Tallinn to Tblisi, potential 2021 summer trip.
I'm looking for thoughts on my choice of bike and any route/admin/advisories relating to a possible (and presently entirely hypothetical) trip to Georgia, starting in Tallinn:
Since buying my TDM and planning this summers short 10 day trip to Central Europe and back I've rediscovered a love for motorcycle travel that I'd shelved when my kids arrived. I then forgot where I'd shelved it.
But planning that trip, getting the bike ready and all that has brought all that back to the fore and it helps that my girlfriend is very excited about it all: her first 2-wheel trip.
Europe is nice, but I thirst for something a little different.
I've been looking East, or in this case SSE.
So first bikes: I have a TDM900 and a Transalp 600. For two-up travel, which would you take. I'm guessing the Yamaha as it's largely a paved route. Any arguments in favour of the Honda? One may be in the next paragraph.
As she and I both have full time jobs, the likelihood is that we would have 2-3 weeks to do this. It is very likely that this may require us to leave the bike there and ride it back at a later date (we probably have a place to leave it there). This is something in favour of the Transalp as my Yam is my "main" bike now.
Secondly the route. Perhaps I'm being biased and narrow-minded but the current political climate makes me a bit wary of traversing Russia. Then there's the whole business of their visas being valid for fairly short periods, as I recall.
Am I foolish to treat entering Russia with such wariness (being an Anglo-French citizen)?
Would Belarus and Ukraine be better, despite the unpleasantness in Donbass?
Is riding down to Istanbul and then East through Northern Turkey plain nuts in that time frame (if we don't want to live and sleep on the bike for 14 days)?
Any thoughts on these questions or, indeed, anything I've overlooked, I'd love to hear.
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Adventure: it's an experience, not a style!
(so ride what you like, but ride it somewhere new!)
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