice pedestrian way with lawns and seats and several statues. With a couple of the statues its meant to bring good luck if you shake hands, rub noses, or touch paws, so guess what, yep! I had to do all that. No wonder I’m a grubby bean bear. And what did we find down this pedestrian way? Goodness L nearly fell over, it was a tourist information office, strewth! what is happening in Russia?It wasn’t the best of TI’s but lets face it, they haven’t had any practice here previously. The girl did speak some English, and she did give us a booklet that offers discounts in certain stores for tourists. She also had a map of the city centre.The water front along the river has a pleasant esplanade and a nice sandy beach with a ‘no swimming’ sign. Not sure just how many people would want to go swimming in that water anyway, it must be all of 10C on a good day. That does sort of limit the enthusiasm.Big hungry mozzies abound, that hasn’t changed, and L keeps finding ticks on herself and D, they both just hope they don’t get any of those nasty illnesses that the ticks carry. The ticks are so tiny that she doesn’t find them until they bring up a huge lump that is either irritating or sore or both. Even then the tick is the tiniest of back specks in the middle of the lump.© Lynette Regan 23rd July 2015