Vitoldas Milius: what about a gift from Georgia?
Yet another unusual travel by the renowned traveller and journalist Vitoldas Milius: having started in Vilnius on October 1, 2012, and accompanied by a representative of the faraway India, he is expecting to cover about 4000 km to Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, in a first generation Zhiguli.
“It is an unusual journey in several aspects. Firstly, only a few would come up with the idea to cover this route in a car, not to mention the car which is nowadays very rarely seen on Lithuanian roads”, says Vitoldas Milius who was the originator of the idea. “And, probably, even more unusual is the fact that my companion in this trip is …an Indian”.
Yogendra Pratap, the chief editor of “Auto Bild India” magazine, has known Vitoldas Milius for several years. They plan their joint expedition “Cape Town (South Africa) – Nord Kapp (Norway)” in 2013, the Georgia trip being something like a little test of cooperation between the team members.
Vitoldas has purchased the car, manufactured in 1974, in Lithuania this year. In his words, “the Zhiguli which is now a historic car nicknamed by the people as “the kopeck” has remained in hands of one owner all these years – thus it was well looked after and had only travelled 90,000 km. Together with the car, I have brought the spare parts that its owner has been accumulating all his life – there were as much of them as could be fitted into a cargo section of Mitsubishi L200 which was not everything…”
It is planed that only one leg of the journey will be accomplished in a car; then Lithuanian-green VAZ 2101 will stay safely in Georgia until February 2014 when Vitoldas Milius will further drive it to Sochi which will host Winter Olympics. From Georgia, each traveller will take a plane to their home countries.
Just like during many earlier travels of Vitoldas Milius, a mobile object tracking system “SeeMee” will be installed in a car allowing to see, in real time, the exact spot the car is in during the whole trip.
In order to enhance the interest in this journey, a contest for internet users is announced again. The participants only have to guess the exact number of km the team will cover to reach Tbilisi. The authors of three most exact guesses will receive surprise prizes – something that Vitoldas brings from Georgia. There is a time limit for submitting your guess, with a deadline on October 3, 12 am (Lithuanian time). Please enter your answer here: http://www.facebook.com/travel2life.lt/app_408328919222092
SUPPLEMENT. FACTS ABOUT THE TRIP:
Vilnius (Lithuania) – Tbilisi (Georgia)
1-4 October 2012
Travel time: 3 days, 2 hours
Route: Lithuania – Poland – Slovakia – Hungary – Romania – Bulgaria – Turkey – Georgia
Travel distance: 4303 km