I must say Ian has done us proud with his last update, I spent the last week in awe
of the fact that he managed to get the word velveteen into a posting, and now look I’ve managed it too!

Well the weeks have past and we now look back on our fantastic journey with rose tinted spectacles, yes Russia was difficult and yes the problems we had were of our own making, but my word have they given us plenty to talk about.

Funnily enough one recurring question I’ve been asked since returning home is “would you do it again?”. Well my answer is quite simply, no. But to be honest it would have been the same even if we hadn’t had problems, there is after all a very big world out there. For anyone thinking about a similar run my suggestion would be to head due north through Sweden and into Lapland, then head south through Finland to Helsinki and then take the ferry to Tallinn and then down to Riga. Although I have it on good authority that it would also be well worth travelling on down to Vilnius in Lithuania. With the benefit of hindsight, which as they say “is a wonderful thing”, I would have considered parking the car for a few months and then flying back out to participate in the Baltic Snow Challenge this sounds just up my street, but typically I’ve only just heard about it. Perhaps one of you out there on the interweb will consider it!

Time for me to sign off, all the best and thanks for reading,
Pete

Ps. Oh nearly forgot, here is the photographic proof that we did at least meet one blonde person on the trip! Pity she ended up getting our car impounded!