Quite interesting reading on journeys from Vladivostok to Chita route by international travelers.
http://www.amarketplaceofideas.com/top-of-the-world-to-vladivostok.htm "Vlad is kind of an odd place with massive east block buildings stuck all over the surrounding hills. Real real ugly. Nice and green but the east block architecture, pretty much ruins it. Lots of really nice old buildings along the main corridors. Wonder who owns them, as many appear vacant. Some are restored, hope they do it with rest, rather than demolish and east block the rest. Mostly looks like deferred maintenance on a massive scale. ...
There were several different road building technologies going on at the same time. They’ve imported basically Mexican roads, fortunately not Brazilian or Chilean. There are crews out patching potholes. Some of the new tarmac is just the one-inch thick stuff with similar results to Mexico. They were already patching potholes and they’re still putting down new asphalt on the same section. Don’t think this stuff has much of a future. But one place they were doing something different than I had ever seen. ...
Drivers are quite tranquilo in Russia. They stop at stoplights, they stop for crosswalks, there’s virtually no horn bleating, they let you merge and change lanes if necessary, let cars into lines. All of this doesn’t apply to cars clearly marked with the letters T-A-X-I. Skumsuckers are the same the world over. Actually even they aren’t too bad in Russia.
http://www.drivearoundtheworld.net/datwsite/ourblog/post/2008/06/--Vladivostok-to-Chita.aspx"How can a superpower country, who sent a first human to space not have a road which can connect the entire country. How is that possible?"
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/russia/russian-far-east/vladivostok/sightsThe bulk of local strolls, beer-drinking and ice cream-eating is along the Sportivnaya Harbour, where you'll find plenty of food stalls, an amusement park and a statue of a topless woman in the Amursky Gulf (Amursky zaliv) facing a rather trashy small beach. Just north is an Aquarium.