Ulan Ude > Kyakhta 235km

We have good internet, yay!!  So we are staying put for a day so I can upload our photos and catch up on our blog.

Was the most rugged roadworks we have experienced in Russia, chatted to a couple of bikers who had stopped to take the tar off their bikes – she an eye doctor riding a Harley.

It’s what we do everyday

Our lunchstop

Outside – no trees

Kyakhta is a lovely little town with so many decorated homes.  By the mid 19C it was very wealthy with the tea trade – 50,000 cases of tea per day with furs being the return load.  Then the Suez Canal and the Trans Siberian went in and it all changed.

There are 3 large churches here, the last Christian outpost before Mongolian Budhism.  Apparently in the wealthier times, this church had solid silver doors studded with diamonds.

Getting water, these pumps are all over the towns

There is a large army outpost here, we saw a couple of troop carriers doing an exercise on the way in, lots of tanks that we could see over the walls.

(There are only two hotels (Turist was closed), the one we found has secure parking – from H Druzhba keep heading toward the blue and white church, veer around to the right, and it’s on the left.)