Update: Fri 11:15

Thursday, 22 September

I awoke to ideal conditions for a 420km ride: 8C, wind and heavy rain. Before I'd even left Petrazavodsk I rode through a large puddle drenching my boots and soaking my feet. Start as you mean to go on.

As it happens, the rain pretty much left off once outside Petrazavodsk giving me the opportunity to spot the mobile missile launcher (10m missile) sat off to the side of the road in the middle of a village. Maybe there was an army base in the woods, maybe the villagers were keen rocket enthusiasts.

Not much to report on the M18 south- and westbound. Trees, lots of trees. Very little else. Considering how little of anything else there is there's a lot of people selling stuff at the side of the road. Usually berries of some kind and now and again you see people parked up at the side of the road and venturing into the woods, bucket in hand. Otherwise, if they're not within walking/cycling distance of a town you'll find someone parked up with a few buckets of stuff on the bonnet and them safely tucked up inside.

It also became considerably warmer. My gizmo was reporting 18C later in the trip, a figure "confirmed" by the odd time/temperature display at garages etc.. Not that the locals were taking the figure any more seriously than I was. They were trussed up like winter was descending too.

In St. Petersburg I'd initially considered one particular hotel which sounded nice but given how out of date my book was I thought I'd be better off hunting down one of the hostels. In trundling around I found my rear tyre rather squishy. I guess either my puncture repair was below par or there is something sharp on the inside of the tyre that has yet to be discovered.

I found the block for the first hostel but no sign. I pressed the apartment number button on the intercom but it flashed back "ERRO4" which wasn't good on so many levels. There was a sign for another hostel in a different apartment so I tried them but the disembodied voice said they were full. I then went round the corner looking for the next place and couldn't find it either. No other hostel signs had reared their heads.

This is all not very good with a nearly flat rear tyre. I headed for my original hotel where they did have a room for 2800R. Wow, that's pretty good. Except, as the guy with the alarming twitches pointed out, she should have said 4800R. Oh. We can offer you a discount. OK. 4400R. Hmm. If I stayed for two nights can you do it for 8000R altogether? Yes, of course, he replied straight-away. Damn! I should have gone for a much lower figure.

There's a slight peculiarity in that Room 214B would I guess be the second room of the 214 suite and so I'm on a sofa bed. A large and comfortable one but a sofa bed nonetheless. Still, once your eyes are closed... Otherwise the "Art Hotel" seems rather comfortable with some decent contemporary artwork on display. Not often I say that.

It's not a hotel in the true sense as you have to trot out to get dinner but luckily the road the other side of St Andrews Catherdral is pedestrianised and chock full of cafes. I picked one which looked popular enough and it turned out to do a decent range of beers at staggeringly cheap (for RU eating out) prices. 110R for 0.5l, my goodness, that's almost down to UK prices. So I started a Billy-no-mates session working my way through their wares which ended abruptly when the woman said she was going home rather than asking me if I wanted another. The place wasn't shutting but the waitress was off so I had to pay the bill. I thought it best to retire before forgetting the way home.

Currently at lat/long: n59 56.401 e30 17.035

Art Hotel Trezzini, St Petersburg.

Trezzini was the Italian/Swiss architect brought in by Peter The Great to oversee the building of St Petersburg.