Vladivostok to Khabarovsk
 

Trying to determine mileage from Vladivostok/Khabarovsk using maps, Internet mileage programs, Google Earth etc. I get the mileage anywhere from 390 to 485. Any suggestions as to how to determine accurate mileage between cities in Russia?

For what its worth my on the road mileage (inc a little bit of driving around in each town) was 700 km (approx 430 miles).

I found getting distances from a Russian road atlas the reasonably accurate and Google usually hopeless

Doug:

I have never traveled that route by land, however, I fly between those two cities frequently - about 4 or 5 times a year. The image below shows the airway route, and it is 355 nautical miles (about 650 km). Vladivostok airport is in the village of Artom, about 50 km north of Vladivostok proper, so add another 50 km to the aeronautical route to get to downtown UHWW.

Based on that, I think the 'over the road' distance would be no less than 700 km.

For what it's worth, the first 100 nm going south of Khabarovsk consists of fairly flat farmland. There are no big population centers along the way, but it appears that there is sufficient population there that you should not have any problems getting fuel, food, etc. The roads look pretty solid, and there is cell phone coverage everywhere. But, as soon as you get into the hilly areas (anywhere on the map below that shows hills), settlements become few and far between.

The area under the airway between the TD and the BG non-directional beacons is mountainous, forested, and very thinly populated.

I am going to guess that if you followed the roads that more or less parallel the border with China, you would find those areas populated in the same manner as the first 100 nm south of Khabarovsk, because the topography is more or less the same - flat, and suited to large-scale farming. I've never had the opportunity to fly off-airways, though, so that is just speculation.

Khabarovsk is a fairly pleasant city, with good infrastructure and services.

Michael

UHHH to UHWW by low-level airways
http://i979.photobucket.com/albums/a.../UHHH-UHWW.jpg

Martin:

Thanks for the prompt reply and information.

Where can one buy a Russian Road Atlas in the U.S.?

Russia - Road Miles
 

Martin:

Thanks for the prompt reply and information.

Where can one buy a Russian Road Atlas in the U.S.?

Rgds./Doug

Russia Road Miles
 

Michael:

Thanks for your insight.

Rgds./Doug

km vs miles...
 

You find Russia is a km country so miles won't be of much use there ...
100 miles = 161 km.
You need to start thinking in km doh - easy once you get into to it. All the signs will be in km (and cyrillic just to add to the confusion)

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A straight line between the two is ~ 650km (~400 miles). So the road distance will be more. Probably a lot more. Adding say 30% could be good if not too twisty. I'd plan on 2 days travel. :mchappy:

Some experience?
Accurate mileage? Well the map may have been accurate when it was compiled, but since then the road has been realigned. Not uncommon. Especially for unsealed roads! Take a look at the date of the map... and then think of that as the date it was printed, the drawing date would have been before that and the data date before that... its old when new! And then add it the side trips you want to do to get to the top of the hill on the side for a good view/photo... The distances and even the road directions are guides only, what you get in practice is something else. If that were not the case you could simulate it on a computer and not leave home at all :)

I rode this a few years ago, all the guy's here are on the ball and giving good advice , my guess would be around 750 -800 KM and it is a 2 day trip.
I cannot be more accurate as we took a detour along the coast from Vladivostok and looped back into the M60 north of the airport , at that time the road was under construction from the airport to Vlad and was very rough and busy.
The new road tends to bypass villages and towns , so if you need help supplies ,food fuel don't be put off going down a dirt road to what looks like an old wild west wooden shanty town . Saying that, there are plenty of fuel stops along the main road , our rule was never pass one by, always top up.
Learn cyrillic, my buddy did and i just thought, be ok i'll get by, but after the first day on the road i realised , i didn't have a clue what the signs meant, but i soon started to learn.
Get a Russian map, as an english version would just add more confusion, we bought ours in Vladivostok .
Could i ask why you are so interested in accurate road milage ? If it's fuel as long as you can cover 400 km you should be ok

Vladivostok west
 

Re: miles. Just curious for planning purposes.

[QUOTE=PanEuropean;405416]Doug:

I have never traveled that route by land, however, I fly between those two cities frequently - about 4 or 5 times a year. The image below shows the airway route, and it is 355 nautical miles (about 650 km). Vladivostok airport is in the village of Artom, about 50 km north of Vladivostok proper, so add another 50 km to the aeronautical route to get to downtown UHWW.

Based on that, I think the 'over the road' distance would be no less than 700 km.

For what it's worth, the first 100 nm going south of Khabarovsk consists of fairly flat farmland. There are no big population centers along the way, but it appears that there is sufficient population there that you should not have any problems getting fuel, food, etc. The roads look pretty solid, and there is cell phone coverage everywhere. But, as soon as you get into the hilly areas (anywhere on the map below that shows hills), settlements become few and far between.

The area under the airway between the TD and the BG non-directional beacons is mountainous, forested, and very thinly populated.

I am going to guess that if you followed the roads that more or less parallel the border with China, you would find those areas populated in the same manner as the first 100 nm south of Khabarovsk, because the topography is more or less the same - flat, and suited to large-scale farming. I've never had the opportunity to fly off-airways, though, so that is just speculation.

Khabarovsk is a fairly pleasant city, with good infrastructure and services.

Michael

UHHH to UHWW by low-level airways
http://i979.photobucket.com/albums/a.../UHHH-UHWW.jpg[/QUOTE]

Doug:

In case it helps you, any roads (thin magenta lines) shown on that aviation map that I posted are considered to be 'highways', that normally implies a sealed road.

Small yellow splotches beside or along the road indicate urban agglomerations. So, I don't think that the route up the valley (parallel to the China border) would be a particularly remote route - I think there is probably a fair amount of settlement (farming) in there.

Concerning maps, I have no idea where you could get a Russian map in the USA, but you could certainly get whatever you need in either Vlad or Khabarovsk. Both of those places are really big cities, probably in the range of 500,000 or so inhabitants for each - if not more for Vlad.

For the purposes of planning the trip, I think Google Earth would likely be the best bet.

You can buy portable GPS receivers in Russia that are pre-loaded with routable Russian road databases. It would probably be cheaper for you to wait until you get to Russia and buy one there, rather than buying a device in the USA and then trying to find Russian cartography to load into it.

Michael

For Russia - Open Street Maps is has the best maps.

I would look at downloading Basecamp from Garmin, building an OSM map (see this OSM Map On Garmin - OpenStreetMap Wiki).

And use this for route planning. When you are ready to go buy a Garmin GPS and use this.

My Атлас Автомобильных Дорог Россия say 760 Kilometers (472 miles). I had a friend buy my atlas and mail it to me from Moscow. You can get great maps/books in Russia fairly cheap.

Your map uses the english alphabet - you better get used to reading maps/signs/whatever in Cyrillic. You can add languages to your laptop/computer/whatever and also make a toggle to switch alphabets. This will aid you in translations, etc. I had someone type in Russian, hit internet translator of choice, and read in english. You can also get small hand-held translators with phrases on them pretty inexpensive.

The big expense is mailing if you don't happen to be there. (Photo by rtwdoug.)
YMMV

732km on the M60
Travel time: 13:17 (I assume this is time at the speed limit)
АТИ: ГРУЗОПЕРЕВОЗКИ, ПЕРЕВОЗКИ, ГРУЗЫ, АВТОПЕРЕВОЗКИ

Open street maps are not only the best GPS maps for Russia, they are also the basis for a lot of the cheaper GPS units maps that you can buy in Russia. And they are free.

Better just to load them onto your GPS before you go ... see sticky thread in the GPS section.

I dont know who in the US does international maps and Atlases, but Stanfords in London is considered one of the best in the world.

They have 7 Russian Road Atlases

Worldwide Road Maps and Atlases - Stanfords Website

My personal favourite is the 2nd one.

They will be able to mail to you