Day 46, June 12 - Cheboksary - Ilet River

100km - 2856km, hot and sunny 34C, little wind, 0 shots, 0 sauna, 0 Lenin, Camping

Got up at 730h and had breakfast and coffee with Mike's mom. By 900h the thermometer was already at 32C in the sun, so I knew that I was in for a hot one. Packed up my stuff and was heading out of Cheboksary by 945h. Tried to head across the Volga on a ferry boat, but after talking with a local DPC (traffic police) I found out that it only went at 1700h - not very convenient! Headed over the bridge and back into Mari El along the path of two days earlier. Saw that the temperature had reached 34C while at a cafe having (yet another) liter of multi-fruit juice.

Eventually, made it back to the route I took to Yoshkar-Ola, and a few kms later I was back at the Ilet River. Today, there were about 40-50 people splashing in the river, so I thought I would join them! The rivers in Russia are now at a cool, but swimable, temperature. I splashed around and had a beer sitting in the river before heading to the shade and resting for a couple of hours. Got back on the bike and headed toward a shop to buy macaroni and pasta sauce for the night's dinner. Rode another 5km until seeing an access road heading off into the woods. I followed it for about 200m, before coming across a good place to camp for the evening. I was immediately swarmed by horse/deer flies that inundated the tent after I put it up. At one point there were about 50 of those bastards flying around! Made dinner quickly and, using the tent fly, scooped that flies out of the tent so i could zip the tent up and eat my dinner in safety. Had to kill the remaining 10 or so flies though... Tomorrow Kazan!