Figure 1 The Marriott in Novosibirsk has attractive Art Deco features
At last we have made it to Novosibirsk. Before the rally we were told that it is the dividing point of the rally. If you make it there, you get your car rebuilt by one of the numerous garages offering help and with luck you can make it till the end.
There is quite a lot to do on our car.
The front of the car is down on the driver’s side and the wheel is at an odd angle (Fig 2). While the same side at the back is also low. Plus the problems with the brakes, the engine and the exhaust that I have bored blog readers with over the past few days.
Since Mike’s marathon at Lake Aya fixing the engine and the brakes, the car has run much better, though it still gets unhappy in heavy traffic or if it has to run for a long time at low revs.
Figure 2 Not sure it’s meant to look like that!
But at least we are here. The hotel is swish with attractive art deco features and comfortable rooms. Lots of those who dropped out at Ulan Bator or later have rejoined the rally here and we have welcomed them with a bit of a party atmosphere. But Mike and I again have been given separate rooms because some are missing. It’s particularly useful to use the extra space for drying clothes after washing them.
After we arrived we went off for a curry with Nick and Dirk who had just come back to the rally after crossing the border on a flatbed.
This morning Mike has gone off to sort out the car while I am left to write and catch up with the navigation plans.
Again we had a great welcome which you can see on the vid I too as we came in. https://www.facebook.com/douglas.mcwilliams.5/videos/10158687710382576/?t=1
Contrary to what I said yesterday morning, we saw some pretty impoverished villages on the drive in. Wood houses, corrugated iron roofs and only old people. Clearly there is a group left behind. And Nvosibirsk, which claims to be Russia’s third city, is in reality only 7th by GMP (Gross Municipal Product essentially equivalent to the GVA measurement) with GDP per capita about half the Moscow level. http://www.urbaneconomics.ru/en/MetropolitanRankingIUE2017
Figure 3 Since both of us are out of the car, I can’t really claim that the car is lower because of the driver’s weight
Although people seem quite sophisticated with an explosion of coffee shops, it is by no means rich and looks poorer than many places in the Far East. In particular it doesn’t look as if a strong consumer economy has emerged and the shopping looks pretty desultory.
But again the young people look healthy and don’t have the pock marked faces that one tends to associate with a bad diet.
Given its geography, one suspects that this part of Russia will benefit most from the Belt and Road initiative as it wends its way through Russia. There seems to be plenty of scope for upside!