Here is link to the Tokyo Weekender site where is a story about the trip

http://weekenderjapan.com/?p=7154

In the morning we went to see all sorts of weirdos in Harajuku. Tokyo is huge, so most of the time you are just wandering around in wonder. We found ourselves in Roppongi and spent the evening in that part of the city. In the morning I thought I ended up in the morgue, but it came clear that we had found a capsule hotel and decided to stay there. Not a bad choice and a good alternative for the net cafes. After getting up we left to sniff around Akihabara, a world of electronics inside Tokyo. The cash was almost nonexistent and on top of that my bank had closed my Visa, so we were running on empty.

In the evening we got some dimes out of the ATM and headed for the entertainment district of Shinjiku accompanied with a couple of mega strong ciders. As the evening turned into night everyone managed to get lost somewhere. I found Toni in the morning at a net cafe, and we found Ville at the train station in the afternoon. As it was the last night we visited the harbor area, Odaiba island to be exact. It’s a pretty view to the city from there, have to admit. After a little mess-up with the tickets we decided to walk over the Rainbow bridge to the next train station. The plan was to get our stuff and go for the Narita airport as our flight was going to leave early. So, it was going to be always so lovely airport night. The case just was that we didn´t have money to get our luggage out from the storage room. So we needed to search 200 yens somewhere. After 15 minutes of heavy searching we had 250 yens, so 50 extra, not bad at all.

Somehow we managed to miss the last train so we needed to take a taxi from the last station before the airport. As we had no cash left we asked the drivers if Maestro works. There might still be some on it. One of the drivers agreed to take us there, and did, but then we found out that his credit card reader doesn’t work with european cards. He was calling around and took it pretty lightly, he just asked us to give all we had. We gave him an incredible amount, 600 yens, and a packet of coffee we have had with us from the beginning. He was surprisingly pleased and even waved us off. Quite nice ending… We slept fine on the airport and in the morning continued towards Helsinki.

As final words I want to thank everyone for reading and for interest towards the journey. Thank you very much! Big thank also to our sponsor, who helped us to let the production happen. In the future there will be more information concerning the video clips, where it can be found etc.

See you…

About the last few days. In Onsen we were invited to Nankoku on the island of Shikoku. Our host turned out to be a real samurai and he had all kinds of treasures in the closets from katanas to Japanese spears. He was also a fisherman and we had a dinner of sea food. Mostly sashimi and sake. Extremely friendly people once again, we also got to witness the slaughtering and gutting of a big fish. In the morning we were meant to go fishing with a fifteen meter boat, but the weather was too bad and the waves too high. We were sent to the next stop in Kobe.

We got to Kobe quite late because we thought we could save some money not taking the expensive expressway but driving the little roads. This was not a bad idea for there was good scenes on the way, but the roads took an incredible amount of time. In Kobe we got in touch with our new hosts and got there just in time for a barbeque. Things went on in Japanese way, with friendly people and good food, enjoyed with a couple of local Asahi beers.

Since our schedule has been messed up for the past six months we needed to wake up around five o’clock in the morning and leave for Kyoto. We got there at dawn. What a place Kyoto is, the center a of Japanese culture. It would have been nice to hang around for more. We spotted some temples and geishas, a few of them. Because we were on fire and had to hurry, we decided to drive for Mount Fuji on the same night. Afterall, we needed to be in the Nissan HQ and Nipu’s home in Oppama Plant in the morning.

At Fuji we camped on the beach where we could get a nice view to Japans highest mountain. In the morning we woke up at five, enjoyed the view and took a dip in the lake. After that we took Nipu for its last drive, a short trip of a hundred kilometres. Yokohama isn’t the smallest city, I think it’s the second largest in Japan. Still, our navigator, Vasiliev, had no trouble finding the factory. And was there a reception. There was a big crowd, and Finnish flag was waving next to the Japanese one. I’m still a bit puzzled over what has happened. We are going over it now in a Karaoke bar in Yokohama.

Years ago there was this idea going in my head, some time ago it was being done, and now it has come to a conclution. Feels damn good. It has been 28000 kilometres in the wheel, and there has been enough of driving. Those who have drove the car know the tricks and the muscle you need to turn that wheel. I still can’t believe we made it… The trip has given many rich moments and unforgettable memories, dangerous situations, and everything in between. Nipu is home!! It’s bittersweet but all stories need to end. Believe in your dreams and make them happen. Live life to the fullest, without wasting moments. Nothing is impossible. Nipu is home and we’ll continue to Tokio and celebrate the six months. Thank you, over and out!

Maybe there will be some crazy story from Tokio coming up…

We had been invited to a Japanese family in Fukuyama, so we went straight there since the schedule was messed up already. We got there late, at about eleven o’clock. The reception was the best. Finnish flag was waving and we were received like royals. We got straight to the table and got chance to take a shower. We got to taste Japanese food with local wine and beer. Where else than in Japan?

In the morning we woke up on tatami and ate traditional breakfast. We talked about the trip and about world, until we headed towards a nursing school that we had been offered a tour into. Not a bad place to visit, probably better than many museos. As a surprise we had been reserved a night at a traditional Japanese spa, onsen. Exatly what we needed after the long and exhausting journey. The place was awesome, right next to the island of Shikoku. We bathed in hot bath and took a Japanese shower. It is quite different from Finnish shower. You sit on a bench and wash yourself there, between other people who are doing the same. Interesting system. The view whas also great from the eight floor balcony. There was also a sauna. I haven’t felt this clean in six months. After the bath we were invited for a dinner at our Japanese guethouse restaurant, where we had an incredibly big dinner, with sake and beer. The stomach still feels tight after all the food. The food hear really hits the spot. Only Toni has had some trouble with his fish fobia, but he’s been fighting it all right.

In the evening we were planning to sing some karaoke but the place was closed early and we’ve been wandering around in kimonos, wondering about the high-tech bathrooms which we also have in our room. We went to watch a local drum show and chatted with the people. We were invited to some guys sixty year birthday where we made people laugh with some baby clothes. People has been interested about where we are from and when we told about the trip we’ve been treated like some heroes, someone even compared us to gods. Maybe I should move here since I’m getting so much respect. But the people, they are really friendly here. Even now when I am writing this blog some guys came and gave me a beer with some nuts. This is impossible in anywhere but Japan! The country has blowed our minds.. The cars get respect and someone wanted to was them, but when we told about the trip he thought that they shouldn’t be washed, since the dirt tells about the status of the long journey. Nipu keeps hearing that there hasn’t been a car like that in twenty years. Someone wanted to buy it but the car taxation ruined the great buy. The left side traffic here hasn’t been as difficult as we expected, we only had trouble when we were looking for an intersection to a highway from the right side.

Every morning, day and night we find something new and amazing. We were invited to Shikoku island to ride with a boat. Tomorrow the trip goes on and while waiting for that… I want to thank Riitta, Mr. and Mrs.Mori, they know why.

We got to Japan this morning and the day started with the checkup of the cars and paperwork. Nipu got smiles from the harbor workers. They probably haven’t seen the kind of car for twenty years. The custom guys didn’t believe their eyes either. The cars were checked and we moved to certification business. The boat line is one month old so the guys had no clue how to handle these things. We did get some papers faxed to Hiroshima and they should be returning soon. After that we’ll need to get some stamps, return to harbor and it should be ok. Today we spent five hours on this at the harbor.

The people are really friendly and helpful. None of us expected it to be like this. The culture seems really interesting, we will probably enjoy our stay here. Today we circled around the city to see what’s going on. We found a manga cafe where we will spend the night. We got a room here with tv, playstation and internet. Other than this, they have showers, washing machines, magazines, movies, toilets with ass showers, massaging couches, free drinks etc. The whole thing costs about fifteen euros which is cheap for Japan. We are walking around with our mouths open.

Tomorrow we got an early wake up as we need to go stamp hunting. I hope there isn’t going to be any big surprises. And now something about the “America” of the east, Russia. This great and powerful country is behind us now, it offered us great experiences and moments. It shouldn’t be underestimated as a destination for travelling, there is something for everyone, and the culture is pretty close to that of Finland. So, don’t be cautious, go to St.Petersburg, it beats Tallinn hands down. I recommend St.Petersburg, Moscow, Altai, Siberia and Far East. I wouldn’t go to Caucasus again, for certain reasons…

We’ll enjoy new winds, people and culture here. Weather is here great as well, +30 during the days and nights are warm, like it should be. I hope we’ll get those two legends on the road tomorrow.

In Vladivostok we got all the paperwork done on the last minute, in the russian way, and we got on the boat on Tuesday. As a bonus we got a trip to Korea, the boat dropped by Doang Hae before continuing to Sakaiminato. We got to smell the city of Dong Hae in the nice 30 degrees weather. The People were the friendliest so far, even the custom guys were joking and laughing at us. At the kiosk we got some drinks for free and a ride to the town and back. Not a bad return to asia.

The boat has been half full for the trip, but it is a lovely little boat. The rooms are Japanese by their style and so are the showers. We got the cars on the same ride, but the guy driving Nipu in had some trouble with the gears. It isn’t so easy. Ville was trying to drive it once but he couldn’t get the first gear on. That was the last time for him. It’s like with the bike, you won’t learn it without the extra wheels.

In Vladivostok the paperwork was no walk in the park. Without the help of our local friend, Yuri, we probably wouldn’t be here right now. The trip wasn’t the cheapest either, the whole set was about 1800 dollars. But that’s nothing since we got the ride to our destination. The things going on in my head are… can this trip be finished, is it really possible that Nipu will arrive at its destination? Only gods know…

We warmed up the engines on Wednesday night and left towards unknown Siberia. I hoped Siberia isn’t going to teach us. The Amur road wasn’t on the map and we heard from many people that it is in bad shape. The road goes near to Amur river that is on the Russian-Chinese border. There was more bad news as the boat company had cancelled the ferry that we were supposed to take to Japan. Other than that we had three thousand kilometres to Vladivostok. It was looking less than promising.

We did some two hundred kilometres through the awesome scenes of Siberia until it was too dark to drive. We had to camp up and grill the normal meal of cat food fish from the can. The night was bloody cold, in the morning I had to scrape Nipu’s windows. The day was going to be all driving with minimum stops, almost up to the point of soiling the pants. We were able to put almost 700 kilometers behind us on the road that was changing from tarmac to gravel to sand and bumbs. In the evening the same ritual, can food special.

On the next day we did over seven hundred and got close to the city of Khabarovsk. At this point the weather started changing. As Siberian early autumn’s cold air was dropping the first leaves off the trees the Russian far east still lives in the late summer. The temperature is 25 degrees of celcius, the leaves are green and the nights are warm as well as the water. Not bad, had to find the shorts from the furthest corner of Nipu. Time to sweat again.

On the Saturday morning we came to Khabarovsk. It is right next to Amur and something like 25 kilometers from China. I noticed on the way that there are watchmen on the bridges, like in good old Soviet Union. The city looks European, the buildings are like the ones in St.Petersburg and the streets are like Frisco. We went around for a bit. There were some locals hanging around Nipu a couple of times, laughing at the car, it’s bald tires and us. They were pretty interested in the trip, though. When we were leaving some guy came along and started to ask all the normal questions. He called his friend there and they asked if we need a garage. At that point we only needed a filter for the car since it was drinking faster than Toni downed vodka. The guy offered to find us a new part with his car. He speeded us to some car shop and found us the spare part. He insisted to pay for is. We started to feel a bit suspicious.

We were getting ready to leave for the second time but as the guy invited to his cousins place to eat we didn’t dare to say no. We ate delicious borsch with vodka, and some coffee and cookies. After that we dropped the cars at their garage and went to buy beer and snacks. The guys turned out to be real nice and genuine, so we got to have another garage party, a bit different than the first one. Ville found new love in 8% beer. We spent the night at the garage talking and tinkering Nipu. The guys couldn’t believe it made this far. Later we crashed at Igor’s place.

We were planning to leave early in the morning but it took us longer than expected. We had lost Patrol keys during the night and had to broke in through the side window. It went smoothly until I was taking the back bag out and the window fell on the ground and broke. We fixed it with some tape and a plastic bag. We said goodbyes to our new friend Igor and Ivan and left for Vladivostok. The trip took another day and a half and we got to spend some time again with the militia jerks. Not a big hassle though.

So, now we are at Vladivostok. It took us five days to get here from chita. We heard we could take a boat of a different company on Tuesday. There is some trouble ahead as we heard that we need to take the cars through customs. Wonderful, we have been running around custom offices and travel offices and have achieved nothing yet. If we can’t get these things settled we will miss the boat and have to wait for a week. This custom stuff will also cost us another 300 euros. It isn’t always that simple, lets see if we can come through.

We spent the weekend on the jewel of Siberia, lake Baikal. We heard that Putin had went there for a swim a couple of months ago, so we thought we need to do that also. The thing is that the water isn’t as comfortable this time of the year, and neither was the weather. Under the clouded sky we turned our jeep into a diesel-powered sauna and even whipped ourselves with a birch whisk before dipping. Very refreshing. The Baikal area was very nice, we camped in the woods next to the lake, grilled and drank beer.

We were circling the area with the cars when Nipu started leaking oil. I blame myself for this one since people had been telling me to fix the bottom but I had left that for later since it wasn’t leaking much before. But now it did really leak. We fixed it with the help of a gold-teethed villager. In a few moments the bottom was like new and the price was only a few euros.

After packing up we passed by Ulan-Ude towards Chita. It was a 750 kilometers away, and the beginnig of the road was spent looking at the scenery of Siberia. It is emptiness, forest, steppe, rivers and hills. Eighty kilometers from Chita Nipu’s engine died suddenly. At that point it wasn’t funny anymore. The ignition was fucked up again. The same deal again, patrol had to drag Nipu once more. When we got to Chita there was no spare parts anywhere, everyone was saying the same, “Niet nada”. Even finding a place to sleep proved difficult, three of four hostels had bankcrupted and the last one had raised it’s prices. We found a smaller place in a ghetto alley but they didn’t want to take tourists in. At eleven o’clock in the evening we managed to find a hotel that accepted us with an ok price.

In the morning we went out hunting for the part and because of a few setbacks spent all day on this mission. In the evening we took the car to repairmen since we didn’t have the part. The whole shop was wondering about this old machine. After a while they had bought a new ignition coil for a Moskovich, put it in Nipu and voilá, it’s moving again. I hope it keeps like that since we met a local guy who told us about the road we are heading for. It isn’t in the best condition, and he expected Nipu to have troubles there. The road is not even on the maps, so we’ll have to see how it goes. We were told that people driving on that road break five to twelve tires on the way. Sounds lovely. Roads till this far have been in russian way “normalna”.

The motivation is high though, since we were visiting the local Balalaika master drinking moonshine, eating and listening his playing. After that we got to spend the night at a local guy. Today we’ve been getting ready for the task ahead. It will be three thousand kilometers through Siberia, we should be in Vladivostok next Monday and on the boat to Japan on Tuesday. Let’s see what’s on the road and hope we can make it, nights at least in Siberia are below the zero…

There also was some bad news. We couldn’t get the permits to China because of the price and lack of time, so we needed to redo the plan. If you want to drive to China make sure to have small sum of dollars at hand because you can’t get anywhere with less than three thousand, and a week there will cost you at least double. We met a guy who told us he could get us there for almost nothing but it would take him a month to arrange. Chinese license wouldn’t be a problem unlike we thought, you can get it from many places within days after having an easy exam.

We’ve been trying to get over the defeat, got ourselves together and decided to head back to Russia. Everyone wanted to see China but we’ll have to skip it this time. We try to go through Siberia which doesn’t sound like the best idea. We thought about getting the cars on a train but it costs a thousand euros per car plus other expenses so we are driving to Vladivostok and will take a boat to Japan from there. It should be about three thousand kilometers from Chita to Vladivostok. I hope the roads are ok. The road from UB to Russia should be paved, but after that it might be the worst drive so far.

Yesterday we visited the market, where the welcoming committee was showing us the finger right away. The road to the market goes through a street of addicts and holics who are selling stolen goods or just lying on the ground. It smells like booze and shit and you better keep a close eye on your back pockets, it doesn’t take long before they’re emptied. Carry the back bag in front. We heard that some tourists have been stoned for taking pictures in the market. But it’s a market with lots of merchandise and with very cheap prices. It’s all from China, of course, but it looks very much like real stuff. I came close to buying a North Face jacket for 20 euros. The souvenirs can also be bought for half the price they are sold in the city.

In the morning we were invited to see a sheep being slaughtered. It was quite an easy and clean operation. They make a small cut in the belly, stick a hand in and rip off the aortha (?). There was no blood splatter at any time, it was collected to the last drop. I think they eat almost the whole sheep and throw away nothing. Let’s see if we have shashlik tonight.

The weather here is very Mongolian. In the day it’s sunny, followed by rains in the evening and changes to freezing temperatures of the nights.