Hi!

Yes, i drove up to norway (northern cape), then to murmansk - st. petersburg - ekaterinburg - chalyabinsk - omsk - novosibirsk - barnaul - altai - krasnojarsk - Up to the Lena River - Baikal - Irkutsk - Ulan-ude - Chitta - Vladivostok.

As i wrote, i have not been in mongolia, but i can tell you for the russian part. The price of gas is at the moment about 16-17 roubles per liter (95 octane). Exchange rate for rouble at the moment 1$ = 30 roubles. Of course, there is only leaded gas in whole russia i think :-) It will clean up your cylinders, don`t worry :-)

I had army controls only in the very northwest, before murmansk. But this was no problem, those army guys were only a bit surprised to see a westerner up there. Along the main road, i have sometimes been stopped three or four times a day, but most of them only want to talk a little. If they wanted some documents i just said `ne panimaju` (i don`t understand), and after 10 minutes or so, the will give up and just let you drive :-) The same if you will be catched by a radar trap. But all in all, the police in russia is not as bad as many people think. I sometimes even parked my bike at the police station, because nobody will touch it there!

It depends on what you mean with bribes... i only once had to pay 200 roubles because of driving to fast, and i didn`t get a receipt, so it`s quite obvious that the money went into the officer`s pocket... but as long as they don`t want money for senseless reasons, i think it`s ok.

Marco

__________________
Marco
http://www.schnueriger.net