Borzya is a railway and steppe town of some thirty thousand people in the far southeast of Zabaykalsky Krai, close to both the Mongolian and Chinese borders. The country around it is Dauria, a high, dry grassland that stretches across the corner where Russia, Mongolia and China meet, and the town stands on the Borzya River with a long, low skyline of Soviet housing blocks, grain silos and rail yards. It is a working place, and its role has always been about moving things: grain, coal, livestock and the occasional rider with dust on his visor.
For a motorcyclist it is an honest, useful stop. Fuel is easy to find, there are shops and cafes, and a handful of places to sleep. Do not expect polish; do expect a plate of meat, rice and salad, a pot of black tea and a friendly question about where you are headed. Chita is a long way behind, and the Dauria reserve lies further south and east, so use the town to top up, buy water and food for the steppe, and check your bike. Oil and tyres are not always easy to find in smaller villages.
The ride to Borzya crosses an enormous, almost treeless plain. The road is straight for kilometres, with long rolling rises that reveal more of the same, and wind is the dominant feature of the riding. A headwind can eat your fuel and your patience, and a crosswind can push a loaded bike around. Summer days are hot, with high skies and flickering mirages, and storms build quickly in the afternoon. Spring and autumn bring cold, dust and bare brown hills, and the best light is in the early morning and late evening, when the steppe turns amber.
History has left strange marks here. In the chaos after 1917 the baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg operated in Dauria, and local memory still connects him to the area around the nearby railway station. The steppe is also a corridor for migrating birds and herds of Mongolian gazelle, and in some seasons you can spot cranes and raptors from the road. It is a landscape that rewards slow looking, with the horizon always a little farther than it seems.