Day 93 – We are sharing kitchen with three Russian fishers, Misha, Pasha and Dima – 2 June

Day 93. 2nd of June. Khevronino to Base Rovsky. 36.8 km, 6.8 km/hr average speed.

Apart from a green snake that was much more scared for Stein than Stein was for him, breakfast was uneventful and pleasant. We took an extra cup of coffee while enjoying a full view of the morning traffic on the river Svir both upstream and down stream.

As we paddled on we realized just how good our well vented camp site had been. We saw no comparable site during our three hour leg before lunch. Just forest, forest, more dense forest. True, there was the occasional meadow, now left for the forest to reclaim, but those were more friendly to mosquitoes than campers.

That settled a dilemma we had discussed, paddle long and camp out today and have a short day tomorrow, or head for a “resort” called Base Rovsky, which would mean a longer paddle tomorrow.

It will be a longer paddle tomorrow.

At base Rovsky we got a basic room in a hut. We are sharing kitchen with three Russian fishers, Misha, Pasha and Dima.

Misha is a pilot on greater St. Petersburg harbor, and speaks good English. They had gotten an OK catch and invited us to join them for a Russian fish soup with a Thai touch, prepared by Misha. Really good, much better than our alternatives. But Misha kept the recipe to himself.

We were informed that for russian fish soup the recommended wine was vodka. In this case served from a gallon plastic (former) water container. Fortunately, there wasn’t much left, so when we had drunk to health, Russian Norwegian friendship and Russian hospitality, the container was empty.

That is probably good for our planned early start tomorrow.

We have about 50 km to paddle before we get to lake Onega and another chapter of or adventure.

Day 92 was updated with photos at 1250 today.
Day 93; updated June 3rd, 1535.