July 21st, 2010

Dispatch from the road: Rally London-Mongolia, Part 6

Drive Like A Woman Editor-in-Chief, Michele Shapiro is setting off on a rally from London to Mongolia. She will be driving with Parag Khanna, Mikhail Zeldovich and Jen Mueller. Jen will be starting with the team in London and Michele will be meeting the team in Moscow and will switch places with Jen. The team will be driving a 1991 Land Rover Defender ambulance. Upon arrival in Mongolia the team will donate the ambulance to a local hospital. Drive Like A Woman will be posting dispatches from the journey.

Click here to read Part 1.

Lithuania-Moscow:
-Written by Jen Mueller

This is the story of how we woke up in Trakai, Lithuania and 24 hours later pulled into Moscow, Russia. As with any extended period of sleepless activity, at a certain point time begins to lose its narrative flow. Let me therefore summarize our trip with this set of pointers, reflections, and insights for those who may be contemplating a similar feat:

1. When the alarm goes off at 7:30 and you feel like you’ve been hit with a ton of bricks, stay in bed. You have a long drive ahead of you. The right time to get up is about the fifth time that Mikhail asks.

2. If you have a certain international-man-of-mystery charm about you, you can pay a Lithuanian lati hotel bill with an assortment of euros and pounds. (Kudos, Parag.)

3. Parking enforcement doesn’t patrol all that frequently in Trakai (hurrah). But you’re right, you do have a few coins left lying around that could have paid for it; you’ll find them four days later.

4. It takes roughly a half an hour to walk across two bridges to Trakai Castle, look at the ticket window, make a few witty comments, and walk back. (This can be accomplished more quickly if one of your number is not still nursing a broken foot.)

5. Do not leave your Blackberry on the dashboard of the car. It might go flying out the open window when you take a sharp turn.

6. Blackberries: surprisingly indestructible.

7. You didn’t forget your registration papers at the dealer in Poland; they’re wedged under the front driver seat. Definitely best to pull over and tear the car apart looking for them before driving to the border though.

8. Blackberry GPS is great, but it never hurts to run into the gas station to peek at one of their maps too (sorry, Misha).

9. If you must stop for lunch in Daugavpils, Latvia (Mikhail’s mother’s ancestral home), there’s a great gas station to the left off the main strip that features not only delicacies such as Mexican burritos, fresh carrot sticks, and yogurt shakes, but also a purple florescent bathroom with both adult and child-sized toilets. (Video coming soon.) Just accept that you will never understand why.

10. Get ready to take your Land Rover into its natural environment: extended stretches of the road to the border are not paved.

11. Just because you cruise past a few kilometers’ worth of parked trucks at the border, don’t expect that you are actually going anywhere.

12. If one of your team disappears to talk with fellow waiting motorists about the cause for the long delay at the border, he may have gone native by the time he returns. Feel free to remind him that his shirt does in fact have buttons.

13. When the cars in front of you start their engines, spring into action! Jump into the car! Slam the doors shut! Make sure no one tries to pass you! Drive forward three feet. Repeat.

14. You have filled out all of your forms wrong. Even if you filled them out correctly, it is still wrong. Don’t even think about crossing anything out; go back and do it again.

15. The guys you are traveling with may suggest that you try to work your feminine wiles on the border guards. This works better if (a) you are not covered in sweat and grime, (b) you can speak the language, and (c) the guards are not female.

16. For reasons best known to themselves, Latvians make it even harder to leave their country than Russians make it to enter. At least it makes all of the bureaucratic nightmares that you’ve gone through to get to this point worth it. When they insist that you need a document that you do not in fact need, it helps to have a Blackberry handy to pull up the relevant law. (Bravo, Misha.) They will change their tune quickly.

17. You buy insurance for Russian roads at the border. For a small truck for a month, the cost is roughly $55. Thanks to some of the aforementioned bureaucratic nightmares, you paid more than ten times that amount for less than a week in Europe. (“Life is clearly worth less in Russia!” Parag concludes.)

18. After clearing Latvian customs, prepare to wait another few hours for the Russian border guards to get to you. None of your teammates will agree to pass the time by making a movie of you crawling forward on your stomach through the long grass in a staged border assault. There will be some more inching forward drama though.

19. When the Russian guard searches your vehicle, make sure he quickly finds your teammate’s stash of mini bottles of artisanal liquors from a distillery in France; he will suddenly have eyes for nothing else. Before you bribe him with one of the bottles though, make sure it isn’t the one (the only one!) that the owner actually wants.

20. At 11:30 on a July night, it is just getting properly dark in Russia. It will start to get light again around 3am.

TO READ MORE POINTERS CLICK READ MORE…

21. You should try to sleep in anticipation of driving the next shift. You should also know that high speeds and bad roads will make that impossible.

22. When you drift into the shoulder because you can’t keep your eyes open, it is time to pull over and let the other driver behind the wheel.

23. High beams and bug smear is a bad combination. The gas stations won’t have windshield washing fluid; be prepared to use the last of your water on a napkin to get some visibility.

24. Russian highway construction workers have sick sense of humor. Even when they say you’re clear to enter the single-lane stretch of roadwork, be prepared to be set up for a headlong collision. An ambulance can in fact dodge between concrete barriers given the proper incentive.

25. When you think the barriers have ended and you can go back to using both lanes again, you are wrong. Swerve!

26. Yes, it is ironic that you can’t stop singing the one verse, “You’re stuck in a moment, and you can’t get out of it …” But if it works to keep you awake, sing on.

27. About 80 km out of Moscow, the road suddenly gets better and turns into a real highway. This is also about the point that the traffic begins to pick up. But at least it’s not just you and the trucks anymore.

28. You really don’t want to be stuck driving through Moscow rush hour traffic in an oversized Land Rover. Drive faster!

29. You have to zoom way in on Blackberry GPS to realize that your planned route is one big construction zone. Take that exit. No, shoot, wait, that one. OK, let’s figure out how to turn around.

30. Whoops, Moscow rush hour traffic.

31. Whoops, vacant megamall parking lot. Uh, how do we get out? Argh, going the wrong way again.

32. The taxis that you call to pick you up from your secured parking lot will start the meter running at the ordained pick-up time, whether you are there or not.

33. On the other hand, two parked taxis make a helpful landmark when you are trying to figure out where to turn.

34. If one of your friends has generously offered to house two of your teammates, make sure you know his address (including apartment number) in advance. If you wait until the morning that you arrive in town, he may sleep through your attempts to contact him.

35. If you still can’t get a hold of your friend after several tries, send your teammates to his building with instructions to await further instructions.

36. You may find yourself deposited in a rubble-strewn courtyard with all of your luggage and no obvious indication that you are in the right place. Hang tight; things will sort out. (This is easy to do when you are too tired to emote.)

37. Before your host leaves for work, don’t forget to ask about your priorities: laundry and wifi.

38. If you need to shake off the ride, take a little walk and hit the grocery store. Try to remember the Cyrillic alphabet.

39. For goodness’ sake, get some sleep.