The Golden Road to Samarkand

23rd, 24th and 25th May

'By hotter winds, our fiery hearts are fanned: For lust of knowing what should not be known. We take the Golden Road to Samarkand. Open the gate, O watchman of the night!' - James Elroy Flecker, written in 1913.

 

We don't know what road he was travelling on but it cannot have been the road from Bukhara unless something dramatic has happened as the road was drab, dreary and featureless - plain boring in fact. Yes, the condition wasn't always brilliant and we hit a couple of pot-holes and there was a section where Paul was down to 40km/h but that is almost becoming a daily reality here. Something has also happened to the weather - it is chilly, we are wearing jumpers.

We left our Turkmen wine with our Bukhara hotel - intrigued to know what they will do with it but we will never know?

When we visited in 2014 we always arrived in the centre of the cities and perhaps things appeared different because of this? The temperature was also in the high 30's/ low 40's. We are miles off that - a 20 degree shift. People have said that both winters and summers are getting warmer, but it is not the case at present.

 

The only 'interesting' things to note about the trip to Samarkand was a wonderful Cornish Pasty stop on the way and the absence of petrol stations. There are plenty of Gas stations selling Methane and Propane, but no Benzin. Paul did have a full tank so we were OK but it is something that we will have to take account of in future. Just because there is a Lada parked outside a pump on a forecourt doesn't mean that there is some petrol available and it is far more likely that the Lada has been there for some years - waiting for Benzin?

 

We arrived just before the rain. Our 'hotel' only spoke Russian (and dollars) and wanted to substantially renegotiate the price of our stay. All quite difficult, it took some time to 'sort', and we were not sure what has been 'sorted'. By the time we had settled in, it was too late for the banks and we could not find any banks, money change facilities or dubious men with suitcases hanging around on street corners in order that we could get some Soms. As far as 'dubious' is concerned though, on the next street there were five black, blacked-out Maybachs and one black, blacked-out Rolls all with similar number plates parked together with a 'heavy' sat on a chair outside the door - wonder what goes on behind the green door? Maybe Avis and Hertz have gone up-market?

 

 

Anyway, with not much local cash in our pockets, Francoise became 'British' and asked a Policeman where we could find a money changer. Few telephone calls. Policeman walks into street to flag down a taxi - but stops the traffic so that the patrol car can pull out. We are then told to get into the patrol car. Google translate says that the 'colleagues' are taking us for our safety. We get to a market area, a dubious man was holding a wad of Soms. Policeman gives him some notes, Paul gives man $100, we get Soms in exchange. We are then taken back to tourist area in police car. All quite bizarre! We counted the notes afterwards, we had been given the bank exchange rate. Just a bit disappointed that we did not get the sirens and flashing lights on the trip. Anyway, saved a couple of taxi fares.

 

One should note that wads of notes are common place here. A 1000 Som note is worth 10p. There are also 500 Som notes. The biggest note we have had is a 50,000 Som note. For the $100 we had 845,000 Som.

Friday morning - temperature is 11 degrees with a maximum of 17 degrees today according to the BBC. Just stopped raining. Weather is unheard of.  Francoise is still not feeling well and it looks as though we are going to take an extra day in Samarkand, as we will not get much done today. Change of accommodation inevitable. 

Why do we expect the BBC to know everything. Sun breaks out in the afternoon, Francoise perks up a bit and we can wander about a bit. Still staying an extra day - elsewhere!

 

Saturday morning more rain. Long ride today - 1km to new accommodation. Again weather betters significantly in the afternoon and we complete our site seeing trip. It's more Madrassas, Mausoleums, Minarets and Mosques, but with a lot more blue tiles than Bukhara. Still amazed to see these Buildings dating from the 14th and 15th Century, even though most of them have had Soviet cosmetic and physical surgery. The photos from the early 1900's show the sites devastated and hardly recognisable compared to what is there today. Would people come to see ruins?

 

Apparently the Uzbek population is one of the un-healthiest diets on the planets. It can only be down to the amount of sugar eaten. The markets have 'sugar' stalls.

Francoise is always careful about photographing the locals. The zoom assists. However the locals have no such issue with Francoise and she is often snapped or asked to be part of some Uzbek stranger's group photo. Not Paul. It must be the hair!

We are both feeling a bit better, so Tajikistan tomorrow. Change of plan as the border nearest to Samarkand is now open to foreigners. Panjakent here we come. It's only 70km - surely?

 

 

Bye-bye Turkmenistan, hello Uzbekistan. And Bukhara.

20th May 2019

A short uninteresting run to the border. Whilst in Turkmenistan we had not noticed one other vehicle with a foreign number plate. No Iranian, no Russian, no Uzbek, Azeri or anything else. There were no Japanese motorcycles of any size and we pondered whether we were the only Harley-Davidson in Turkmenistan? We have avoided all fines. Fines are a major industry in Turkmenistan and far more so in Ashgabat. Speeding, dirty cars, smoking in a car, mobile phone in a car and probably others we don't even know about. Motorcycles were also banned in Ashgabat so either we were very lucky in getting away with riding a dirty, black motorcycle, or, as foreigners, we presented the police with too much of an administrative nightmare - too much paperwork when there were easier pickings elsewhere.

 

Maxim, our guide/driver gave us a bottle of Turkmen wine as a present - we struggle to carry it. It is a bizarre amber colour with a variable alcohol content, 9% to 12%. What to do with it? Would dearly love to bring it back to UK, but shaken not stirred?

At the border,  passports were no issue. We were literally pushed through to the front of the queue, not just by the officials but by all the locals on the basis that we were 'tourists'. Great! If only it had been like that when we arrived in Turkmenbashi. The motorcycle however seemed to pose them some concerns. There seemed to be a suggestion that we unpacked the motorcycle and put everything, as in all our luggage, through the scanner. Surely they don't do that with anybody travelling by car? Maybe nobody crosses the border in a car? There were some forms to fill in, but as we couldn't read them. We shrugged our shoulders and the officials filled them in for us. All good. We then brought the bike round to a window. The official made us go into a small room. We showed him all our paperwork that we had collected in Turkmenistan, but he still seemed perplexed. He also had no English - why should he? So we just shrugged our shoulders when he spoke to us. Our papers got shuffled on his desk. He was clearly in a quandary and a few phone calls were made. Somebody else joined us in the room with pretty good English and suggested we do the passports again. We said that we had accomplished this task rather proudly - and he eventually found our exit stamp in the passports. We think that this was part of the quandary as we had exited the country but the bike was still there. They eventually hand wrote something in a ledger and indicated that the bike needed a customs inspection. They only looked at our wet gear bag and then gave up and waved us on. Another passport check and finally a wave on, a ride through a barbed wire fenced-off corridor with watchtowers and a final passport check. Harry Kane Tottenham Hotspur was the comment on mine followed by Eden Hazard, Chelsea on Francoise's and we were waved into Uzbekistan. Less than two hours compared to five in Turkmenbashi.

 

We were welcomed into Uzbekistan! Again they were probably not that used to people other than Uzbeks or Turkmen crossing the border as they looked in our passports and, when they could not find them, asked us about our visas? Paul responded, '30 days, no visa',  some discussions were held and internet look-up and all was OK. They filled in some paperwork for the bike, made us sign it. We were finally on the way out of the compound. The man opened the gate, we had to negotiate some six inch deep wheel ruts in the tarmac - watch that ground clearance - and we were off!

Dreadful road to start with. Very hot. Dripping sweat after all the shenanigans, but we felt good.

In just over an hour we were in our hotel in Bukhara. Paul not feeling that brilliant but after a short rest and clean up, we walked into the old town for tea and cake.

The three most renowned Silk Road Central Asian cities are Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkand.

Road conditions stopped us returning to Khiva, but Bukhara and Samarkand are on the list. Madrassas, Mausolea, Minarets and Mosques. That's what it is all about - the 4 M's. The buildings here post- date the mud ones of Turkmenistan; they had brick and tile. There are still some mud walls, but buildings tend to be from the 9th to the 16th Century with a bit of Soviet 'restoration' thrown in. And whitewash, when the Soviets wanted to quash Islam by painting over it. 

Compared to 2014 when we visited without the bike, Bukhara seems to be booming with the number of tourists and hotels having increased dramatically. However, just like 2014, Francoise was a bit too gung-ho with respect to the sun and had sun-stroke, which rather curtailed our visiting. We also need something to rhyme with 'Bukhara' aka Delhi Belly...

 

We invested in a guide for our first day off in Bukhara. Francoise was not well enough to participate in the morning and barely OK in the afternoon. We already knew most things about Bukhara anyway, having visited in 2014, but it was good fun and we actually spent a good part of the day sitting in shops and chatting about all sorts of things from UK immigration policy to the cost of living and even Brexit, though apparently all guides had been warned not to mention three things to English tourists - their age, their salaries and  Brexit! The lady guide invited one of her best friends to join us in the afternoon and we sat in a carpet emporium in one of the old 15th Century trading posts drinking tea the four of us. Every time we finished a teapot, the carpet shop owner brought another and nobody wanted paying for anything - they said 'Uzbek hospitality' and that was it. We can't manage the cross legged sitting for very long, even on a pile of carpets. It nonetheless felt quite special even though Francoise was more interested in getting back to bed. A big topic of conversation was our views on Turkmenistan. Whether it is Uzbek propaganda or not we don't know, but they told us that nobody under the age of 40 in Turkmenistan was allowed a visa to visit other countries as the regime was frightened of losing people. Equally our guide, although far more 'free', had only been able to visit Russia, Tajikistan and India and this was part of her learning her craft of being a guide. Her friend had not left Uzbekistan at all. Although visas were available the paperwork was daunting.

 

Weather is cooling down and as we don't feel 100% fit for the bike, we will stay another day.

 

Mary and Turkmenabad

18th and 19th May 2019

Mary and Turkmenabad

 

Time to get out of the country but still a long way to go. First stop was Mary. On the way we visited what we thought was a ruin of an ancient Mosque that had been badly hit by the earthquake and had been left there as a memorial. However our guide/driver just said that it had fallen down because it was old. The romance of it. We also visited a ruined mud wall Silk Road city. There was no one about, you could pick up shards of pottery - it was both bizarre and eerie at the same time. As a country they just haven't got their act together on this yet.

 

The road was feeling long and we were glad to get to Mary. There had been another butterfly massacre on the way; Turkmen Red Admirals. Not sure whether it is a host, swarm or whatever for butterflies or whether you could say that they were dropping like flies? But there were a lot of them which makes you think where the right level lies; does Turkmenistan have a lot, or we too few?

 

The road is quite boring otherwise. Somewhat like the great plains in America or the Outback in Australia; long straight roads with not much happening except police men with radar pistols and rifles. The speed limit is 90km/h, then of course the control check points, where it is quite clear they don't know what to do with us. They would like to do us for something but they are a bit taxed by the idea that we smile, shake their hands, say hello in English and don't have any Turkmen.

 

We were battling the clouds again and got hit on the last 20km into Mary. The roads weren't good enough to even ride at 90km/h.  We thought Turkmenistan would be all desert but lots of it were quite green.  Lakes and rivers were passing through the desert. Our driver/ guide said that it rained throughout April and that was why the desert was green. That evening we ate in a cafe in a park down by a river - the usual with some beetroot thrown it - but we could have been anywhere in Europe apart from the language - even the girls were wearing jeans with torn knees and not the obligatory red and green dresses. There were even reddy brown cars. This is not Ashgabat!

 

Following day we visited Merv in the morning. An absolutely massive mud wall city site with not that much left standing except for some of the walls. Apparently the place was doing so well for itself during the days of the early Silk Road that Genghis popped down from time to time, emptied the shop and killed everyone - one history book says it must have been one of the biggest massacres know to mankind.

 

Boring ride in the afternoon to Turkmenabad with quite bad roads; very bad for the Harley - shake, rattle and please keep rolling along. Only noticed one bit that has fallen off and it looks like the headlight might be no more!.

 

Is Ashgabat on the Central Line?

16th and 17th May 2019

Is Ashgabat on the Central Line?

Paul has a number of 'Life Rules'; shirts are plain and coloured, motorcycles are black, cars are red etc. Turkmenistan, or at least Ashgabat has some similar ones. As Turkmenistan has only existed as an independent country for 28 years, it is not clear who is copying who? In Ashgabat the President, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, has decreed that he likes cars to be white, though there are some silvery grey ones and also some washed out gold coloured ones too. One doubts that the odd yellow taxi will survive. It is strange not to see the blacked out black Mercedes as one does in other ex-Soviet countries. And all cars are to be clean. Not sure whether we will get into the City Centre on a dirty black Harley.... 

As well as the cars, the President has also decreed on school uniform. And ladies dresses, red or green. And the roof of your house, bright red or bright green. And all buildings in Ashgabat are to be white marble, be they bus stops, theatres, apartment blocks of any sort, retail malls, sports facilities or the Presidential Palace itself. All are in white marble. The White City. Except at night when the LEDs and Neons click in. All paid for by Oil and Gas revenues which lead to petrol costing less than 40p a litre and that is the price foreigners have to pay, and free electricity. People have talked about water being an issue but after yesterday we don't get that. Ashgabat was totally destroyed in 1948 by an earthquake with nearly 200,000 people or a third of the country at that time supposedly being killed - hence the rebuilding and search for national identity.

We have taken a couple of days off. Sight seeing in Ashgabat followed by an overnight stay at Darvaza Gas Crater and then finish off the sight seeing.

It would have been nice to think that the Gas crater was a natural feature, but apparently something went wrong with a Russian gas exploration in 1958.  It has been burning ever since. In fact apparently they have had to tap into whatever seam has been leaking, as the flames had got too big and were too dangerous for tourists. They have now been able to turn down the crater. On our way we saw a smaller glugging mud crater and a water one too that was a third covered in plastic bottles.

As far as the sightseeing was concerned,  Francoise was stopped from taking photographs in the Russian Bazaar by security personnel. Nuclear Fruit and Veg? Top secret tomatoes? Our guide says it is because the market vendors are shy. We also went on a cable car to a look out point above Ashgabat. What was strange was that the top was the other side of the border in Iran or more precisely, neutral territory whatever that means.

Not a city for walking despite wonderful pavements and great parks- it is just too spread out. Also no life. We were probably only taken to places we were meant to be taken to. We asked about the old City, but as everything was destroyed in the earthquake, 'old' means Soviet blocks. Who will ever use these parks that are being created - the Olympic Village with its mono-rail, everything in pristine white marble is locked up - it was for the Asian Games in 2017. There are no shop windows because nobody walks, shops are viewed from the air conditioned - and dry- inside. There is no way to cross the six lane wide roads - even though there are no cars on them. The temperature now, in May, is fine - it is crying out for a cafe or chai society with chairs and parasols set amongst the trees - but to serve who? We think that there is only one other room occupied in our hotel. We are heavily outnumbered by staff who must be bored out of their minds. Not sure how the tourist revolution is ever going to happen with getting in so difficult too. We think we are being shown what we are allowed to be shown.

 

We also squeezed in a visit to Nyssa, which was the home of Parthian Kings from the 3rd Century BC to the 3rd Century AD. Despite there being the mountains all around, buildings weren't built of stone; these are mud and straw and therefore there is not that much much left. It was a UNESCO site and perhaps because of this, it was very expensive at a Turkmen level, 42 Manat or 28 litres of petrol. There was no guide, or panels of any detail in any language and some of the mud rendering looked surprisingly youthful. We also stumbled across a couple of guys making mud bricks. I suppose we will never know.

Found out that Tomato and Cucumber Salad is called Choban Salad. Shaslik or Barbecue seems to get us a kebab too. Looks as though we are set for a few weeks.

On the road again tomorrow.

 

Storm and a teacup

15th May 2019

Storm and a teacup

New driver to follow today. However Maxim doesn't have any more English than Murat had and he didn't have any. 

Only 200km to Ashgabat today and the roads had been fine yesterday - no horrors to collaborate the horror stories. Quite a bit cooler today.

 

We stopped for petrol about 100km shy of Ashgabat. Maxim made sign that we should leave the bike at the petrol station, as he wanted to show us a site. So we climbed into his 4x4 and drove up to a Mountain village. It was a bit grubby. The stream running down the centre was littered with rubbish and plastic bottles. There is an environmental pollution awareness programme needed here. Nonetheless there was an interesting cemetery to see.

It started spitting in the mountains. By the time we got down to the plain,  it was a full on storm. This was not what we were expecting in Turkmenistan. We were soaked putting our waterproofs on. There is a 20 minute rule with all motorcycle waterproof.  It was slightly more than 100km, which is significantly more than 20 minutes and it rained all the way. We thought this was a desert?

Like many such countries there is no surface water drainage provision; the sewers would become blocked when it didn't rain and too much maintenance. So by the time we got to Ashgabat not only were we wetter and colder than we had been since Baku,  but we were also driving through standing water - beware roundabouts and for goodness sake never think of putting your feet down. The good thing about there being no drainage is that there are also therefore no missing manhole or drain covers at the bottom of the puddles - just potential potholes.

We followed our driver/guide into Ashgabat and to be honest we were getting a trifle annoyed - being very cold and wet - as we went passed a number of what we imagined were the 'sights'. It was not the time for a sightseeing tour!

He then pulled up at one. We thought it was for photos but we were actually staying here! The Ashgabat Wedding Ceremony Building. 32 years later?

 

One hump or two?

14th May 2019

Good nights sleep and we were now riding as opposed to sailing. Turkmenbashi to Ashgabat, the capital is @600km which we felt too much - especially considering all the horror stories we had heard about the roads. So we were aiming for Serdar which was about two thirds of the way there. We followed the Caspian for a while and then started heading in-land. It was sunny and warm pleasant as opposed to warm very hot. But it was only 10.00 in the morning.

We had seen camels whilst riding in Qatar and Paul had also seen them when riding through Saudi Arabia - but not like this - they seemed to be wild and could also have done with some grooming products.

 

The Turkmen seem to have mastered road lane discipline - just don't paint any white lines. Roads are massive and traffic is sparse but the roads to fizzle out at the sides.We lost count of how many police check points there were along the road. "Harley Davidson! 2 cylinders?" the only reasons why they stopped us along the way. No cash involved.

We had stocked up on cereal bars - Muslim countries and Ramadan. However the restaurant we stopped at for lunch was serving beer, the ladies weren't covered and people were eating. So we did. Tomato and cucumber salad.

 

Whenever we stopped, tea, lunch, water, petrol - it was that same as it had been in China. Motorbike. Harley-Davidson? Read the countries on the windscreen, stroke the animal tails, reach for the mobile and suddenly there was a crowd. It was difficult to have a conversation but smiles and selfies etc.

The afternoon hit 42 degrees C. We had been expecting it, but we hadn't really had the time to get accustomed to it so getting to Serdar was a relief. We are not allowed to ride on our own - we have to follow someone - and our guide/driver made signs that we had 10 minutes and he then took us for a ride in his Toyota into the Moon Mountains, which is the geographical division between Turkmenistan and Iran. And yes there were Police checkpoints along the way. The plain was desert but with a climb of only @150m things had become pretty green.

We now feel on our way. Tomato and cucumber salad and a kebab for supper.

 

Sailing

13th May 2019

Our biggest stress point on this trip has been crossing the Caspian and getting into Turkmenistan. It's complicated, it's stressful, it's pretty unfathomable without the languages and almost impossible without help. That's all really one needs to know, one could leave it at that. It's a very long story and beats what we had to do to get into Singapore. Jump over it if you don't feel up to it, it is long, very long and beaks all the presentational rules with little graphical content. But it is cathartic for us.

One has a choice of Type of visa for entering Turkmenistan, a Transit visa or a Tourist visa. Transit visas are easier, but you can only spend 5 days in the country. We were not sure we could cross the country in 5 days due to the heat and reputedly very poor roads, which would have slowed us down. So we opted for a Tourist visa which necessitates you being part of an organised Tour with somebody accompanying you all the time. So we organised a tour just for the two of us - ie somebody local, government 'approved' , following us or leading us in a car as we crossed the country.

All good and a Letter of Invitation was issued by the Turkmenistan Bureau of Foreign Affairs on that basis so we could obtain the visa. They allowed us a ten day visa in a twenty day window, which was fine for our seven day itinerary. Except the Turkman Embassy insisted that we name the start day and that's where the next problem lay.

The start day is the day you land in Turkmenistan. There are no ferries, as we know them, across the Caspian. There are freight ships. They don't run to a timetable and they are not announced anywhere. There are five that seem to ply their trade carrying an Azeri flag and they all date from the 1980's. One of them sank a few years back under high wind, which now means that there are restrictions linked to wind speed. There are also two Turkmen boats built this century. All boats leave when they are full and dock when they can. Paul has been tracking them nerdishly for the last two months on a Marine Traffic website to see whether there was any pattern. There isn't. All one could say is that the best crossing time for a Turkmen boat was @12 hours, but equally it had also taken 33 hours once, whereas the Azeri boats were a lot slower. There are not boats everyday. Things were also complicated by the ships leaving Azerbaijan from two ports; Baku Port or Baku International Seaport, which is actually 70km south of Baku.

What Paul had noticed was that for the past ten days no ship had left Baku. We found out that a  Turkmen ship was due  to dock in Azerbaijan at 1030 Monday morning and one at 1730 the same afternoon. So first thing Monday morning we went to Baku Port to see whether we could buy a ticket there. We were told that freight ships no longer ran from Baku and you could not buy tickets there. The port was closed and all ships were leaving from the International Seaport 70km away. It made sense - prime real estate in the city centre doesn't want or need a load of Turkic trucks.

So we returned to the hotel, packed the bike, told the hotel what we were up to and if we failed to find a boat we would return. We found the seaport and all went really well. We had bought our tickets, for a good boat, 160$ each including cabin and and extra 20$ for the motorbike to 'use' the port and we were through no issue. We were sorted and told to wait in the parking area until called. boarding would be at 13.00 - it was 12.30.

It's not like Dover Calais. There is no signage. There is no one walking round 'calling' you. We saw the man who sold us the tickets as he turned up in the parking lot. He said 16.00. This is a freight parking lot. There was no shade. There was a shop where we bought tomatoes, apples, water and crisps. There were containers containing dubious showers and even more dubious toilets. There was no choice - there was no nice terminal building. Paul bought another bottle of water and cleaned the bike.

15.30 and no action of any sort; we started to fret. The locals who inhabited the containers 'couldn't' help as they were Azeris and we were booked on a Turkmen boat. Francoise asked the security guard who was barring the way, he said we were in the wrong car park. There were only two and we had gone to the one we were directed to.

 

So we changed car park and everything was fine. We cleared Azeri customs with no hassle. We could see the boat so we rode up to it. 'Who said you come here? At once an easy question but simultaneously a hard one. There were a large number of lorries there slowly reversing on to the boat. Luckily a Turkman who had studied in London and driving a rather flash Audi 4x4 - especially for his tender years - turned up alongside us and we were both sent back to the fence to wait. Lorries had to be boarded firsthand . They had to reverse on, so they could drive off as there was only access at one end of the ship. We would be last on, first off. It was still very sunny. We boarded at 18.30.

We had to hand over our passports on the ship and pay the transit cost of the bike - another $100. This was so far all going to plan, we knew this. We then asked about our cabin and were told we only had reclining seats. We explained that we had paid 40$ each extra for a cabin. They were not that interested. Luckily our young Turkman was in the same situation and he kicked up a fuss.  We benefited from it. The ship confirmed that the Azeris's on shore were not allowed to sell cabins and that they could only sell seats. Of course we had no receipt - just the boarding cards, which said reclining seats....

Anyway we got a cabin. We watched remaining lorries manoeuvre onto the lower deck. They were literally six inches apart side to side. 40 lorries on the top deck, 16 on the lower. We were three cars, one transit van and one motorbike. It was now 19:30. Soon a tour group of 19 bikes, back up van and lead car turned up and filled the boat. They had tickets for cabins too - but there were no more available. At 20.00 all aboard.

The two shops on the ship were interesting in the fact that the doors were open and there was absolutely nothing in them. Just dust. The children's play area had already become an impromptu cabin - there were never any children anyway. There were,however, a number of Turkmen ladies who came aboard as foot passengers. We watched their luggage being craned aboard. The ladies all had plastic bags full of food. So did the truck drivers. Francoise went to the restaurant and asked about food. No food today was the answer, wait till Turkmenistan. Umhh.

However at 21:00, boat still in port, helpful young Turkmen whose family had been in the construction business for 10 years, said the restaurant was open now. So we went along. Lots of people eating their own food out of their carrier bags, but nothing else. But people had teapots so we asked for a teapot and was given one in minutes. Money was not requested. A few people started getting plates of things and after an hour we went and asked for some too. Again no money involved. The plates contained buckwheat, a stale bread roll that crumbled and a frozen mega chicken nugget. By frozen we mean that it was still frozen; or if not frozen, very cold and still quite crunchy. Not edible.

We returned to our cabin. We had been told that breakfast was at 09:00.

Paul remembers looking out of the window - we had a sea view cabin - and we were still in port just after midnight. In the morning people said that we had left sometime around 0100 in the morning and at that stage it was irrelevant whether it was Azeri or Turkman time. 

Breakfast was more edible. The hard boiled eggs were very difficult to peel and the cold frankfurters had plastic casings , you had to squeeze them out like pop ices. We then hung around as there was nothing else to do. Land was sighted just after midday and we docked at 14:00. We then had to sit down and wait for our passports to be returned. 16.00.

A sparse breakfast so we could rush to buy tickets, a tomato, apple and crisps for lunch, buckwheat for supper, a sparse breakfast, no lunch.....

 

But we were then first of the boat. And first to the passport office. But there was nobody there. One had to go to the Cashiers office first for the right to go to the passport office - but we did not know that. We were now last at the Cashier's office and we paid the 10$ per head arrival fee. We returned to the throng that was now around the passport office.

Paul had also been trying to contact the 'authorised travel firm' to tell them what boat we were on, so that they could pick us up outside the port as we were supposedly not allowed to travel on our own. As they had arranged the accommodation, we had no idea where we were supposed to be staying anyway! But we couldn't get through to anyone who spoke English. Friendly young Turkman, going under the name of Stephen as that was easier to pronounce, rang them up and gave us some other phone numbers. Which didn't work either. Deep breath time...

After a while we were at the front of the passport window and handed over our documents. The  officer seemed a little perplexed with the two expired Turkmenistan visas, from 2014 and 2017, but nodded his head when Paul gave him the Letter of Invitation we had received. He nodded his head, waved the passports and said something like '5 minutes'.

There was now a second wave of Turkic lorry drivers but we stood our ground for at least 30 minutes next to if not in front of the window.

Paul then spotted someone wearing a T-shirt that said 'Owadan' on it, which was the name of the travel company we had spotted and Paul pounced upon him to introduce himself. He had no English whatsoever, but started knocking at the Passport window and obtained the return of our passports. Things started to happen. He had a chum working with him, they said 'Bank' to us. We had already been to the Bank before but we needed to return, this time it was for $80 per head. We now know it was for our visa's. 

On obtaining these visa's the guys pushed to the front of the Passport queue and our passports got stamped.

They then said 'Bank' again. So we went back to the Bank and paid a further $89, which was for the bike. Something to do with size of engine, fuel tax and our itinerary.

All these payments receive hand written receipts in duplicate and are entered into ledgers. Those receipts need to be taken then to the next room.

With a fistful of receipts, for a fistful of dollars it must be said, our two new best friends went to the other end of the corridor and went into the room labelled, Veterinary Hygiene - taking no notice whatsoever of the queue that was outside. And the next room which was Plants and Animals, and the one that was Control Substances and then others that didn't have names on. They then said 'Bank' to us - this time it was only $13 and we think is the motorcycle insurance.

Afterwards We were told to go to the bike and ride it to the front of the queue of lorries. It was 21:30 and quite dark by now. There was a very cursory inspection of all of goods and chattels - we were expecting far more, having flushed what might be mis-construed medications down the toilet on the boat.The man gestured 'Go'. So we went. We showed our passports and he lifted the barrier. We were in Turkmenistan! Now where?

Luckily there was somebody beckoning us and we followed him to a cafe for tomato and cucumber salad and a kebab. And then to the hotel and we slept.

Very few photos as there was too much going on, too many guys in uniform and quite honestly we didn't really have a clue as to what was happening! But we will if we do it again!

Puddle deep, Mountain High

11th May 2019

It rained most of the night in Sheki. You could tell it was an original Karavanserai of a certain age because it didn't have gutters or down pipes, the rain just poured off the edge of the roof.

 

It was raining very heavily indeed when we woke up and continued to do so throughout breakfast. Mental note to oneself: All that looks like cheese isn't necessarily cheese and Paul's Grandad used to spread dripping on his Shredded Wheat...

It was still raining heavily after breakfast and there was no choice any longer. Mental note to oneself: Pack an umbrella next time as it will help keep the stuff dry when you are loading the bike.

 

We set off, slowly, in heavy rain. We reached and had tea at the petrol station 50km out of Sheki where we had abandoned in 2017. We continued in heavy rain high into the mountains and it was miserable and were very cold indeed. Reckoned this was the worst we had done since Bordeaux-Paris before we were married.

We stopped and had soup of boiled ruminant - with added fat and what might have been large nuts and also olives. Might have been. And a kebab. And what we definitely think was lamb chops. And we were warm again. Then we had some sun and we tackled the road works with vigour and sailed into Baku straight to the hotel, where we had lodged two years previously. All was good with the world once again.