Ready to start my trek tomorrow morning

Here is a shot after making it through customs in Anadyr...

Yes, I am now in Egvekinot thanks to the great help of a few friends.

First of all, a big thank you to my girlfriend Ilima for spending countless hours helping me to get ready before and after I left Seattle when we realized that I left my upmost important maps on the floor while packing in Seattle! Grrrrrrrr !
She was able to send them to me via Bering Air to Anadyr where they will wait for me for the Anadyr-Omsukchan sections.
She also sent me digitalized copies for the first section which I was able to print in Egvekinot.

I also want to thank Elena Vasilieva from Bering Air, the English school teacher Leonid Tererhov from Rhatyrka as well as a few other important friends in Anadyr for all the help they have provided to me to expedite my arrival in Egvekinot.
Seattle-Anchorage-Nome-Anadyr-Egvekinot in 5 days ! I may have broken a record on this popular route ! ;-)

Finally thank you in advance to Erik and Ilima for your help posting when I will not be able to do so over the next few months.



Check the plane wing on the side of the trail !




OK, I have checked all my gear and I am ready to start trekking tomorow early morning.


The weather is currently sunny, cold (-13 C) and crisp, perfect to start my trek on skis.

I have changed my scheduled route Egvekinot-Anadyr, planning to follow backwards the wezdehod route that I took on the way from Anadyr to Egvekinot via Uelkal, an eskimo village of 170 people on the coast.

This first section is going to include at first a crossing of the frozen bay for going straight South for about 30 miles,which will then lead to a coastal section all the way to the eskimo village of Uelkal.
Afterwards, I will be going West up a river bed and avoiding surrounding mountains.

In the river bed, I plan to stop potentially at the only place where I saw anyone on the way besides the village of Uelkal... a fishing camp where Pietr, a chukchi from Egvekinot spend his winters fishing, and welcomes the wezdehod drivers passing through...


Think of it as the ultimate "truck stop" where you can get freshly caught delicious small fishes !



Afterwards I will proceed South West on miles and miles of rolling hills and flat plains to finally reach the bay of Anadyr, which I hope will still be frozen at that time !

Thanks to my GPS, I was able to mark the trail with check points "bread crumbs" and counted a total of 180 miles. I am planning to take between 15-20 days to complete this section, depending on the condition of the snow, the weather and how my body is going to adjust to have to pull an heavy sled for the first time in 11 months...

Paka !
Dimitri