We have broken through the 5,000 mile barrier and are now in the beautiful city of Kiev Ukraine.
The journey from Novosibirsk has been hell. Kotka has suffered badly, her prop shaft coming loose, and also her starter has now broken so both cars have to be push started each morning- we means giving consideration to how we park them at night, so as to make pushing easier. Russian roads are truly terrible- and very dangerous. Obstacles everywhere, and whilst potholes are pretty obvious, there are hidden dips and bumps which you cannot see at all, which throw you about. In fact Kotka probably has a broken spring, but the springs are strongly taped up so leaving well alone, and I am just putting up with having a car on "the tilt". It is very very tiring constantly being on the look out, and looking at nothing but the next 20 yards of "tarmac".
We crossed the Urals some days ago- in 2007, crossing higher up at Perm, these seemed no problem at all and hardly noticeable, but this time we had a 100 miles or so of pretty severe climbing, bad weather and the usual humps and bumps.
We decided to give the Crimea a miss as Kotka has been suffering too much and it was not worth the risk of what we had heard were bad roads in that area, so from Chelyabinsk we headed more or less dead west, and crossed into Ukraine on 23 June, arriving in Kiev early on the 25th
The long straight roads- hardly a corner to be seen, have meant that petrol consumption has gone up to about 35 mpg on both cars, and they are running neck and neck on actual litres consumed, Kotka being just 5 litres behind Myrtle. Both starters packed up, both cars were leaking a lot of oil till I spent a morning taking bits off, tightening nuts and bolts, renewing some gaskets, and now we can stop at a hotel without leaving an oil well on the forecourt when we leave. Kotka's windscreen has cracked.
We will stay in KIew three days then head for Cracow/Dresden
Only 40 pounds or so from our target!
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