colin bicycled 750km along the “road of bones” to get from ust nera to yakutsk

Beyond the Horizon: Part 3 pp126-169from outside Ust Nera to Irkutsk, alone

(the cyclist below is actually Tim Harvey)

Colin bicycled 750km along the “Road of Bones” to get from Ust Nera to Yakutsk

Yakutsk, Yakutian Province, Russia

• Colin has been in SiIberia for 6 months

• The first major city since Fairbanks, Alaska

• Pop. 200,000• A chance to send mail

and repair his bicycle• Along the Lena River, the

10th longest River in the world

More images from Yakutsk:

Leaving Yakutsk:Bicycling 1150km on the M56 “highway,” south to the Trans-Siberian

Highway

Two stops between Yakutsk and Tynda (the end of the M56): Aldan(left – the town and the river) and

Neryungri(right)

Tynda: the end of the M56 and a major hub on the BAM rail line

More images from Tynda:

Outside of Tynda, Colin met another world-traveller: Rosie Swale-Pope who was on her journey to be the first person

to jog around the world unassisted

Chita, Russia: 1100km from Irkutsk

More images from Chita

Crossing the Yenisey River

• Familiar ground for Colin: in a previous adventure he rowed the Yenisey from its headwaters to its delta in the Arctic Ocean

• The photo is of Colin• The Yenisey is the 5th

longest river in the world

The “road” between Chita and Ulan-Ude:

Siberia: the land of rivers and bad roads?Crossing the Selenga River, the primary tribuary of the

Yenisey River

Ulan-Ude, Buryatia Province, Russialate April

More images from Ulan-Ude:note the Selenga River again, as well as the world’s largest bust of

Lenin, one the USSR’s founding heroes

Rounding Lake Baikal, the deepest lake in the world (bottom right is a satellite photo of the lake, frozen)

And finally…Irkutsk, where Colin planned to wait for Tim and Yulya

As with all Russian cities, Irkutsk has Orthodox churches and a statue of Lenin

Irkutsk to Moscow:Colin formally breaks with Tim, but will meet Julie in

Moscow