Meshchera is the part of Russia that writers fall in love with. It is a low, sandy, forested plain south of the Oka, full of lakes, peat bogs and pine woods, and the author Konstantin Paustovsky, who wrote lovingly of it in the 1930s, called it a land of quiet beauty with nothing spectacular about it. Spas-Klepiki is a small town of about six thousand people on the edge of this country, and the starting point for one of the oddest railways in Europe.
The Meshchera narrow-gauge line, which runs from the town into the forest, was built to haul peat and is said to be among the longest of its kind on the continent. Little diesel trains, with a few open carriages, still run along it in summer, carrying passengers through birch and pine, past lakes and clearings. Peat extraction left its mark here, and in 2010 a heatwave set off fires in the dried bogs that sent smoke across Moscow. Today the area is partly protected as the Meshchersky National Park, and the wetlands are an important refuge for birds, beavers and elk.
For riders, the roads are quiet and flat, with the pace set by the sandy soil and the trees. Surfaces are mixed: stretches of fair asphalt, and sections that crack and sink where the ground is wet. Some tracks into the forest are sand that can trap a heavy bike, so keep to the paved roads unless you know the way. Mosquitoes in summer are determined, and autumn is lovely when the birches turn gold, though rain can set in. To the north-west, the road along the Oka leads to Konstantinovo, the village where the poet Sergei Yesenin was born in 1895, and where his family house is now a museum.
Spas-Klepiki has fuel, shops and a few places to eat, but beyond it the villages are small, so top up. Foreign riders should check current conditions before planning travel.