14th to 17th of July – Vladivostok
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Two and a half days on the train. My compartment I shared with an elderly woman and only the night before arrival in Vladivostok another guy joined us. Lucky me, this could have been also an experience with 3 guys of the sort I met around the train station together in one compartment. There were some of this sort on the train who spent a couple of 1000 Rubles in the train restaurant on vodka + other similar kind of beverages.
Our wagon smelled of garlic and fish whereas the next wagon was the “Büffelwagon” which smelled of sweat. Yak. I wondered where the constant fish smell came from...well, this puzzle was solved when the elderly woman had to pack her things because the other guy entered our compartment. She had placed her smoked fish in the upper shelf of our compartment just wrapped in a newspaper…no wonder.
We arrived in foggy Vladivostok at 5:30h in the morning. They make one climb 2 staircases up through the railway station in order to reach the other side. I wonder how handicapped people shall reach the platform, I didn’t see any lift. Outside I saw 2 taxis waiting and I just told the first one “bring me to a hotel with internet”.
He did and the lobby of the Azimut Hotel looked good but once you exit the elevator on your floor you discover that you are actually in an old, shabby Soviet hotel, the former Vladivostok Hotel. No complain, I have my internet and a hot shower.
The hotel is crammed with Chinese tourists (Sehen Sie, Vladivostok ist doch immer eine Reise wert! :-)) and the lobby is sometimes in a state of emergency because they don’t come in pairs but always in a pride (I didn’t want to write “pack”). That IS noisy when 100 Chinese crammed in a hall speak simultaneously.
Maybe Vladivostok is worth a travel but only in about 2 – 3 years. Everything is currently under construction: the whole coastal line will be rebuild, ongoing canalization works, some pedestrian zone is under development in the city center, new roads and bridges under construction…everywhere dirt and noise and as a pedestrian you always have to jump because of the crazy car drivers in between. Couldn’t they have started this already 20 years ago for my arrival here? Hahaa!
In the afternoon I met Yuri and his employee Sveta in the lobby and we discussed the options for the shipment of my bike. You can only ship out from Vladivostok by sea because the Korean Airport Incheon does not accept motorbike shipments from Vladivostok. And all international flights in and out of Vladivostok have to pass this hub. In the end I decided to ship to Bangkok in a 20’ container.
But first we had to find my motorbike in Vladivostok. The next day I went with Sveta to the railway station for hunting (actually she was already there the day before and tried to find my motorbike w/o success).
So we ran around between tracks, warehouses, abandoned trains and finally in one office they told us that they can check the wagon number in their computer system. But we should come back later because the system was down. On track number 2 we should find the wagon…and we did! Two workers were inside and I think that I recognized one of the faces from the night action in Skovorodino, so they must live in this wagon…?
My motorbike looked well and it was secured at the side wall with pallets: good guys! We negotiated the price for the transport and for the unloading of the bike. All sides happy I drove over the passenger train platform in order to find an exit from the railway station…really wild east :-) Curving between the tracks and different platforms I found an exit and drove to the hotel without helmet, nobody cared…
In the afternoon I worked with Yuri on the papers needed for the loading and customs clearance. The next day we went to a remote warehouse and container area in Vladivostok for the loading of my bike. All streets flooded from the continuous rain, traffic jams everywhere (this is really awful here) I was back in the hotel after 8pm.
Just now I arranged the necessary spare parts with the Endurobunker in Dachau which will be shipped to Bangkok as well. Some work waiting for me there :-)
And I decided to fly back to Munich. I will stay there until my container arrives in the seaport of Bangkok. The next adventure will be to find the container in the huge port but this time I have at least a paper: the bill of lading.
« Back to journal
Two and a half days on the train. My compartment I shared with an elderly woman and only the night before arrival in Vladivostok another guy joined us. Lucky me, this could have been also an experience with 3 guys of the sort I met around the train station together in one compartment. There were some of this sort on the train who spent a couple of 1000 Rubles in the train restaurant on vodka + other similar kind of beverages.
Our wagon smelled of garlic and fish whereas the next wagon was the “Büffelwagon” which smelled of sweat. Yak. I wondered where the constant fish smell came from...well, this puzzle was solved when the elderly woman had to pack her things because the other guy entered our compartment. She had placed her smoked fish in the upper shelf of our compartment just wrapped in a newspaper…no wonder.
We arrived in foggy Vladivostok at 5:30h in the morning. They make one climb 2 staircases up through the railway station in order to reach the other side. I wonder how handicapped people shall reach the platform, I didn’t see any lift. Outside I saw 2 taxis waiting and I just told the first one “bring me to a hotel with internet”.
He did and the lobby of the Azimut Hotel looked good but once you exit the elevator on your floor you discover that you are actually in an old, shabby Soviet hotel, the former Vladivostok Hotel. No complain, I have my internet and a hot shower.
The hotel is crammed with Chinese tourists (Sehen Sie, Vladivostok ist doch immer eine Reise wert! :-)) and the lobby is sometimes in a state of emergency because they don’t come in pairs but always in a pride (I didn’t want to write “pack”). That IS noisy when 100 Chinese crammed in a hall speak simultaneously.
Maybe Vladivostok is worth a travel but only in about 2 – 3 years. Everything is currently under construction: the whole coastal line will be rebuild, ongoing canalization works, some pedestrian zone is under development in the city center, new roads and bridges under construction…everywhere dirt and noise and as a pedestrian you always have to jump because of the crazy car drivers in between. Couldn’t they have started this already 20 years ago for my arrival here? Hahaa!
In the afternoon I met Yuri and his employee Sveta in the lobby and we discussed the options for the shipment of my bike. You can only ship out from Vladivostok by sea because the Korean Airport Incheon does not accept motorbike shipments from Vladivostok. And all international flights in and out of Vladivostok have to pass this hub. In the end I decided to ship to Bangkok in a 20’ container.
But first we had to find my motorbike in Vladivostok. The next day I went with Sveta to the railway station for hunting (actually she was already there the day before and tried to find my motorbike w/o success).
So we ran around between tracks, warehouses, abandoned trains and finally in one office they told us that they can check the wagon number in their computer system. But we should come back later because the system was down. On track number 2 we should find the wagon…and we did! Two workers were inside and I think that I recognized one of the faces from the night action in Skovorodino, so they must live in this wagon…?
My motorbike looked well and it was secured at the side wall with pallets: good guys! We negotiated the price for the transport and for the unloading of the bike. All sides happy I drove over the passenger train platform in order to find an exit from the railway station…really wild east :-) Curving between the tracks and different platforms I found an exit and drove to the hotel without helmet, nobody cared…
In the afternoon I worked with Yuri on the papers needed for the loading and customs clearance. The next day we went to a remote warehouse and container area in Vladivostok for the loading of my bike. All streets flooded from the continuous rain, traffic jams everywhere (this is really awful here) I was back in the hotel after 8pm.
Just now I arranged the necessary spare parts with the Endurobunker in Dachau which will be shipped to Bangkok as well. Some work waiting for me there :-)
And I decided to fly back to Munich. I will stay there until my container arrives in the seaport of Bangkok. The next adventure will be to find the container in the huge port but this time I have at least a paper: the bill of lading.
