Transcontinental motorcycle expedition through Eastern Europe and Central Asia

We all meet on Friday morning at the OVERCROSS office in Tübingen and the motorcycle journey can begin. We head out on our travel enduros towards the Czech Republic, specifically to Pilsen, where we will spend our first evening in a cozy hotel, without much frills, and get to know each other over a beer. The route leads us and the motorcycles east towards Wrocław. The city is very impressive and a cultural highlight of Europe. We will enjoy nice meals and have time in the evening or the next morning for a little city stroll. Since our destination is still far away, we need to keep making kilometers as long as the roads are reasonably good. The ride through Poland mainly takes us past meadows and fields; we try to make good progress and will spend the night just behind Warsaw. We set off for Vilnius, where we will also experience an art and culture city of Eastern Europe. We try to arrive in the afternoon to have a look at this beautiful city in the Baltics. The next day brings us the first hurdle; we pack our belongings on our motorcycles and head towards the Russian border. After we successfully navigate the patience-testing border procedure, we look for a place to camp and rest. In Russia, we immediately encounter significantly worse roads, and the general impression of the villages and towns makes it clear that we have left Europe. Before we disappear completely into the Russian province, we dive back into the hustle and bustle of the metropolis of Moscow and meet our OVERCROSS associate Moritz, who will show us the capital of Russia on a city tour. In Moscow, we will also take our first day off to check the motorcycles, do some shopping, rest, and have enough time for sightseeing. After the rest day, we get back on our motorcycles and ride on secondary roads to visit important cities of the Golden Ring. We look forward to seeing the Kremlin, monasteries, and the oldest churches in Russia. Our intermediate destination is Nizhny Novgorod, the eastern city of ancient Rus. Ruts and crazy overtaking maneuvers will not be uncommon here.

From Nizhny Novgorod, we ride our motorcycles through a beautiful floodplain landscape towards Kazan. We will stay overnight in a hotel near the city center, from where we will start our city tour. Very interesting in Kazan is the fusion of Slavic-Russian and Islamic-Tatar culture, with the Kremlin and mosque to be observed. From Kazan, we head north until we reach Yekaterinburg. We ride through typical Russian forests and meadows until we reach the climb through the Urals and cross the geographical boundary between Europe and Asia. Once we have passed the Urals, our expedition begins to get wilder. We continue on side roads towards the east and may need to choose alternative routes if the road is flooded again or bridges are impassable. Now we are in Western Siberia, and endless expanses and swarms of mosquitoes await us.

We take a detour around Kazakhstan, saving us two border crossings and a lot of time. About halfway through our motorcycle journey to the east, we will arrive in Novosibirsk, the third-largest city in Russia. But first, we must get through the 'thirsty stretch.' Starting from Omsk, we ride through 700 km of swampy land to Novosibirsk. Two days of straight asphalt and endless mosquitoes are rewarded by reaching the Altai. If everything is technically and otherwise in order, we will leave Novosibirsk behind and ride our motorcycles to the next stage destination: Barnaul. The route now slowly takes us south and into the Altai. But before heading into the mountains, we stop in Barnaul and visit the most famous biker bar in Siberia in the evening. The biker bar is a must on our transcontinental tour, with motorcycles everywhere: in the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. After all, the eye also drinks. There we can treat ourselves to a few beers, and if we are lucky, there will also be live music in the bar.

With our motorcycles, we now set off to the Altai Mountains, one of the most beautiful places on earth. We take our time over two days to cover the 700 km from Barnaul to the border. We pass through stunning high mountain landscapes on partly very good asphalt roads with lovely serpentines. But there are also gravel roads to expect until we cover the last kilometers through a vast valley on asphalt to the Russian-Mongolian border. One last time, we are faced with border formalities. We will complete this in the morning, and now Mongolia awaits us without asphalt. The first off-road kilometers to Ölgii, one of the larger cities in Mongolia, show us what to expect on the final leg. We get to experience the impressive vastness of Mongolia for the first time. From now on, we will mainly be riding off-road, which will challenge us and the motorcycles until the end of the tour. We ride past beautiful lakes, towering mountains, and through the vastness of the Mongolian steppe to reach the goal of our transcontinental motorcycle expedition through Eastern Europe to Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar! We will arrive two days earlier to register the participants' motorcycles with the shipping company and prepare for the return transport. Those who wish to return can shape their time according to their own preferences.