Offroad in the Kola

Just a note: our travel map connected to this blog unfortunately does not show the actual route we are taking. It just connects the points by fastest available road. And we aren't even using highways. They are not that much fun.

So, there are a lot of old disused roads on the Kola Peninsula that you are free to drive on, although they are not on many maps. The one we chose, connecting the abolished town of Oktyabrsky (east of Apatity) to the mining town of Revda along a former rail road track, winds its way along the southern and eastern banks of beautiful Lake Oumbozero. The road, if you want to call it that, crosses several streams, wide patches of swamp, rocky hillocks and a lot of wooded area. The weather was good and it hadn't rained for days meaning that we could expect low water levels at the river crossings. The total distance without any tarmac or concrete road surface is about 90 km.
We had gone shopping in the morning and were a little bit late to start but felt that we could just stop whenever we got too tired to drive on. We did not know beforehand what to expect and had planned our supplies accordingly. We were also going alone without any other cars to tow us out of the mud should Bruce get stuck bad enough.

Start of the road, first water crossing, lunch by the lake.

The start of the road was a sandy, muddy gravel road with more pot holes than road. It reminded us of skiing moguls. We just had to go slow but it wasn't exactly a challenge. Athena laid down between us and seemed to enjoy the swaying and jolting of the vehicle. Rory on the other hand got scared by the sudden lurches in unpredictable directions and went to sit in Katie's lap. There she tried to hold on by clawing and pushing her feet against Katie which left bruises. Rory then was banned to sit in the middle with her sister and eventually she got better at offroading. She still does not like it much though.

Haven't met a soul in hours. It's beautiful by the lake during the day (when the mosquitoes are in hiding).

The road quickly got worse and turned into a one lane obstacle course. We came to a stream with a broken bridge. The depth of the water in the middle wasn't easy to judge and we did not want to take unnecessary risks. So, we decided to turn around, go back a little bit and hop onto the old rail road track. Its concrete bridge looked a lot less likely to collapse and was once built to carry 60 tons of locomotive. It would carry our 5 tons easily. "Choo-choo, we're a train".

The rail road track is actually worse to drive on than the obstacle lane, so we got back on the trail.

The Kola wilderness is really beautiful. Often there are tree logs put across the trail to give the worst mud holes more traction and prevent vehicles from sinking in too deep. We were really lucky that it was so dry and can only guess how muddy this road would be after a good rain. The streams are so clear. After about 6 hours and 50 kilometres we decided to camp by the lake. At dusk the wind stopped, and then the mosquitoes attacked.

Cooking dinner inside while under attack. The lake is still beautiful and we are the only human beings (and dogs) out here. Not quite, though. At around 9 in the evening a group of 5 offroaders passed our camp. We don't know where they went as the sun set about half an hour later. They did not stop, or, maybe they didn't even see us. You have to stay concentrated and watch the path in front of you. It is hard work. And so, so much fun!

Side note from Max: I had a Landrover 110 for about ten years and drove it offroad many times. It is a very capable car offroad. I think there were some obstacles on this path that we would have had to try several times to pass or possibly would have gotten stuck (maybe badly so) in a Landrover. The Duro just went wherever you pointed him to go. There is a switch on the centre console that depicts a hare and a tortoise (Hase und Schildkröte). We only used the tortoise setting for water crossings (just in case!) and on the steeper descents (because of the better engine braking). We do have three self-locking differentials, though. They help a lot.

At dawn Max checked the oil level in the front differential, which turned out to be low. So then we had to refill oil as quickly as possible under an onslaught of mosquitoes. That wasn't fun. We probably chose the worst possible place to stay. And left as quickly as possible.

The next 40 km continued as before although there seemed to be fewer obstacles, or maybe not as frequent with very easy bits in between. We crossed lots of little streams as it had rained at night, but there were no deeper ones than knee deep. Eventually we came to the end of the road and drove a little bit up the hill to an abandoned mine. The rest of the day we rested near the town of Revda. It had taken us 10 hours to do 90 km.

Wednesday, 21st of August in the morning we filled up at the fuel station and headed south-east out of Revda towards the active mine. About 800m before reaching the mine parking lot there we turned off the road to the right and into the Kola Tundra.

1. the road up, 2. no trees! 3. Revda in the background, 4. lunch stop

There were some big boulders to climb over on the way to the top. We actually did need the tortoise setting for once! It was very windy and cold up there, but the views were amazing. It felt like we could see all of Kola (probably not, it is huge). It is very rocky and looks a bit like the moon. The dogs loved running and climbing over the rocks, especially Rory who must have some mountain goat in her blood.

1. shows Lake Oumbozero in the background that we travelled around the days before.
3. photo of the cliffs (maybe 70m high?)

Lake Seydozero: the 'Jewel of Kola', the lake between the mountains. With Lake Lovozero in the far distance.

Bruce on the moon. Katie over the moon!

We returned the way we came. The Arctic sea was calling and we decided to spent some time on its coast. But first Murmansk, our next destination.