Day 18 St. Petersburg – Helsinki  248 km

The cars turned towards the west, an impressing roar went by as the 93
cars passed me.
Still one border to cross, it already started 30 km before, passports
please said the officer in English....
Crossing a Russian border is like their roulette, you never know when
it's gonna hit you...
It was all over in one hour, very efficient paperwork, they even
checked our bags and we had to open one of our boxes.
It was a former military ammunition box... several infusion bags
rolled over the road and the guy waved us through...
Finland, right from the first meters everything was different and the
roads clean, straight and flat... we didn't mind an occasional traffic
light.
The Hotel Rivoli had a sauna and a pool, it took us 3 minutes to get
into both.... all the Russian dirt came out very nice.
Walking through the shopping area, all these nicely dressed people, we
were like Alice in Wonderland..... back home at last.
 

Day 19 Helsinki-Tallinn-Rostock

The last-but one day, we boarded the ferry, together with a group of
Hell’s Angels.
Good food and enough beers, last detour, the ship went to Rostock
instead of Travermunde.... no problem for a Volvo.
We spent 24 hours on the ferry from Helsinki to Rostock.
 

Day 20 Rostock – Arnhem

One last day driving through Germany, Autobahn straight from Rostock
to (in my case) Arnhem. I floored the pedal and the V70 jumped onto the highway.....  The V70 did over 200 km/hr easily....
and we're back in the Netherlands,

Unfortunately one Amazon didn't make it on its own, the timing gear
broke and had to be placed on the trailer.
We could live with it, everyone was home, safe and sound.
Mission completed..

One last cellphone call to Hugo, " What are your plans for the next
Anniversary? " I asked him.... " well.... I wanted to see how Volvo´s
run through the Sahara " He replied.....
" Give me a call in six years " I said and hung up the phone...
 

Ed van der Zee
PR/ V- 44 Vereniging Nederland

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