The Brothers Sampson

I am petrified with fear. Oh, the Mongolia thing does not bother me. Rather, I just spent the last 3 hours with my brother Rick. We went out looking for motorcycle gear for him in Council Bluffs, Iowa. Nothing wrong with Council Bluffs, but Rick just figured he would be able to find the super sale on gear and clothing by dead reckoning.

That is not the scary part. Rick had loaded the address of the place he thought we should be looking for into his iPhone. He then proceeded to do the drive and read the phone thing until I took it away from him. We are both doddering old men, clueless in the low sun of winter.

As it turns out, there was a sale. It was in the old Target store, not where Rick thought it would be. And it was junk.

Rick is going to accompany me on the first foot of my journey. Notice I did not say "first leg" of my journey. Rick is doing the "foot". We have both bought fine machines and they are safely stored at Martin Hurley's farm in Cork, Ireland. From there the plan is to go to Scotland, Wales, a tad of England, and then head for France.

I look at the first 30 days as my chance to adjust to the new bike, fix the stuff that is wrong, and basically get comfortable with life on the road again.

This is my plan. Ride to Istanbul and meet my wife Mary Alice in the middle of May. After Istanbul I will ride across Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, a bit of Russia, and cross into Mongolia in early to mid July. I have some new found friends on the HUBB site of Horizons Unlimited making the trip to accompany on the Central Asian portion and the Pamir Highway. I want to spend a month in Mongolia and then go to Russia. Then it is on to Vladivostok the long way, which might include a bit of the Road of Bones (and then back down to Vladivostok. I want to be in Vladivostok on September 15. Then I will figure out how to get home.

So that is the first entry. I will try to get pictures up in short order and tell everyone how easy or difficult it is to get Visas to cross Central Asia. Fritz