Ask Lonely Planet: Russian beauty a big challenge

The Kamchatka Peninsula is stunning but hard to get around. Photo / R Neches

My partner and I wanted to travel to the Kamchatka Peninsula from Vladivostok in Russia but found the cost was very expensive (more than flying to Moscow or New York) even though it's reasonably close. Do you know cheaper options of getting there and what time of year is best?
- Seumas and Aleksandra

Lonely Planet's Asia-Pacific travel editor Shawn Low writes:

While absolutely stunning, Kamchatka is particularly hard to get around. Locals are fond of saying that on Kamchatka, "there are no roads, only directions". And access to the key features (volcano bases, rivers, geysers) is via truck, helicopter or a multi-day hike.

As such, you would need advance planning when you're headed there.

You can get to Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky (the region's hub city) via plane from Vladivostok. There are roughly six weekly flights from Vladivostok to the Petropavlovsk airport in Yelizovo. At the time of our last Russia guidebook research, costs were R12,000 (about $500) one-way. From Petropavlovsk, you can book tours into the other parts of the region.

Another thing to consider is to prebook yourselves on a small tour group (the place is hard for independent travel). Week-long trips hit the $2500 mark and upwards. Pricey, but you do tick off all the highlights. Check out Lost World, Explore Kamchatka, and Kamchatintour.

If you do want to consider independent travel, the easiest trip includes a hike up Mt Avachinskaya to Nalychevo Valley, hopping on an Avacha Bay cruise and bussing on to Esso for rafting. Try asking around for local guides as well. Esso is a good springboard for independent travellers and you could try to look for a guide there.

Reliving Steinbeck's adventure

My wife and I plan a motorcycle trip from Los Angeles to north-eastern United States and possibly return. What route and time frame would you recommend? We are looking at up to nine weeks but four to six is the goal.
- Peter and Erika

Lonely Planet's North American travel editor Robert Reid writes:

Fifty years ago this year, John Steinbeck spent nearly four months on his roundabout trip recapped in Travels with Charley, but you can see a lot in four to six weeks too, particularly if it's one way.

I'd zig-zag, and steer towards the "blue highways". Maybe go up Hwy 1 in California, stop at the National Steinbeck Centre in Salinas to see his trailer Rocinante, then cut east from San Francisco to Tahoe over the Hwy 50 across Nevada and Utah, weaving south to hit the flurry of parks then back up along the continental divide from Santa Fe, through the Rockies to Montana, where Glacier National Park turned 100 recently.

Cross the Missouri River in North Dakota - with a few Lewis and Clark sites north of Bismarck - then wander to Minnesota's thrilling, and lesser-seen north - and get off the bike in the Boundary Waters National Recreation Area. Follow the Mississippi River south from its headwaters in Minnesota - it's a big year, as it's the centennial of Mark Twain's death - you can relive his glory in Hannibal, Missouri - then see Elvis' gaudy home in Memphis and take the "blues highway" (Hwy 61) south into the Mississippi Delta, where you can stop by Morgan Freeman's juke joint in the incomparable blues town of Clarksdale.

Head northeast along an ancient Native American trail, the Natchez Trace, to Nashville and east into the Smoky Mountains, and a Civil War stop or two in Virginia. Stop in Washington, DC, for free museums; New York because it's New York; then go through western Massachusetts en route to Boston. Tired yet?

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