It takes two vans to get everything to the airport. The helicopter is a flying gas tank, carrying nine people and packed with everything for the camp for the first ten days. The pilot is worried that we are overloaded so he makes five or six false starts while hovering five feet above the ground. Apparently, if we crash back onto the tarmac, it means there is too much stuff in the helicopter.
The Russians have brought flats of potatoes, oven mitts stuffed with huge nails, cabbages and cucumbers, vodka, wine and cases of canned goods, including something they really like that is a combination of beets and horseradish, wood stoves, flare guns, big cooking pots, and rifles. We fly for …
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