OUR FIRST REST DAY - MOSCOW

Dear readers!

Yesterday I received the report about driving to Moscow late in the evening and decided to put it in this post together with the report of today.

Our alarm went off at 05.45h, so we could start the long drive of the day. Other teams had already left before six o'clock! They had a good reason though, because driving through the dark with roads full of pits might become a very long and perilous adventure. 

We left the dark Pskov around 08.00h towards Sint Petersburg where the roads were still bearable. We had an driving agreement with two other teams, because you don't know where, how and if you would need any help or had to offer some. 
Together with these two teams we deviated from the planned route by driving more to the north towards Luga. The reason why we decided to do this was because we had seen some great connecting road in the direction of the east to Novgorod. All the other teams took the original planned route. 

It was quite weird to still be driving in the dark around nine, ten in the morning. 

Once we were in Luga we turned right towards the east. We will be driving the upcoming 7000 km in this direction. More north than Luga, around 100 km away from Sint Petersburg, we will not be driving. That's about 800 km from the Arctic Circle.

The provincial road connection we mentioned earlier appeared to be like a racecourse that had just been built. Sometimes you need to get lucky.

In between we stopped at this local fuel station and the way over there is full of pits and holes. 

After a complicated game with gestures, money and the showing of our credit cards we were able to actually refuel our cars. Funny and very different. 

Novogorod is this gloomy slough with a population of 200.000 people, who are probably all very depressed. We did take some pictures of this misery we were in.
The rest of the way to Moscow we drove at some bad sections of road, but overall it was good. Though you had to pay attention to not drive in some hidden pits!

We drove past a truck that had lost control and crashed into someones front garden. 

Around 14.00h we had lunch in a trucker cafe and it was quite good. A very friendly lady showed us how the menu worked and gave us an example of what it would look like.

Around 19.00h we arrived in the city of Moscow. What a city, gigantic! It's amazing what this differs from all the other small villages. There are four, five, six lane roads and Audi, BMW and especially Mercedes appeared literally everywhere. It was crazy the cars that they have for sale aren't the basic designs.
When we drove into the city when it was dark, but very beautiful. Beautifully lit buildings, amazing streets already with the festive lights.

The Russian traffic is madness. The turbo cars blew everyone away. Just behind us it went wrong. We heard some cracks and some horns and suddenly the road was empty, because of a crash followed by a traffic jam. That wouldn't have been the first time that happened...

Tired but satisfied we arrived in the hotel. We had dinner in a restaurant and had several drinks at the Hilton hotel.

The next day we had a nice and fun day down town Moscow and impressed by the beauty of Moscow.
Via Lonely Planet we had several drinks at the Pushkin cafe. Stunning decors inside, even the toilets were beautiful! This was followed by dinner in a little Georgisch restaurant in a small street, which was great. 

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The first and the last ten pictures are taken by LUUKVANKAATHOVEN.NL Automotive Photography.