Ken Hensley

Finland, Russia, Russia and Switzerland… "96 tea bags and 2 pedal bins"!

Day 8

SNOW!!!!
Aaaaaaaagggghhhhh!!

Snow is for skiing but here it´s in the trees and, in places, on the ground. I don´t know why I was so surprised when I woke up from a good sleep on this dusty old but generally comfortable train. After all we are in the far east of Russia and travelling north. I guess it´s because the weather "down" in Vladivostok was so pleasant. I am more or less prepared for the cold…… more or less.

The river looks cold but at least it´s not frozen over and the mist lingers eerily, half-way up the distant high hills, as if it doesn´t know which way to go.

Okay Rufus, that´s it, I gotta jump in here because this guy´s obviously reading too much Stephen King!

You´re right Hon, this is starting to sound like a bad novel. Wish he´d just stick to the subject, whatever that is.

But I digress…

After 7 hours of quite decent sleep I decided to give breakfast a try in the restaurant car. Eric, Alex (our translator) and Sid came along and we ordered scrambled eggs and toast, mineral water and coffee. In the flash of an hour or so our fried eggs and bread were delivered….. well, you get the picture.

Spent an hour or so working on this, in between visits to the space between carriages which is the only place you can smoke, officially speaking and soon Khabarobvsk was in sight. It was good to get off that train although, in a little over 12 hours, I would be longing for it!

This venue was bigger and the equipment was worse and the people didn´t really have a clue so it was (once again) up to Helge and Harek to take over and sort everything out. In the end it was a good show and even the security guys relented in the end by allowing the audience to get up and come to the front of the stage. We rocked through the last three songs, hammered the encore and went to dinner.

I am very proud of my Vikings. They have that special quality that faces adversity and just plays with the hand that is dealt, without complaint or argument. We always discuss problems openly to find optimum solution and to see that they don´t happen again but, generally speaking, they just "get on with it" and I am thankful for that.

So now…. The toughest test. There was beer, wine, water and stuff on the big red bus (see photo) and space enough for us to stretch out. We had to battle a bit to get pillows and blankets but we finally set off on the long trek to Blagoveshensk.