Forward Russia!

We are in the city of Barnauld in Siberia. It was a long trek across Kazakhstan with a few problems on the way. The red panda lost its exhaust 3 times in one day meaning we only covered about 300km and then we hit a pothole and mangled one of our rims. We were able to hammer it back into shape though and were soon back on the road.

Kazakhstan was excellent and didn't deserve any of the bad press it got prior to the rally. We found the people to be helpful and the authorities to be pretty decent. We did get pulled over in a small town by an unmarked police car with blacked out windows though. They managed to get the equivalent of about 20p out of us as a souvenir (a 2 pence piece, 50 uzbek money and 1000 turkmen).

We're going to be puching on towards Irkutsk from here, and the red panda is heading southeast towards the western border of Mongolia. So, we'll be going it alone for a thousand km! Chances are that we will bump into other teams on the way as we know there are more to come.

The Collins mini atlas is working a treat. The fact that it has so little detail and just a few main roads means that we don't take wrong turnings onto the deadly pothole ridden B roads. We should be in UB before the 18th.

Uzbekistan / Kazakhstan

One of the easiest countries we've tackled so far, Uzbekistan was a nice experience. We'd had to hammer it through Turkmenistan in order to get ourselves into a position to leave Uzbek by 8pm Monday.

Tom, Will, Felix and I set off for Samarkand from the Turkmen border at 9am and were there in good time without any problems from the police. They seemed more friendly and less corrupt than over the border. Once we'd found the centre of town, we stayed in a really nice little B&B near the Rejistan mosque. Dinner was good, beds were comfortable and the showers were very welcome. At about 9pm 6 other teams rocked up to the hostel having tackled the central route.

Tom and I were the first to set off in the morning as we had to be out of the country a day before most. The drive to Tashkent was decent, apart from a moment where we had to dip in to Kazakhstan en route (the mini atlas didn't tell us this). The guards there were fairly mercenary but we got away without having to pay them anything because of the language difficulties.

We made it to Tashkent by 5pm, drove around town for a few hours looking for a bank and then headed to the border. Smoothly passed into the country with a little help from a Kazak officer who seemed to like the English. The plan was to sleep on the other side and wait for Will and Felix to cross over in the morning. Their exhaust fell off (again) which changed things.

We found a nice bar and restaurant about a kilometre outside of the border town and tried to communicate to the staff that we'd like to sleep in their car park and have a few beers. After about 10 minutes of sign language and drawing on post it notes we were drinking and relaxing.

Then the local youths turned up. 6 lads out on the town looking for beer, girls and money from the English people that had turned up in their local. Ilia, the boxer and main beef of the operation was kind enough to offer not to hit me with a metal stick in exchange for $10. We endured their drunken torment for 2 hours, paid them nothing and met a really nice chap called Xavi who allowed us to sleep outside at his family home with the dogs and ducks. He also guided us to the road to Shymkent this morning.

We've seen a lot of other teams in the last two days and they are mostly heading in the same direction. Can't believe there are only two countries to go after Kaz! Almaty is next, probably get there tomorrow as we have taken it easy here in Shymkent.

Will update as soon as is feasibly possible, Tim x

Turkmenistan

Our time at Camp Baku sadly came to an end after three nights and four days of sleeping on car bonnets at the port. We were relieved of $250 per vehicle in exchange for a space on the boat, which didn't seem to unreasonable considering they originally wanted $400. The captain was drunk and we had to climb what was basically a rope ladder to get aboard! After 20 hours at sea Turkmenistan appeared on the horizon, filling us all with a sense of anticipation and dread.

Turkmen customs are perhaps the most thorough we have experienced yet. It took 8 hours in one big office before all five teams were allowed into the country. A further $200 was spent here on car insurance, road tax and fuel surcharges. At about 6pm we set out into the desert unaware of what was waiting for us.

The roads were pretty good and Molly was able to tick over at 60-65mph for most of the time. Unfortunately police checkpoints are stationed at about every 20km of the country! We were pulled over at least 13 times during one day and every police officer was looking to get some cash out of us. We paid our first speeding ticket for doing 72kmh in a 60kmh zone (there were no signs) of $15. The officer put the money straight into his top pocket. We were caught speeding two further times across Turkmen but managed to pretend we didn't know what "dollar" meant. After we'd been stopped a few times we realised that the police officers pulling us over didn't have cars so it was safe to pretend we hadn't seen them and drive on.

As the miles ticked over the checkpoints became less frequent but the guards more cheeky. One tried to tell us we had a faulty handbrake, gearbox and chassis and needed to pay a fine. Another stole my mobile from the car whilst I was at the document office (we realised this about 30km after). The temperature hit 48 degrees in the desert but we didn't suffer too badly since we were nearly always moving. Team OB1-2-Gobi broke down on the way to the capital. Last we heard it was a head gasket failure.

The Turkmen people were lovely, offering us food, drink and directions. We decided that the people in authority do not represent the real Turkmenistan. Thankfully, getting out of the country was much easier than getting in!