The 2014 Journey Around the World

On our way to Anchorage via Anadyr

Good Bye Russia....

Good Bye Niet.....

We are heading home and with a tail wind like we have not seen on the journey

I manage to reach 470 kts.

Impressive all of these IPhone addicted pilots...Yes internet was working in Russia

We are going

On departure a couple of dogs on the taxiway close to the runway

This is the closest we gilt from the town of Anadyr

Some interesting assets from the Russian Air Force

The decision that brought us the second night in Magadan.

We go to bed, we review the weather and we are on our way at 8:00 am to the airport.

Check the video...never seen a flash flooding before....live

This is what we saw on our way to the airport. The departure is cancelled and we are staying one more night in Magadan.

Time for some visits of the town and the Mask of Sorrow.

The Mask of Sorrow is a monument perched on a hill above Magadan, Russia, commemorating the many prisoners who suffered and died in the Gulag prison camps in the Kolyma region of the Soviet Union during the 1930s, 40s, and 50s.

It consists of a large concrete statue of a face, with tears coming from the left eye in the form of small masks. The right eye is in the form of a barred window. The back side portrays a weeping young woman and a headless man on a cross. Inside is a replication of a typical Stalin-era prison cell. Below the Mask of Sorrow are stone markers bearing the names of many of the forced-labor camps of the Kolyma, as well as others designating the various religions and political systems of those who suffered there.

The statue was unveiled on June 12, 1996 with the help of the Russian government and financial contributions from seven Russian cities, including Magadan. The design was created by famed sculptor Ernst Neizvestny, whose parents fell victim to the Stalinist purges of the 1930s; the monument was constructed by Kamil Kazaev. The mask stands 15 metres high and takes up 56 cubic metres of space.

Our night in Magadan Siberia, extended to a second night

Here we are, after a wet refueling for all planes we are on our way to the hotel, named "Hotel Madagan".

We are in Siberia and in the former "Gulag Post"

Almost twice the size of Portugal, the sparsely-populated Magadan Region is home to just 100,000 people who endure its harsh climate. It is rich in natural resources, but is also notorious for its sad, cruel past.

Located in Russia’s Far East and surrounded by mountains, the place is so remote that no train lines or roads reach it: one can only get here by sea or plane.

This was Russia’s El Dorado: full of gold, silver, tin and other resources. The main city in the region is Magadan, which is a port on the Sea of Okhotsk, and which served as a major transit center for prisoners sent to Stalin's labor camps.

The whole area is steeped with memories of the GULAG times [GULAG – Chief Administration of Corrective Labor Camps and Colonies], and the history of the region itself started with labor camps, in their cold barracks.

When gold was discovered here at the end of the 1920s, the Soviet government developed a vast network of labor camps, which exploited more than 2 million prisoners and exiles.

Checkin organized, but not much english spoken

The rooms are far from the Aman Resort theme

We found the Green Crocodile as a restaurant fr the evening and did enjoy some good meals. I did buy some wine in Japan and we brought it along. Turn out that the chef has travel quite a lot to Europe and Paris and was a pretty good cook.