Troubles alreadyWe headed out of town towards Birabidzhan 200km away on a sunny cloudless day. We crossed the huge Umer river bridge. This took some time since the river is wide like the Mississippi, the bridge extends over the flood-plains and the speed limit is 40km/hr. The land in that region is lush and green (mainly due to it being swampland). Those endless green swards are bottomless peat relieved only by the beautiful birch forests where the water is not so deep. Deep blue irises decorate the green.
Uwe and I parted just before Birabidzhan and I contacted Sergey, our biker contact, with the intent of repairing the broken spoke in my rear wheel. I borrowed a passers-by cellphone but the signal was bad. I abandoned the attempt and rode to a gas station to fill up for the ride to Belagorsk. Riding down the main street I was flagged down by a car and out gets a man with the words "Hi, I am Sergey". We then set off to what I thought was his place. We arrived at the western outskirts of town, Sergey pointed west and said "Chita". OK, I get the message, so I rode off a short distance to camp. I was determined to do all the large and small maintenance jobs that had accumulated so camped in the forest and got the electric-start going again. Turned out to be a fuse blown by the extra drain of my new thermostatic fan. I discovered that the one broken spoke was now two and since the rim and spokes were new, this indicated a bigger problem. I resolved to return to Birabidzhan the next day and make my intentions clearer to Sergey.
I rang Sergey from the railway station and he arrived minutes later. We discussed the problem (actually I pointed and made noises) and after discovering our one shared word "garage", we set off.
Now it seems that in Russia, nothing can be achieved without friends and soon there were 4 men in the car driving by an obscure route to an unlikely destination. If you see 4 large men filling a car driven at speed through town, it is not the mafia, just one man on an errand. Our destination was a decidedly unpretentious lock-up on the outskirts of town. There we met more bikers and were shown Andres secret, a full workshop with lathe, drill and most importantly heating for winter.
More nodding and da, da-ing and we set off, I thought for lunch. I was soon ensconced in an apartment, shown the shower and told that I could sleep. Now since it was 12:30pm and I had all the spare spokes, alarm bells rang in my head.
I made my concerns apparent and so went back to Andres workshop, this time with Lyuba, a charming lecturer in English from the university. The wheel was already off and the tyre removed so to business. We discussed the problem and I tried a drill and file to realign the holes but with no success, a special tool was required. Another person from a machine shop was called and he took a spoke nipple away. Two hours later a stepped drill had been made (I don't know how) and the trial was a success. We set to and re-drilled all 36 holes, trued the wheel and refitted the tyre, completed by 6:00pm.

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The miracle-workers of Birabidzhan

Here another mystery became apparent, beer appeared as if by magic and we all drove out to a disused children's camp for a barbeque and banya (Russian sauna). Conversation was a little strained with our lack of a common language but the beer was cold and the shisk-kebabed marinated pork delectable. Lyuba arrived and the conversation came alive. Lots of questions and jokes from both sides made a balmy early summer evening like heaven. It was an evening I will always remember. To have the friendship of these men and women is a gift, for them to do so much for me, a complete stranger overwhelms me. How can we have been so hood-winked for those cold war years by politicians. These are the warmest people I have ever met, my own nation included.

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All beer and banya-ed out

I slept in a Sergey's spare apartment and was directed out of town towards Chita, a happier man than the last time. Sergey had one more act of kindness to perform, giving me a mobile phone SIM card so that I could ring Lyuba at any time for translation and to give me three souvenirs, one of which would prove to be invaluable later.