|
|
Hola Viajero! 
Dec 02, 2005 09:00 PM Sakhalin Island is SKASKA!!!
Finally I arrived safely in Sakhalin island. On board we only ate salmon, red caviar and kobachok (I do nor remember how kobachok in english, I will ask picasso- Boris). In Korsakof, the port, the military wanted to impose me a fine and to sign a protocol and expell me, because in theory I need to justify every day in Russia through hotel vouchers and register, and I slept in geysers. I cried Mama mia, khochu domoi, and finally I only signed protocol, but no shtraf, or fine. Now I am waiting for the ship to go to the Kurils islands, Kunashir, Iturup and Paramushir, and then will head to Vladivostok, then Yakutia republic (minus 60 degrees centigrades, the second coldest place on Earth after Antarctica!), then a budhist monastery in Kizyl (Tiva republic) where I have friends from Sikkim since the times when I was a budhist monk, and then, after spending Christmas with my daughter Anushka in Siberia, will leave Russia through the amazing Military Georgian pass, via Dagestan, Chechnia and Osetai. I must be in Lima the 5th february 2006, because I already paid for my boat Maxim Gorky to Pitcairn island.
It is snowing, and Kamchatka is closed to airplanes because ciclons and strong winds. Sakhalin was a forced labour place. I just bought a book by Chekhov, where he explains about the conditions in Sakhalin. But people is nice, open, and helpful, and food, especiallly fish and red caviar is delicious and cheap.
Sakhalin was Furusato in Japanese times. This afternoon I will visit a museum founded in an old japanese house.
Do svidania
Xopxe
...
...
pls, do not miss my following travel log. I promise you that it will be much more interesting that these 4 together!
|
Nov 24, 2005 09:00 PM Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskii, the end of Russia and of the world
Finally, after arguing during half an hour I was allowed to get off the plane. Nature was wonderful, we saw so many high mountains and geisers! I sleep besides a geyser, for free, because Kamchatka still lives in USSR times, and the hotels charge more to the foreigners. In Kamchatka there are Lenin statues in the streets, women counting with abacus in the shops, signs of Slava Trudu, or Slava CCCP in the buildings, Stalin and Khrushovski kvartiri or small apartments, itd (etc).
I have no way out of Kamchatka, the north is forbidden for Russians and foreigners alike, and there are no roads, only bears. Last year there was a helicopter, but is broken and the pilot is always drunk. To Kurils islands, disputed by Japan, there are no boats now, only in summer for rich americans, and I am not american, neither rich. The only way to get out from Kamchatka is flying to Vladivostok.
Last night I went to a tavern in the port, called kabak in Russian, and drinking vodka made friendship with the sailors, and promised me help taking me to Sakhalin island next week in their cargo boat, ilegally, because I am a chushesemets, or foreigner. I will wait sleeping in my geyser.
...
Please, do not miss my next travel log, that will be much more interesting that the previous ones put together, nothing to compare with them.
Do svidania
Xopxe
|
Nov 19, 2005 09:00 PM From Russia with love
If you fly to Russia with Aeroflot, the adventure starts before reaching the country.
Before landing in Moscow the captain advised that owing to the bad visibility the plane will head to Nijni Novgorod, the Gorki of the USSR times.
Everybody was angry. But then, just arriving to Gorki, the captain said that the weather was OK in Moscow and we flew back. The result was 3 hours delay.
I could catch the last Metro to my hotel Asia, and at 2 AM I call my friends. They do not allow me to stay in the hotel. I catch a taxi to Tretiakovski Galerei, where they live, and spend the night drinking vodka, congac, champagne,.. and eating chocolate and russian kalbasa. After the first toast, somebody said Mejdu pervi i vtoroi pererivku ne bolshoi, or Between the first toast and the second the delay should be short. and again we had to drink until we finished all the bottles and the sun appeared through the window. Wopmen drink a lot in Russia.
Next day I go to Sheremetevo Odin to fly to Kamchatka. In the underground they sell theatres and ballets tickets day and night. Moscow is the most cultural city in the world. They also sell religious icons and holy books in any Metro station/.
In the airport I mlisten all the time the following destinations Samarkand, Sevastopol, Vladivostok, Murmansk, Yakutia, Kazan, Dushanbe... for me is music. I feel happy. After 9 hours flight and 9 hours time difference, I land in Petropavlovsk Kamchatki. There is a military control, that airport is full with army fighters russian airplanes. When they notice that I am foreigner they confiscate my passport and do not allow me to get off the plane. The oficial said to me You must have a very good reason to come to Kamchatka without hotel reservation, no guides, no tours, and under 10 degrees, with cold and snow, alone, otherwise we wil send you back to Moscow in this same airplane.
...
....
Will they allow me to visit Kamchatka, an old dream, and visit the Valley of the Geisers...
Please, do not miss my following travel log, which will be much more interesting that this one.
|
Sep 29, 2005 06:00 PM Kamchatka Peninsula and Pitcairn Island
I am writing this to announce you that soon I will stop writing for a while in Globosapiens. Perhaps I will write two or three more reports about some Micronesian and Melanesian Islands if I find time, and will be off again travelling for a few months. First I will go by train to Sakhalin and the volcanoes of Kamchatka stopping in Novosibirsk where I have a pretty and small treasure (see my Novosibirsk pictures). And then, for February 2006, I have already booked a cabin in the cruise MAXIM GORKI to embark in Callao to Pitcairn Island.
I will keep hanging in this page fresh news about my journey whenever possible.
Hasta la vista and Happy New Year 2006!
|
Page:
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
|
|
|
