I was having my breakfast when Natasha, the bubbly and funny receptionist, burst in to tell me that the hotel owner was coming in 15 minutes to drive me to the bicycle repair shop (awesome!).
Drove down to TrialSport and handed off my back wheel with the promise that it would be better by 1900h. We drove back to the hotel, by which time I had arranged a rendez-vous with Kate, my Ulyanovsk Hospitality Club guide, to show me around the city. We met up and walked down to the high banks 70m above Volga river. We then went to the house where Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was born! (Sadly, foreign tourists pay 2.5x more than Russian tourists - Viva la brotherhood!) After that we headed to the musical fountains and the wedding bridge where couples 'eternally lock their love' together. After a quick coffee break I sadly had to say goodbye to Kate, who was headed to her family's dacha.I wandered back to the Volga and had a shashlik lunch with a few Troikas.
I wandered around the city and then, passing an electronics store, went in an bought a small FM/Shortwave radio to sit on my bicycle while riding (It blocks out the sound of my own voice!) and blast out Russian electropop music! Headed back to the hotel and sat out reading on the patio awaiting the arrival of the hotel owner (who said he would go back with and pick up the tire). 
He arrived around 1900h with my fixed tire and, when asked how much the repair was, he said that it was a gift from the hotel to me! Wow! I then headed downstairs to the restaurant and had a large dinner to (partially) pack back the group for their awesome hospitality! Headed to my room and watched FC Barca destroy Man United to win the UEFA cup. (What a goal Messi!)
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