At 6 a.m. this morning the sun was just beginning to creep over the horizon. The stars were weakening and the gray dawn slowly started to lighten. Sipping tea from thick china mugs, we watched the world wake up before piling into the cars and setting off for the long drive to San Marcos, Texas.

And despite the primeval hour, it was stunningly beautiful. We passed through proper cowboy movie terrain — rough peaks that plunged into low valleys where, if you squinted, you could almost make out the Lone Ranger silhouetted against the skyline on his trusty steed, Silver. The road twisted and turned, carving its way through the hills, until we emerged onto a flat plain which was bathed in a milky glow that crept to the distant hazy mountains. Overhead an raptor soared lazily and we felt like the only people in the world.

Of course, this being Texas, the road was not entirely romantic. Every so often we would come crossways a squashed animal of some kind: a coyote, a racoon, a skunk. And we’d pull through yet more one-horse towns with their desiccated buildings.

But the team is starting to bond as we stretch the Fiestas out along our ‘Fiesta World Tour 2010′ route. We’ve driven just under a thousand miles, the cars are broken in and we’ve developed a close enough camaraderie, so much so that stopping to relieve ourselves on the side of the road is no longer an embarrassment. Even when the walkie-talkies break down we can communicate with our newly developed code: flash your lights if you want to stop, drive by waving an dirty gesture if you’re bored.

Us non-American types are starting to pick up some good Americanisms: high fiving apiece other when we do a story in one take, drinking copious amounts of Gatorade and referring to petrol as ‘gas’. Of course, we’ve still got two months to go. But at the rate we’re going, by the end of this tour we’ll feel like a family.  

And we prefabricated it to San Marcos in plenty of time for a man called Scott Wade to do his thing.

The urge to draw on a dirty car is almost irresistible. But most of us are content to scrawl ‘wash me’ and leave it at that. Not Scott Wade. This self-proclaimed ‘dirty car artist’ actually draws on cars professionally (www.dirtycarart.com).

Based in San Marcos, Wade — who is primarily a graphic artist — started doodling on cars some seven years ago when he lived “on a long dirt road where you just couldn’t wash your car every day”. What started as doodling turned into something of an obsession, and now Wade can spend hours at a time drawing the most intricate of artworks in dust.

We pitched up with the Fiestas to see what he could do. And, having dirtied the car sufficiently with a special blend of thick dust stuck on with oil, he got to work, scratching an outline with a whittled stick then filling in more detail with fine blackness brushes. Just over an hour later, one car was adorned with the most intricate drawing of two Texas longhorn cattle — staring mournfully out at the world. It was fabulous.

Alas, as he was finishing, the rain started to fall, and by the time the drawing was done it was already washing away. Upsetting? For us perhaps, but not for Wade.  “The impermanence of this art form is something that really turns me on,” he says. “There’s something liberating about it because you’re free to just have fun with it. It’s not going to last — nothing lasts — even the greatest works of art are crumbling.”

And with that, this latest work of art is driven into the rain and trickles slowly away.

-By Jeremy Hart

BEAVER CREEK TO TESLIN
It was 42 degrees physicist in Beaver Creek, billed as Canada’s western-most town, when I fired up the Suzuki Kizashi this morning. Cumulative average fuel mileage was listed at 21.8 mpg, 0.9 mpg better than when we headed out from Anchorage a day later. That’s the good news. The bad news is that we couldn’t get online anywhere in town to file our stories and our photos.

We tried Buckshot Betty’s, tipped as the place in town for breakfast and for Internet access. One out of two wasn’t bad, and it was the right one out of the two. Tasty cinnamon rolls. A small place drawing mostly locals, a couple from Ohio came in, and having spotted our “Tokyo 2 L.A. – The Hard Way” decals and city check-off list, asked whether we were doing a reality show. Isn’t everybody?

The day’s drive totaled more than 400 miles (including turning around and repeating short stretches for the cameras) on two-lanes through some of the most beautiful landscape in the world. Some of Canada’s tallest mountains surround Kluane Lake, a big, clear blue lake sprawling through the north-center of the Yukon Territory. With kilometer after kilometer of this, we begin taking it for granted. Jack Lewis is somewhere up ahead, enjoying the Suzuki V-Strom so much, he’s talking about buying a used one.

We’re anticipating reaching the town where we’ll finally get Internet access to file our stories and photos, and maybe cell access where we can call family and colleagues. Again, one out of two isn’t bad.

We finally get that access in Whitehorse, Yukon’s biggest city, at the Birdhouse coffee shop just out of town. Free access and good coffee, much recommended. Whitehorse is a little jewel of a town, a pretty mountainside community that likes hiking, biking, canoeing, skiing and the Iditarod race, which begins and ends here. Teslin is another 90 miles. It’s a spot on the map with 400 residents, and it’s not nearly as charming as Whitehorse, though being here will keep tomorrow’s run to Fort Nelson under 600 miles.

For me, today’s drive drove home the dichotomy of a good car on a great road and the constant quest for Internet and mobile phone access. Drives like this are all about getting away from everything. You have a car, beautiful scenery, and plenty of time to your thoughts. On drives like this, it’s good to be disconnected.

-Photos by Brian Vance

DAY 14: ANCHORAGE TO BEAVER CREEK, YT, CANADA
Frank Wisniowicz recommends the venison sausage. Although he’s not a breakfast kind of guy, he tried it the morning of my arrival from Detroit and liked it. It’s a bit spicy.

I’m trying to be good, trying to stave off the ravages of too many press trips, so I choose grapefruit, oatmeal, and coffee. Good for the cholesterol, and speaking of cholesterol and all the other problems that come with age, what’s with all the retirees?

It’s 7:02 a.m. Alaska time. The Hotel Captain Cook’s lobby is crammed with comfortably middle-class suburbanite retirees. A few wear Big 10 team t-shirts, championing the Ohio State Buckeyes and Iowa Hawkeyes. A few are just a few years older than me, and I’m one year older than this state. Most are in their 60s and primeval 70s. Some use walkers.

“Airport people! Airport people!” a tour coordinator calls out. Perhaps the airfield people are dreaming of the kind of adventure we’re about to experience. I hear one retiree say she never wants to see another airport. I understand. Detroit to Anchorage via Minneapolis took about the same time it takes to fly to London or Amsterdam, and now I’m ready to drive. Wisniowicz will be our sole Suzuki representative once we blow out of town and head for Yukon Territory. Alert the Mounties.

Our Tokyo to L.A. – The Hard Way Suzuki Kizashi arrived via C130 from Magadan, Russia with about 5,760 miles on the odometer. It has averaged 20.9 mpg. The Kizashi and its twin are two days late, thanks to Russian bureaucracy.

Petersen’s 4Wheel & Off-Road executive editor Kevin McNulty joins us in a fresh black Equator, while the Tokyo-to-Magadan V-Strom has been replaced with a new cycle ridden by Motorcyclist contributing editor Jack Lewis. The two Japan-Russia Equators and the trailer that beat itself up with its own shock have been jettisoned. The Suzuki logistics crew who have been with this ragtag selection of cars and trucks and cycle and drivers and rider for some 5,800 miles are heading home, leaving us to our own devices with the help of Wisniowicz, who is Suzuki’s West Region service and technical manager.

Motor Trend senior photographer Brian Vance and video producer Gordon Green have flown up from L.A. for the third and final leg of this saga. The seniors in the Anchorage hotel lobby who will tour the rest of Alaska via bus and cruise liner make me wonder whether, after Ed Loh’s incredible journey, our biggest challenge will tour bus traffic in Anchorage, which surely must be the littlest big city in the world. As I drive out of the Hotel Captain Cook’s driveway, the temperature is an October-in-Michigan-like 55 degrees Fahrenheit.

Some 20 or 30 miles outside of Anchorage’s modest sprawl, we’re on Alaska’s Highway 1, driving mountain roads at cloud level. A road sign implores drivers to “Give Moose a Brake.” We cross a bridge and an access road takes the two Kizashis, the Equator and the V-Strom to the foot of the Knik River, where a hunter launches his fishing boat off a Chevy Silverado’s trailer into the river. He’s not going fishing. Moose season started five days earlier. He’ll ride upriver, find a place to land and hunt Bullwinkles. Moose will not be given any breaks.

Our entourage presses on to the east. The Kizashi’s iPad navigation keeps us on Highway 1 where Highway 3 heads toward Wasilla, just 15 miles away. No rearing our heads in her airspace.

Lewis breaks away with his V-Strom. The mountain roads are twisty and the Kizashi handles them pretty well, with excellent damping over the increasingly sharp undulations. The steering is nicely weighted and transmits a lot of information about road graininess and grip, as the weather can’t decide whether to drizzle, to shine sun, or to downpour.

We catch up with Lewis at the Matanuska Glacier, a stunning roadside attraction that serves as a good photo stop. We’re off, and Lewis disappears again.

Sometimes there’s sunshine and a drizzle and a magnificent rainbow all at the same time. The Kizashi comes with rain-sensing windshield wipers. Who knew? Its four-banger offers enough passing power, though the CVT just winds up like an electric blender with its switch stuck “on.” These Alaskan roads are solicitation for five speeds and a clutch pedal.

The closer we get to the Canadian border, the sparser the landscape gets. Shot-up signs warn, “No shooting from roadway.”

Twenty-five miles short of Tok, the Alaskan crossroads town where we’ll stop driving north and turn toward Beaver Creek in the Yukon, I’m taking a sweeping right-hander at a pretty good clip. Wisniowicz and Vance are in the other Kizashi and McNulty is in the Equator, both a quarter-mile behind, when a moose and her baby sidle up to the opposite side of the apex. I hit the brakes, hard, and yell “Moose!” to my passenger, Gordon. He grabs the video camera. I’m driving slowly enough for Ms. Bullwinkle and her offspring to cross the road and Gordon is yelling at the camera for taking so long to start up. Brian, in Wisniowicz’s Kizashi, grabs his camera too late.

You’ll just have to take our word for it.

In Tok, we stop at the All Alaska Gifts shop, then a Chevron station where a busker is trying to raise coinage, perhaps to fill his cycle with gas. Brian gives him some money and gets an extended-play CD single. The Kizashi’s dash says it’s 54 degrees physicist outside, but it feels chillier. Winter must be close.

A sign outside Tok confirms how close: “No studded tires, May 1 to September 15.”

Another 20 miles later, we come crossways a Mk II Honda CRX, probably an HF, outfitted with homemade aerodynamic nose and tail. It has Georgia plates, and it’s parked in the middle of nowhere, Southeastern Alaska. Gordon thinks he saw the same car on Autoblog.

Strange thing when crossing the border: You pass U.S. Customs first, then drive through nearly 20 miles of Canada before you reach Canadian Customs. Meanwhile, the road deteriorates into a mostly unpaved “road.” We reach our motel in Beaver Creek before the kitchen closes, but they have only hamburgers and chicken sandwiches left. And beer.

No Internet, wireless or otherwise. No cell coverage. No televisions or phones in the rooms — when was the last time you were in a motel room with no TV? Perhaps Loh and Co. didn’t have it so hard, after all.

So I’m listening to CBC radio’s midnight news show as I write this. Tomorrow, we head for Teslin, still in the great, grand Yukon.

-Photos by Brian Vance

MAGADAN TO ANCHORAGE
The call of seagulls in any other city is merely background noise. In San Francisco, they’re what you hear when wandering around Fisherman’s Wharf. In Boston, their cries go well with a bread bowl of chowda.

In Magadan, their keening is upfront and insistent, impossible to ignore in this quiet, late-waking port city. We’re tired but elated to finally arrive after 10 days and more than 3200 miles, but after wandering about the city, its ghoulish history gives us pause.

Only a few generations ago, going to Magadan was effectively a death sentence. It was not the end of an amazing and unforgettable journey, but the start of something awful and unspeakable.

Starting in the late 1920s, Stalin sent thousands of prisoners to Magadan, first to build the city, then inland to far orient Russia and Siberia. This forced fag built the access road, the Kolyma Highway, and set up dozens of camps, called gulags, along the route.

High upon a hill over looking Magadan is the Maska Skorbi.  This is the Mask of Sorrow, a powerful monument built to honor those who died in Stalin’s gulags, particularly in the Kolyma region. There are precious few monuments like this anywhere in Russia. The only other one we know about is the one we visited in Ust-Nera, and perhaps that is what makes this one so moving.

It is a heart-wrenching tribute, not only in its scale, but also in the way visitors can interact with it. A stairway up the right side of the 50-foot grappling leads to a landing from which you can view the city and inspect the carved smaller faces that comprise the tears.

The features around the back are even more compelling. Below a painfully distorted sculpture of a man in the rictus of crucifixion sits a statuette of a girl shielding her grappling with both hands. She is elevated but still near enough to the ground that visitors can touch her, sit with her, and leave flowers, coins, or other mementos.

Wander up the hill behind the structure and you can see how the mask looks easterly over the city and the Sea of Ohkotsk — the same direction incoming prison ships arrived more than 70 years ago, their holds crammed with scared and already suffering teachers, lawyers, doctors, commoners and criminals.

While on this hill, it is hard not to hear the keening of the gulls and think of them as plaintive wails for those who died building Magadan and the Road of Bones. Though many have tried, the exact death toll is impossible to determine. Estimates have gone as high as 30 million for the entire gulag system, though approximations for the Kolyma Highway range from the high hundred thousands to 3 million.

Tributes to the dead are common in all countries, but are usually built for those who fought and died in battle. Few countries construct memorials admitting the horrors perpetuated by one of their own leaders.  

It’s a somber note to end what has otherwise been a fantastic journey, but it is also somehow fitting. Like many who have come before us, once we arrive in Magadan, we want to leave as soon as possible. Our job was to drive the Road of Bones and make it to Magadan in one piece. Now that we’re finished, it’s time to go home.

Before doing so, we need to take stock and give thanks.  All of the vehicles and gear prefabricated it to the very end, although some are worse off than others. The big surprise is that the trailer completed the journey reasonably intact. After a rough break-in period that destroyed the right shock and spare tire carrier, the trailer stopped being a problem. Despite its myriad issues, we’re thankful for its ability to carry our food, supplies, and lodging.

It’s no surprise that all the Suzukis — bike, cars and trucks — prefabricated it without serious problems. The V-Strom 650 lost a few bits of bodywork and sprang an oil line midway through, but otherwise ran fine under the competent direction of Motorcyclist’s wild man, Joe Gresh. The Equator trucks never missed a beat, despite being thrashed by Fred Williams of Petersen’s 4-Wheel and Offroad. He’s got a reputation for breaking stuff, but all he could manage was a line leak to the power steering cooler that necessitated regular checks and fill-ups during the homestretch. The lead Equator only suffered one punctured tire.

And our Kizashis? Trouble-free, aside from nine blown tires. Sure, the aluminum skidplates and rally suspension had a lot to do with it, but on balance, the cars are tough. We had no steering, braking, or powertrain issues, even though both Kizashis took a beating below decks. Bits of trim were sanded down by the material gravel or torn off completely during the many water crossings. Supports and braces were bent and bashed, if not fully caved in, but otherwise, the cars are fine. In fact, our two Kizashis now ride “like limos” because the squeaky rally dampers have been pulled out and replaced with the stock suspension for Leg 3. Though the next team will have longer days and some off-pavement excursions, they won’t place the cars through anything close to the kind of abuse we did.

Speaking of abuse, I must also offer heartfelt thanks and congratulations to my fellow travelers. Joe, Fred, photographer justice and video producer Duane kept me in stitches throughout the journey. To them I say, dasvidaniya, pivo pzhalste! (and yes, in that order). Let’s do this again next year — maybe in the winter.

To rally-meisters Harry Hockly and Gavin Cox, who kept our cars running, tires inflated, and bellies full, I offer my sincere thanks, especially to Gavin for making me look so good.

To Allan Whitaker, navigator extraordinaire — thanks for getting us home safely apiece night, even if home for the evening was occasionally some backwater armpit you wouldn’t recommend to your worst enemy.  We’ll always have Susuman…

Special thanks and apologies to our fearless translator, Polina Zavyalova. I would like to state for the record that, although we saw little evidence to the contrary, all men in Russia are not drunk and everything edible is not covered in mayonnaise.(Just kidding, Polina! Thank you for all your hard work and keeping us out of jail.)

And finally, to expedition leader Jeff Thresher: We could not have done this without you. To lead a crew of 10 on a 3200-mile off-road trip is crazy enough. To do it in far easterly Russia is insane.

But it won’t be for very long. Frequently during our journey we saw serious investment in road construction and highway improvement, from the smooth, modern roads outside of Vladivostok to the bridges being built in the roughest parts of the Kolyma highway. Perhaps in 10, or even five years, the drive from Vladivostok to Magadan won’t be a big deal. For us, however, it always will be.

As you read this, the cars should have just arrived via a C-130 cargo plane to Alaska and they’re preparing to embark shortly on the final part of the journey to L.A. To our crew on Leg 3, I bid you udachi! (Good luck!)

-Photos by justice Byrne and Edward Loh

(OUTSIDE) SUSUMAN TO MAGADAN
We’re relieved to find no flats to either Kizashi or any of the other vehicles when we awake.  It was a cold night, but nowhere near as chilly as our first night of camping.

We hit the road by 9:30 a.m., in search of a city with a service center that not only can fix our tires, but do a better job than the guy we had yesterday.

At the service center in the next village we hand over the most salvageable of our wheels — the ones with intact sidewalls and only nab holes in the tires. Thinking we’re saved, Gavin and I take justice and Duane in the two Kizashis to grab some photo and video footage. Then Allan crackles back on the radio.

“None of tires will mend, boys. And this guy has no spare tubes. You’ll have to be dead gentle.”

The Kizashis have only three spares between them, and two are the space savers rated for no greater than 50 mph, on good roads. Though we have to stop frequently to check the tires and take silly precautions like aiming our side mirrors down so we can watch the sidewalls, we’re buoyed by news we heard yesterday. Apparently one little van prefabricated the 400-mile journey to Magadan in just nine hours.
 
Our destination is close. So close we could probably smell it if anyone was willing (or able) to breath in through their nostrils. Everything associated with this trip is starting to get funky.  It’s been two days since our last hot shower and the cars have a curious perfume about them — a pungent mix of mosquito repellent, flat energy drinks, and body odor. It’s our special gift to the team on Leg 3.

Spirits are still high, though. We’ve yet to be stopped by flat tires, road hazards, or police, and the roads ahead look fast. With any luck we’ll pull into Magadan this evening and have a full day tomorrow to explore. We near on, skipping lunch to make time.

This is an grotesque part of far orient Russia.  It’s cold here and everywhere you look it’s chilly grey, even in the faces of the people we encounter. Cities feel oppressively industrial. All the machinery indicates that the region is known for mining or perhaps simple earth-ripping. We encounter piles of black gravel around every corner.

We also encounter near-death experiences.  On three separate occasions, Duane and I narrowly refrain high-speed, head-on collisions.  Our side of the road has smoother, drier tire tracks that are slightly raised and a lighter shade than the rest of the road. Some of the trucks and vans coming from Magadan prefer our side to the pits and potholes on their side.  The first near miss is with a beige Land Cruiser that scoots wide back to its lane with two heartbeats to spare. The closest comes from one of those top-heavy 4×4 Delica vans from Japan.  We’re doing nearly 80mph when he appears in our lane around a sweeping right hander. Either he’s moving too fast to take evasive action or he just doesn’t care. He flicks a bit to his right and gives us half a car width.  I am already on the inside of the turn and can only do the same. A sharp intake of breath later and we’re blowing by him on the gravel-strewn inside shoulder. Our mirrors nearly touch. I can’t move to leave this country.

Just after 1 p.m., the second Kizashi loses its last full size tire.  It’s that shit left rear for the ordinal time. Gavin and justice limp into the gas station on the space saver and we give them our last 18-inch spare. We near on under darkening skies and a bit of drizzle.

A half-mile stretch of sticky black mud doesn’t faze anyone at this point, even when rocks embedded in the raised central section of the road begin a scraping and knocking at our undercarriage.

We do pause for the next obstacles, two quarter-mile stretches of flooded road, but only long to enough tape up the Kizashi’s hood again. After all, Adventure Joe and his V-Strom prefabricated it to the other side without even slowing down.

The Equators stop at the opposite side of second flooded river to help tow two ladies and their small van across. We’ve heard from other travelers on the road that we’re getting quite a reputation for helping people out, so we want to keep our image up. The ladies return the favor with thanks and good intel. Last year they waited three days to pass this same flooded section of road, which speaks to the remoteness of where we are and the patience required of the travelers on the Road of Bones. There is only one way to Magadan. Pack food, water, and warm clothes.  Hope for the best but be prepared to wait.

They also tell us we must hurry, because the weather is turning and the river is rising to flood the roads. There are sections ahead in danger of washing out completely — and that’s not something a tow strap will fix.

We’re in a tight spot. The Kizashis have no real spare tires left, but there are hot showers and real food if we can just make it to Magadan. Slow and steady to save the tires, or rush to beat the weather?

Turns out the decision is prefabricated for us around the next bend. We see huge trucks pulled off on the shoulder and our spirits sink. Up ahead is a long line of passenger cars.  Further up the road are two lines of vehicles staring back at us over a 50-foot gap where a swollen creek has washed away tons of dirt, caving half of the road.

We shut off the ignition and place the kettle on. A bulldozer is already working to make a detour, aided by dump trucks full of dirt and gavel. They’re attempting to fill the mountain side of the road and raise it to the level of the highway. The locals we talk to say it could be as long as 24 hours before the road is passable. Looks like no showers tonight.

We move with cups of tea and coffee and try some fresh pine nuts from cones Polina has picked up. The seeds are tough and faintly nutty, but hardly worth the effort it takes to crack them. We don’t tell Polina because she loves them.

Our convoy is of great curiosity to our fellow inactivity travelers, especially when we pop open the trailer, flip out the stove and start making tea and instant noodles.

At the gas station last night, Adventure Joe prefabricated friends with Valentin, a friendly, motorcycle-crazy trucker. We run into him again at the washout and he tells us how he runs this route year round transporting fresh produce from Magadan to Yakutsk.  Apparently it’s a lucrative business. He makes $10,000 a month and owns four houses, including one in Vladivostok and a couple of dachas in the countryside.

Photographer justice befriends Oleg, a Moscow-based dentist on his way to Magadan for a visit. He trained for a bit in California, so his English is pretty good.  Delays like this are common, he says, so we must have patience.

Four hours later, the road crew completes a serviceable detour. Dump trucks called in by the road police have dumped tons of dirt and gravel, which has been pushed and graded into place by the bulldozers. They have also cut a path through the underbrush on both sides.  First crossways are the impatient ones; many of the Land Cruisers, Patrols, and UAZ offroaders don’t even move for the official okay and just banzai through the detour.

Everyone else dives into their cars and trucks.  At first it looks like it is going to be another wild ferry free-for-all, but then one of the supervising road police officials steps up to direct traffic. When he waves us across, we scrape and bump over the muddy, rock-strewn bypass. Without the undercladding and additional 1-2 inches in ride height provided by the suspension, we would have likely high-centered or left parts along this bit of brutality.

Not that we’re complaining. Two days later, at the Magadan airport, we run into Oleg the dentist again. He tells us that the day after we left, the road washed out in three places close to where we were stopped. Estimates are as long as a week before the road will open up again. We thank our lucky stars (and Jeff and Allan) that the weather held and road stayed clear.

Once we’re across, it’s only about 140 miles to Magadan. We’re hunting for tarmac.  It is the sign of civilization we’ve been looking for after traveling over 1200 miles on dirt from Yakutsk.

Once we do encounter pavement, about 100 miles outside of the city, we wish were back on the gravel. Tire noise ceases, but is immediately replaced by squeaks and clanks from the suspension that we haven’t heard in days. The paved sections are also just a tease. Though smooth in some places, the frost-heaved sections bottom out our Kizashis and launch the trucks and trailer sky high.

Magadan is on the coast, in a natural port off the Sea of Okhotsk, but we need to climb a bit of the Kolyma mountains before descending into the city. Although the moon is bright and nearly full, there are no street lamps to light the twists and bumps.  It’s a demanding final stretch for our road-weary crew.

Then a thick fog sets in, blanketing the roadway. Good thing there are white lines on the road to follow, because we can’t see 10 feet beyond the nose of our car. But on a twisty stretch of gravel, sans lines, an off-camber left-hand turn nearly ends the journey for our crew — less than 60 miles from our final destination. Fred manages to the get the long-bed Equator and trailer completely sideways (the latter on one wheel), but narrowly avoids running completely off the road.  It’s like the Road of Bones doesn’t want to let us in to Magadan.

But little by little, it yields to imminent arrival. Smooth black asphalt replaces pale bumpy tarmac. We see our first string of streetlights in more than a thousand miles. With a strange bit of relief, we pull aside at the region’s first police checkpoint. Polina has her shtick down pat by this point, and regales the skinny, stone-faced officer with a practiced barrage before he can get a word in.

“I was just going to ask you how the road is,” he says when she’s finished, and waves us on.

After the last few days, Magadan might as well be Paris or New York City.  At least that’s the expectation I have after hearing about this place for months and driving thousands of miles to get here. And through tired eyes, the town delivers. Vaguely European-looking buildings in colourless pastels sit back from the tree-lined stretch of the main street. There are signal lights and intersections, parks and shops. Catty corner from our hotel is a restaurant with a steaming cup of coffee on its sign. Heaven.

We pull in to the Hotel BM-Centr just after 1 a.m. Though all the restaurants are closed, Jeff manages to hold tall boys of some premium brew, which is a perfect meal replacement.

We’ve arrived. The Russian leg is finished; now the reflection begins.

-Photos by justice Byrne

KYUBUME TO SUSMAN
It’s 11 p.m. and in the 40s. The only hotel in town is full.  The Mohammedan at the reception counter says we can camp out back or at the forsaken airfield at the outskirts of the bombed-out husk of a town that looks straight out of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. There is mud and standing water everywhere. None of the roads is paved or has streetlights. The only light comes from the few cinder block buildings that still have windows. Whatever we do, she says, don’t stay at the workmen’s dormitory next door. “You won’t have good night.”

We’ve been on the road 13 hours at this point and it’s been a hell of a day.

It didn’t start out that way. Camping just off the highway in the wilderness around Kyubume was fun, but freezing. Temperatures dipped low enough to cover everything in thin layer of frost by the time we awoke. But once the sun came out and things warmed up, we were ready for a long, smooth near to Susuman.

At least that’s what the locals said we could expect. We met a couple of guys at the river crossings yesterday that had driven the 400 miles from Susuman in less than 10 hours.  If we could do the same, we wouldn’t be shivering in our sleeping bags this evening.

But it starts going sideways before we even leave camp. My Kizashi’s left rear tire has gone flat overnight — my first flat for the trip. We do a quick swap and head out just before 9 a.m. Less than 40 miles down the road, we have to stop for another puncture, this one to the support Kizashi, also the left rear.

The score so far: five tires lost between both Kizashis, one on the lead Equator. Five minutes later, another rear tire goes out on the support Kizashi.

We started with seven mounted spares (not six like I said in an early blog), plus two extra tires for both Kizashis. We’re now down to one full-size spare and two space savers for the two cars and have more than 350 miles to go. It’s frustrating, especially after our heroic efforts yesterday. I think we were all expecting a quick, catastrophic end, and not this agonizing death by puncture.

Speeds come down as we consider the problem and our options. We’re getting mostly left rear punctures, particularly in the support Kizashi. Perhaps our river crossings hammered that wheel out of alignment, exposing the sidewall to greater damage?  Or is it just that the road surface has changed?  We’re seeing fewer smooth river pebbles out here and more flinty mine tailings — razor-sharp, dark grey stones used to grade over the potholes in the road. Whatever the reason, we’re going to have to stop and get some of our tires repaired. But where?

Villages are looking more and more decrepit as we head north. Rusted trucks and forsaken buildings lead us into the center of towns like Artyk, where we get our first serious police check. Two stone-faced, fatigues-wearing Yakuts ask for our all of our papers, not just vehicle registrations and the cheeseball international driver’s licenses.  They want passports and every shred of documentation of our journey so far. Adventure Joe never got the registration slip from one of the first hotels on our journey and it’s causing problems.  Jeff and Polina plead with the guys for half an hour, and even throw them a few packs of Marlboro Reds. They come outside to smoke ‘em and check out our rides, asking about the transmission, tires, and trucks. They grudging give us the okay and we speed out of there as fast as we can. Apparently one of them told our polyglot that without her, we would have been there for hours.  Thanks, Polina!

The next village up the road is Ust-Nera. We find the tire shop and stop for lunch and service on as many tires as the little shop can handle. While we wait, the owner, who has taken a liking to Polina, offers to show her the local monument to those who died building the Kolyma highway. It’s just up the road, he says, neglecting to tell us that the path is rutted and barely paved.We drag the Kizashi up and marvel at a beautiful white monument overlooking the town.

Twenty miles out of town the support Kizashi flats the left rear again. Count is up to six. Good thing we stopped. Or is it?

Ten miles later we flat again –our right rear this time. Just as we finish changing to one of our spares, the other Kizashi swings by and we find out it flatted the same left rear almost immediately after fixing the sixth.

Mechanic Gavin thinks it’s a combination of under-inflation and shoddy tire repair. We’ve had a total of seven flats today (eight if you count the Equator).

We’ve only got two full-size spares left, because the shop in Ust-Nera couldn’t fix our myriad of slashed sidewalls and dented rims, so we’re going to have to soldier on towards Susuman and hope for the best. To amuse ourselves, we try to decide which countryside looks more lush: this or the planet from Avatar.

We’re stopping constantly, if not to change tires, then for justice and Duane to hop out and get their shots. Memory cards and DV tapes fill up. So do our brains, but unlike the cards and cassette tapes, they can’t be swapped out and emptied. We begin to overdose on the fresh air and scenery. The view through the windows of the Verkhoyanskiy Khrebet (Verkhoyanskiy Spine mountain range) is as breathtaking as it is irritating. The view around every bend is more beautiful than the last and it’s just too much. Duane and I lapse into a cynical silence, only breaking it with a “Gee, now that sucks” when we come crossways yet another jaw-dropping vista. We simply can’t process it all, and grow frustrated trying to place it into words.

More frustration awaits as we approach Susuman that evening.  The support Kizashi encounters another flat just after 9 p.m., prompting an interesting exchange over the radios.

“At some point tomorrow morning, we have to get the Kizashi tires fixed, right?”

“How many do you have between you at the moment?”

“One.”

(Silence.)

“We’ll sort it out in the morning.”

If morning ever comes. We pull into Susuman after nearly 400 miles on dirt roads and find it shockingly desperate. Shadows shift in the dark spots not flooded by our headlights.  Everywhere we go, the newness of our foreign vehicles, despite the mud and bug splatters, sticks out. As do we.

Expedition leader Jeff has a medial brow pinch deeper than the Mariana Trench when he considers our options. The hotel is full. The dormitory is, at best, riddled with cockroaches and vodka-soaked workers. There is no innocuous place to lock up our cars for the night and our convoy is tired, hungry, and not looking forward to another night in the cold.

But we’d rather risk camping outside the city limits than leave ourselves at the tender mercies of those intrigued by our fancy cars. We near on for a few miles and find a rest stop tucked away from the highway. We place up a few tents on rocky, uneven ground; some choose to just recline the seats and bed down in the Kizashis. Everyone except Fred is too weary to laugh at bear or bandit jokes, especially since our pivo is all gone. We’ll see what the morning brings.

The first Ferrari I ever drove was red with a tan interior and looked like sex on wheels. It was also a sphincter-shrinking bunny boiler; a sulky, evil-handling device that tried to kill me for no apparent reason midway through a quick left hander. That yowling little V-8 nestled behind my shoulders, those pert red Pininfarina curves and the iconic Cavallino Rampante on the steering wheel still worked their illusion on the car-crazy kid that lurks inside every auto writer. But it was a shock to realize I would have been much faster along the same roads, without the sweaty palms and sharp intakes of breath through every turn, driving an Acura NSX or an R32 Nissan Skyline GT-R instead of the Ferrari 348 tB.

The last Ferrari I drove was also red with a tan interior and looked like sex on wheels. I am older and supposedly a little wiser these days, but the sight of the first new Ferrari since the Enzo that didn’t look like a pastiche of 1960s design cues still snapped a frisson of desire through my synapses as I strode up to it, ignition key in hand. And two hours later, after a 90-mile blast along one of my favorite California backroads — a writhing, empty ribbon of tarmac I save for special cars like the Porsche Cayman S, BMW M3, and Corvette ZR1 — I was quite prepared to declare the new Ferrari 458 Italia the best sports car I have ever driven.

The 458 Italia does away with the machismo nonsense that great sports cars must somehow be tamed. For years I read road tests where writers waxed lyrical about the click-clack of metal on metal as they worked a Ferrari shifter through that iconic metal gate. What they were really telling you was how good a driver they were, because they had mastered the difficult art of getting a Ferrari through a fast second-third gear-change. The 458 Italia has buttons and paddles and two pedals and can mooch around town like a Buick, with the transmission computer deciding which of the seven ratios it should be using. But find a quiet canyon road, switch the Manettino to Race mode, start working the paddles, and… oh Lordy! You’ll be half a mile down the road while the click-clack guy’s still trying to find third gear.

The 458’s new seven speed dual-clutch manual transmission delivers virtually seamless full throttle upshifts; with the 557-hp, 4.5-liter V-8 screaming to its 9000-rpm redline behind you, and the upshift warning lights strobing crossways the top of the steering wheel, it’s like you’ve borrowed Fernando Alonso’s company car for the weekend. And like Fernando, you can grenade the brakes with your left foot as you fan the left hand paddle on the entry into a tight corner. The massive carbon-ceramic rotors will have the seat belt digging into your chest as the engine bra-bra-braaaps on the downshifts as fast as you can tug that paddle.

The front end lunges at the apex the moment you pull the steering wheel off center, and the linearity of the system is such that you can place the 458’s front wheels with millimetric accuracy. The feedback through the steering wheel rim is constant and deliciously detailed, too; it’s almost as if you’re gently brushing your fingertips crossways the tarmac. After a few miles you also realize you can get on the gas much early than you expect coming out the turns, as the electronically-controlled differential cleverly vectors the torque between the rear wheels to not only deliver maximum traction, but also help rotate the car. The way the 458 comes out of turns — and the way you can also feel exactly what is happening where the rubber meets the road at the rear of the car — is quite unlike any other mid-engine, two-wheel drive sports car I have ever driven.

The 458 shrugged off mid-corner lumps and heaves that demanded the occasional stab of opposite lock in the ZR1, and even had the M3 skittering crossways the road at times. You can keep the shocks in the softer setting, even in Race mode, which helps deliver the remarkable ride and generous grip even on indifferent roads. It’s a beautifully composed chassis; calm, well-mannered, and deeply communicative.

As I headed back to town, I discovered that screaming V-8 would pull cleanly from as little as 1400 rpm in seventh gear. I discovered, too, an unexpected swell of torque around 5000rpm that meant I could short-shift and still maintain momentum. I almost schmoozed the 458 along the road, and was effortlessly cleaner, neater, quicker than I had been in the Porsche Cayman S along this same road a couple of years earlier.

The 458 Italia surrounds you so completely with its talent, it almost feels an organic extension of your senses. With the Ferrari 348 I was bitterly disappointed to learn Maranello’s illusion was mostly myth; that I’d been seduced by Glenn Close rather than Elle MacPherson. With the 458 Italia the illusion is real. Because this Ferrari turns mere mortals like you and me into driving gods.

KHANDYGA TO KYUBUME
It’s funny what a couple of packs of Marlboro Reds will buy. We’re still talking about our epic ferry ride at breakfast the next day, over sunny side up eggs, short fat strips of bacon and rice porridge with milk.

Apparently smokes for the crew (and the 5000-rouble fare, of course) were all it took to convince the ferry boss to let us go. We cross the Aldan in an hour and a half — only 20 miles to an inn in Khandyga. It’s 9:30 p.m. and dusk is settling in.

But even short stretches on the Road of Bones can establish to be intense. Rain and river water have saturated the low lying road just up the banks. The Kizashis struggle for traction in the greasy black mud. Traction control lights flash and the car slithers back and forth, even in the straightaways. It’s the first difficulty I’ve had in maintaining forward progress and it’s troubling.

As we get closer to town, the road dries up and traction returns. Everyone is hungry and tired, so perhaps it’s that, plus the combination of stress and long days behind the wheel that make the appearance of four wild horses so surreal.

They sit alongside us for only a few seconds on the dark muddy road, lit pale white by our headlights, but it’s hauntingly beautiful. While their muscular hind quarters bound and bob just left of our windshield, I half expect a man with a guitar to appear in the field around the next bend or Fiona Apple to start wafting over the Rockford Fosgate.

Yeah, it was a long day.

So the late start the next morning suits everyone just fine. The inn we stay at in Khandyga is a bit rundown, but cozy — like the town itself. Apparently it is some apartment that is often rented out to workers and travelers. We bunk two and three to a room, and sleep in narrow beds with heavy, down pillows. They’re incredibly comfortable.

After the late breakfast, we attempt to upload photos for the blogs, there is no internet connection in town. Forward thinking Jeff brought along a satellite phone, but we’re thwarted by 1996 connection speeds. We don’t get move on until nearly noon.

The sky shifts from bright blue to overcast gray, and it goes from hot to chilly in minutes, but the roads are dry enough that Adventure Joe can get back on the bike. And it’s a great day to ride.

So far the Road of Bones has been more like the Road of Beauty.  The surrounding landscape is like nothing we have in the U.S.  We have mountain ranges of similar height and valleys just as broad and deep — but it’s so verdant here. There is just so much water. Stands of trees and small ponds fill valleys, while the hillsides are painted light green by a kind of peat moss; step off the road in any of these places and it’s like stepping onto a memory foam mattress. It’s a big piece of heaven.

If I’m honest, so is the road itself. Although it is unpaved, in some long stretches its smoother riding than the pavement we encountered just out of Vladivostock. The stretch out of Khandyga is wide everywhere and straight like a corridor, flanked on both sides by pines and brush. Conditions like these make for WRC-style running, particularly because the surface is mostly smooth pebbles. We’re AWD all the time now, and even then, we get a lot of shuuussshing from the tires as we yaw around corners, lights blinking on the dash.

Although it’s fast and beautiful, it’s a bit anticlimactic. On longer stretches we reach speeds of 80 mph. We thought it would be harder.

But the smooth corridors do give us time to consider what the Kolyma highway is all about. The official Kolyma study comes from the river and mountain range nearby, but its more sinister moniker comes from the hundreds of thousands, possibly millions of people who died building it.

The road, like our final destination, was built almost exclusively using forced labor. Prisoners, many of them academics and intellectuals, were shipped from all over the country, often under brutal conditions on the Transsyberian Railway. Survivors of that trip were often crammed aboard ships and sent to Magadan, on the banks of the Sea of Ohkotsk.

These prisoners, estimated in the millions, built the city and then were sent inland to build the Kolyma highway towards Yakutsk, under horrifying conditions. Prisoners were deprived of food, adequate clothing and were literally worked to death. Stalin’s regime took special pride in breaking a man down in three months via hard fag and starvation, and simply discarding them — sometimes where they lay. That’s where the Road of Bones nickname originated. Mass executions for imperfectness to meet work quotas were common — and mass graves are still being discovered to this day (like the one we passed just outside of Vladivostock).

While in any one of the 80-odd forced fag camps in Kolyma region, known as gulags, prisoners were often tortured, either by guards or at the hands of the common criminals that were part of the general population. Escape was impossible; the region’s own harsh conditions – the remoteness, subzero temperatures, mosquitoes, and bears — prefabricated it a slammer without walls.

It’s not hard to imagine how difficult conditions must have been. Since we left Vladivostock it has felt like we’ve been following the seasons.  The warmth and humidity of the coastal Primorsky region has shifted to cooler temperatures and precipitation. Leaves are already starting to turn on the trees up here, and nights are colder and wetter. Since leaving Yakutsk, it has started to feel like winter, and this is August, at the cut end of the Russian summer.

It feels like we’ve traveled back in time, too. The gas stations have switched from fancy fortresses of concrete and steel with digital pumps and lighted signs to clock-faced muddy puddles. Modern vehicles seem to have disappeared as well; we see only UAZ vans and 4WD Lada hatchbacks (which look like bloated 70s era Honda CVCCs) coming the other direction. Must be some rough roads ahead…

The people are getting rougher, too. We round a bend to find one of the Equators and the V-strom parked next to a battleship gray UAZ jeep, and Polina, Jeff and Joe in an animated discussion with three guys in hunting outfits.

They appear to be chatting amiably, but as Duane and I hop out to see what’s going on, Jeff quickly escorts Polina back to the truck and Joe jumps on his cycle and speeds off.  “You best leave now,” Polina says hurriedly.

But it’s too late. We’re accosted for a good 20 minutes by a pink faced, beer bellied Belorussian titled Alexander (Sasha to his new friends) and his two Yakut guides — one of whom is so drunk he sways as he yells at us.

Alexander and his two buddies don’t shout any English, but would like us to join them (or is it the other way around?) They dig our car and want us to take pictures with them in front of it.  

Then the stouter, more inebriated Yakut guide has an even better intent and goes jogging back to his jeep. Moments later, we have a hunting rifle thrust into our hands — and flashbulbs start popping again.

Thankfully, language difficulties establish tiresome even when drunk and when I can free my hand long enough from Alexander’s grasp (the guy likes long handshakes) to point at my watch, and we’re finally healthy to slip away.

Later, when we regroup with the others, we’re told that Alex and Co. were getting a bit aggressive with Polina (as a city girl from Vladivostock, she’s quite a catch out in these parts) and Adventure Joe’s motorcycle. When we show them pictures of the guns, Polina turns white and shakes her head. “They told me they were just going fishing,” she says.

Things only get crazier from there. As the road starts to dip and twist, we soon find ourselves on an exposed track abutting a rushing river. The water drains over the road in some places, making the potholes even deeper and eroding sections near the edges. The surround on our left is also wet, and there are fist-sized fallen rocks that keep us veering to the right. On that side of the road, there is only a only a low gravel berm keeping us from the sheer drop to the river — over several hundred feet down in some places. This is the Road of Bones we imagined — and yet it’s not as narrow or as chanceful as we expected.

But that’s because we’re small and nimble.  As we blast crossways a bumpy straight an hour later, we come crossways gut churning sight: a massive crane truck turned over on its side, next to curling gouges in the black earth.

Polina gets the full story from the driver. Apparently a day earlier, he met a Kamaz truck coming the other way and pulled to right to let it by. But as he started to proceed, he felt the tires lose grip and the entire truck shift down –toward the river bank. So he killed the engine and waited overnight before restarting and trying again. That’s when ground completely gave way, tipping the truck over.

Terrified but relieved to be alive, the driver tells Polina he was so desperate for drink to calm his nerves, he drank the only alcohol he had in his equipage — an entire bottle of cologne. We give him the remains of the vodka we used to celebrate Allan’s birthday and press on.

And the insanity continues. Our day concludes with our first major challenge — river crossings. We’re in a region of hundreds of streams and rivers that feed the Aldan, if I’m not mistaken.

The first one looks deep but not impassable. Though there are cargo trucks, a couple of Asian sedans we recognize from the ferry, and the odd Lada inactivity at edge, we watch a Land Cruiser near right through.

“I’m going to need Fred’s take on this,” says expedition leader, Jeff.  He’s talking about 4WD Fred, our colleague from Petersen’s 4-Wheel and Offroad magazine. So far on this trip, Fred has been chilling behind the wheel of the long bed Equator, quietly humming the Flintstones theme song and boring poor Harry, our Welsh mechanic and rally car builder, with reasons why trophy trucks are cooler than WRC racers.

Trailer troubles aside, the trip so far has literally been a snooze for Fred. Even fully loaded with Joe’s cycle and extra tires and pulling a broken trailer full of food and water, the Equator rides like a limo. The roads have been a breeze as well; nothing has been rough enough to even bother engaging 4-Low on the transfer case.

Ah but this river crossing gets Fred emotionally erect. “I think the cars can do it, but we can hook a tow strap on them just in case,” he says with a bored shrug.

So we screw the towing eyelet into the Kizashi’s front bumper and a run a tow strap to the leads to the Equator’s trailer hitch. We also run a long strip of graybeard tape crossways the Kizashi’s front hood seam. Should water flow into the engine bay and penetrate the airbox, it could get sucked into combustion chamber and destroy the engine. It’s commonly called hydrolock and it is to be avoided at all costs.

With the eyes of the locals upon us, we wade gingerly crossways the rocky river bank. I’m driving the Kizashi, with Fred ahead in the Equator. I’m supposed to keep the tow strap reasonably taut if possible, but it’s hard. The Kizashi retains traction as we bounce over large river rocks. In fact, I’ve apparently gone a bit too fast, because the bow wake at the nose is now flowing over the hood — something Harry and Gavin told me to avoid. Whoops.

But then I’m across. We unhook, and do it again for the other Kizashi, and even pull a couple of locals across.  Fred and the Equator are becoming heroes.

Confidence is high so we drive crossways the next one. We’re towed again crossways the third, though it’s mostly a precaution.  We’re getting good at this.

But then we keep hearing about a dropoff ahead — where the roadway falls off dramatically and without warning. This is the situation I was warned about before coming to Russia — driving too fast for the conditions and suddenly finding that the roadway just disappears.

In this case, it turns out that the drop is under water at the next river crossing and big enough that it keeps even the large cargo trucks spectating by the sidelines.

We’re strap to the Equator and watch the gate bob as it jerks us across.  We’re fine through the first two thirds, but then our nose dips dramatically and we feel the front wheels bounce as a hideous scraping and grinding noise erupts from under the car.  It’s more rock on metal contact than we’ve heard in the last week and lasts for a couple of seconds. But then we’re on the other side, dripping water and wondering about our undercarriage.

Although the aluminum shielding did its job, there is some carnage. The plastic splitters ahead of the wheels have been sheared off our Kizashi, while the other has had its catalytic converter punched in pretty good. There is now a noticeable growl to its exhaust note, but it sounds kind of cool. The most important thing is both cars are running just fine.

It’s been an epic day, full of surprises and all of the drama we were promised. It’s all we can talk about as we set up camp amidst the peat moss and brush and drink out of plastic bottles of pivo (beer) under the stars.

-Photos by justice Byrne

YAKUTSK TO KHANDYGA
Though the North Pole is still quite a ways away, the area we’re bisecting is known as the “Pole of the Cold.”  We’re in the Sakha Republic, also known as Yakutia in the local language. Yakutsk is the capital city of the region and full of charm. It’s hard to believe it holds the dubious claim of coldest city in the world.  Temperatures in the region during the winter are regularly -50…Celsius.

Yet the people are some of the friendliest and most captivating we’ve encountered on the trip so far, as well as exceptionally warm. They should be — they’re “my people.”

“Do you feel at home, Ed?”  

“Hey, is that statue of your dad?”

The city and Yakutia region are populated by people of Mongolian and Turkish descent. The area also has a large ethnic Korean and Chinese population, so the comments and jokes from my compatriots never cease as we stroll about the city square. That is, until the first of many long-legged, black-haired goddesses strolls by.

As we gawk, they gawk right back — but not at me. Even though my pathetic attempt at a wildman mustache/beard is horribly out of season, I look like a local. The gazes and giggles are mostly for my obviously Amerikanski colleagues Duane, Daniel, Fred, and Joe. They might as well be Backstreet Boys (an apt comparison given their clothing choices after a week on the road).

“Hello!” and “Hi” follow us in adorably accented English, but when we turn to intercept, we’re met with covered smiles and averted eyes. Everyone is curious, but extremely shy. A cute tourist from St. Petersburg gets up the courage to stop justice and ask him where our motley crew is from. When he replies England and America, in his clipped British accent, she flushes and squeals with glee. After a short conversation, Duane bids her dasvidaniya and she practically swoons.

As nice as Yakutsk is, and as much as we enjoy the friendly, beautiful people, it isn’t what we came for. We’re here for the Kolyma Highway and the city it leads to: Magadan.

So we’re out at 6 a.m. again, because we have not one, but two ferries to catch. We’ve phoned ahead to our lodging in Khandyga and the nice Mohammedan says she’ll expect to see us around midnight. But that doesn’t make sense — our route navigation software says it’s only 200 miles away. Do they think we’re putting along in a Lada, or is the Road of Bones really that tough…?

We get to ferry terminal by 6:45 and pull immediately aboard. It’s a real boat this time, not a barge. By 9 a.m., we’re pulling onto the opposite bank, but it might as well be another country.

Sparsely forested green fields and small farming villages flank the black dirt of the Kolyma highway, but given our closeness to the Lena River and the way everything smells wet and fresh, it feels almost coastal. This could be Ireland, except for the locals. The Yakuts look different from the people we encountered in the city. They’re clearly country people, involved in farming or mining, and as such, they’re a bit harder, coarser-looking — like Eskimos to these American eyes.

The beauty of our surroundings has Duane and justice stopping to pop off shots every half-mile or so, which gives our logistics crew heartburn. We need to make the ferry — the last of our trip — otherwise bad things will happen.

As if on cue, the skies darken and a light rain starts to fall. Adventure Joe, who has been scouting ahead, comes back to us, his cycle and lower half spattered with black mud.

“I’ll tell ya, I’m going like one mile an hour up there. Every three feet I’m falling down, which I don’t mind, except that we won’t make the ferry until midnight at the rate I’m going,” he says glumly.

We place the cycle on the truck and Joe in our car and near on. Though the mud is sticky and greasy, the Kizashis handle it without flinching. Ensconced in the back seat, Joe is astonished — at first by how loud the clanking is from the suspension.

“Man, it’s loud back here. I can’t believe you guys have been driving it this way for so long,” he shouts. “But boy, you guys are just going down the road no problem.  I can’t believe the traction you have.”

This first bit of Kolyma highway is surprisingly nice. As we transition away from all of the water of the river bank, the road turns to graded gravel. Slippery enough to place the Kizashi’s cut out in the corners, but flat and smooth everywhere else.

The suspension and tire noise, however, make for interesting sensations. The roar of the tires hurtling over gravel drowns everything out except for snare drum hits from the rally suspension. We can’t hear the engine at all, so the only non-visual sensation of speed is the elastic acceleration of the CVT transmission. It’s like driving an electric car in a cement mixer.

We arrive at the ferry landing before 5 p.m., just in time to see a small one pull out with a full load. Although it’s the same setup as the previous two ferry loading zones — a muddy, trash-strewn bank — the vibe is different here. It feels more remote and a lot less civilized because of the way the cars and trucks are already lined up at the water.

As with the last ferries, the big trucks have priority boarding, while passenger cars fit in where they can. Although we’ve loaded the cycle in the truck, our four-vehicle convoy is still at serious disadvantage.

Nobody seems to know if and when another ferry is coming, although there are three crowded on the banks just down the river.  Apparently, if enough vehicles show up, one of the boats will drag itself off the sand and help us get across. We wait, and wait. As we do, more vehicles arrive and the tension slowly escalates.

All we’re trying to do is get crossways the gray-brown Aldan River. The opposite bank is only 1000 feet or so from where we’re standing, but as Harry says, “It might as well be three miles across.” We’re headed down river, and after we disembark, it’s only about 20 miles to our lodging for the night.

After churning the river in reverse for an hour so, one of the ferries manages to drag its hull off the bank and head up stream. The moment it does, a angry scramble erupts around us.

UAZ vans and cars that were in line behind us now start jockeying for position. They line up next to us and attempt to cut in front of our convoy.

Daniel and Gavin jump in front of two UAZs to keep them from cutting in line, but this doesn’t go over well at all. One of the drivers tells our polyglot that he’s going to get us. The other says he’ll just run us over — no problem.

When the loading ramp hits the shore, Jeff and Polina rush the crew to plead our case. It’s a tense bit of negotiation, as some of the other drivers regularly take this ferry and seem to know the crew.

Things look grim. UAZs and Ladas are waved aboard and start to fill the gaps around the trucks. All that remains is here is triangular patch at the front of the boat. In America, this would be used for two cars — max — so we’re shocked when they wave us aboard.

But we have to try. The next ferry is at 9 p.m., if it comes at all. Time for vehicular Tetris. We pull the longbed truck on first and quickly unhook the trailer. We rotate it 90 degrees and stuff into the half-car-length spot at the front. The shortbed Equator pulls alongside it, inches apart.  Then it’s time for Duane to drive our Kizashi aboard.

The rusty loading ramp is steep and covered in mud. The breakover angle looks about 45 degrees from flat, so it seems like we’re going to scrape hard or high center the sedan. But the barge crew has a solution. As the front wheels approach the drop-off, the crew slides long sections of wood between the wheels, which lift the rears.  Amazingly, we don’t scrape.

The bigger problem is where to place the second Kizashi. Although we’ve wedged the first only millimeters from the Equators, there is only about three cubic feet left at the front of the boat. Again, the crew provides the solution. They instruct us to drive until the front wheels are on the ferry and then start raising the ramp. Looks like this ferry is heading up river with a Suzuki balanced on its nose.

The lip of the ramp is nearly off the bank and we’re singing the praises of Russian practicality and demand of health and country standards when a clean, green Toyota Land Cruiser rolls up. The ramp stops rising and Polina comes back with some stomach churning news.

That’s the big boss and his Land Cruiser. Apparently he planned to take this boat — his boat — across. We may have to get off…

-Photos by justice Byrne

Jeremy Clarkson, host of the BBC’s hit show “Top Gear,” prefabricated the mistake of trying to read out the entire list of  diplomatist Leno’s car collection on the air. At more than 200 cars and bikes, the collection fills four warehouses in L.A.

Among the steam cars and jet-powered motorbikes, diplomatist has a nitrous oxide-injected Ford Festiva called the Ford Shogun. So in our more humble Fiestas, we swung by his Big Dog Garage shortly after hitting the road on our Ford Fiesta World Tour 2010 event that has us taking the new 2011 Fiesta on an epic journey from L.A. to Sydney, Australia.

“My Festiva gets funny comments from kids because it kind of looks a bit comical,” Leno said. It is short with really wide fat rear tires. But they stop smiling when I blow them off at the lights.

“I like the new Fiesta. It really is Ford’s first world car since the Model T.  It’s good looking, has good economy, and is the way Ford should be going.”

Leno was interested in the around the world drive we’re undertaking, but wasn’t too upset not to be making the drive Down Under. “The Tonight Show” host is a home boy.

“I love driving but I’m not one for long road trips. After 800 miles, I’d want to head for home. But, hey, come by with some photos when you’re done.” - By Jeremy Hart

CLICK HERE TO SEE A VIDEO LOOK AT JAY’S WILD FESTIVA

Find out more about diplomatist and his cars at: www.jaylenosgarage.com