Thursday 4th July 2013<\/p>\n
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Wake early, gentle rain. Views of hills and meadows. Everything smells fresh. Decamp quickly, no breakfast yet, and hit the road. TURN ON LIGHTS. Don’t think anyone spotted us last night. We have a better plan today. We head north to Oskemen, which means it will be a short drive to the Russian border in the morning.<\/p>\n
Ben, from Tim’s previous life, has left a comment on the blog. Maybe we should have asked to have map embedded into BGfL, so schools who were interested could follow us. See children, if you study very hard and work for 35 years, you too can be shaken, stirred, smell and live in the same clothes for days on end.<\/p>\n
400 miles, 640 kms to do today. We have learnt from yesterday, buy bread when you see it. But we didn’t see it. Will stop after an hour, or in a town, see if they sell tea as well. If not, will make our own. Sky ahead clearing. Haven’t travelled in fleeces for weeks. I am sure it will warm up.<\/p>\n
The cheese, biscuits and granola bars we ate yesterday where for Mongolia. We will starve there! Oh, I forgot the 80 organic, pre cooked meals we have, and the 10 organic, pre cooked portions of rice pudding. Yum.<\/p>\n
Red kite swoops down, and snatches something from the road just ahead of us. Will we ever pass the hotel we were looking for last night? Sunglasses go on. Discovery 3 and Volvo, first of the holiday, apparently. A fence! Dead dog.<\/p>\n
9.30 100miles down. Stop for breakfast. Fleeces come off. I hang wet washing around the car, and most of it dries by the time we leave. Hilde uses eggs and makes omelette. One of our is broken. We have muesli, and yoghurt. Use all the pot today. I grind beans and we have fresh black coffee. Luxury. Had to boil water in pan, due to spectacularly poor shopping trip yesterday. Hilde asks Atle if he needs more omelette. He retorts, “i am not fat, just too short for my body” Bit like Mum saying she wasn’t fat, she just had a wide girth. I thought she was fine for a hippo.<\/p>\n
Find water coming from underground. Maybe this is a shrine, Buddhist? There is a bright blue handrail along the steps. At the bottom is a large tree with hundreds of scraps of brightly coloured cloth strips tied on. This is fascinating. We will see much more of this in Mongolia. Another wonderful insight into a culture and religion we have only previously read about. We are so privileged. Tim takes off remaining mud flap. Hilde says in Norway we would be fined for having only one. Either two or none. We don’t want to give the police here any more excuses to part us from my hard earned inheritance. Tim cuts finger, not badly enough for contents of grab bag, but I do make sure the lotions and potions I administer sting.<\/p>\n
Drive off into another load of nothingness. Large six wheeled drive troop carrier. Stop sign at road check. We stop. Policeman is talking to local, his light sabre dangling limply in his hand. He does not even glance our way. We creep forward. No whistle. We move off. Did I tell you I am getting very adept at spitting, no more toothpaste covered tee shirts.<\/p>\n
Fight between kestrel and red kite. David and Goliath. David wins. We have a change of plan, which will cut off over 100 miles. Slightly overheard Hilde talking to Tim, but no idea where we are heading now. You may need to ignore the title of today’s missive. Tim tied his new pendant and key ring to mirror. The white felt hat is already dirty where it is dusting the dashboard.<\/p>\n
Map shows a lake. We see no lake. Global warming or global warning? Getting better at this co-pilot job. Can’t really call me a back seat driver, as we have no back seats. Clear to overtake, slow down for speed trap, pull over for a pit stop. Children fishing with rods. Oh, we can see a little bit of water, but a lot of sand with salt crystals.<\/p>\n
Before we use the roof ladder again, a rivet needs replacing in one of the rungs. RUS registered car. Going home? Large harriers flap over fields. Tim has spent several sessions crawling all over the Landy with a screw driver. Tightening up stuff in an effort to eliminate squeaks. He did so again this morning at the breakfast stop. When we set off – silence. Now he says, “Can you tell where that new squeak is coming from?” Absolutely not. Even if I did know, I would not tell him. Going round in his gloves, poking into crevices, twirling this and that keeps him happy. All he is missing are a deer stalker, pipe and magnifying glass. Elementary. My dear Watson. Atle says he can never solve the squeaking. If it isn’t the car, then it’s Hilde.<\/p>\n
When we do a trip like this, everything has its allotted place. We are fastidious at replacing it, so when its dark, late or we are tired we both know instinctively where to find it. “Where’s the hand wash?” In the front tray. Wrong. In the footwell where it has bounced out. Great system this.<\/p>\n
Along this stretch we pass people at motorcycle and sidecars, selling large fish. Can’t tell whether salted, dried or smoked. Notice we have been running parallel to a railway track for many kms now. Tim singing like a chicken. Sorry girls. How far is the horizon? No reply from either embassy in Mongolia. But heard from Olav and Astrid. They bribed the truculent guard in Uzbek, not with dollars, but two cigarettes. They are now in TJ, ready to tackle the Pamir Highway. If we wait at the border in Mongolia, or go north for a few days so that Atle can see his reindeer, then that would be a good place to meet them.<\/p>\n
Tim and I will have to go to Ulan Baataarar, apply for our visas. go sight seeing, horse riding or trekking for a few days, then back to collect them.<\/p>\n
We have done nearly 12,000 kms. Tim says, the big truck we saw earlier is often bought and converted for over landing. Bit cumbersome. At the last crossing, Atle wanted to borrow the Custom Officer’s mirror on a stick, to check his under carriage. Should have mentioned the wonderful variety of butterflies we have seen. Don’t know the name of any of them I am ashamed to say. Boris?<\/p>\n
Were these roads so poorly constructed as a deliberate plan to keep people in their allotted place? Plan works then. Close my window, respite from being buffeted by the wind. Look what its done to my immaculately coiffured hair. Consider bringing out head scarf. One RUS car had KGB in registration. One border guard wore a cap with FBI on. Me thinks they were both imposters. Or very poor spies. Happy Independence Day America, when you wake up.<\/p>\n
Biggest country, fewest pictures. Largely due to blurring whilst on the move, and bodily tremors once we have stopped. You lie down to sleep and think you are still travelling. 12,000 kms down. Nice new chewing gum. How near to your home do you have to be, to be considered local? In Kings Thorn it would be 1k, then you would be in the next parish of Little Birch. Here, it must be more like 200+ kms before you are in the next province.<\/p>\n
Tim does that furtling up his short leg again. Hope he is just scratching a bite. Slow down for settlement. Coach from KYR. No bread or kettle. Rather disappointingly. we have to speed up again, meaning teeth masticate of their own accord. We discuss the fact that we won’t mind the unpaved surfaces in Mongolia. But if you put a chuffing road down, you don’t expect to bite the inside of your cheek quite so often. Just thought of a great project to get funding from the Lion’s Den team. Import solar powered hovercrafts to KZ. Make a fortune and save a mint on dental bills. May mention it to Jeremy Clarkson, see if he can be the brains behind the design. Would split the profits 50\/50 with him, of course.<\/p>\n
Pass a prison at visiting time. Were most of the inmates locked up for traffic related offences? Or couldn’t they afford the fine? Several large tanks on display nearby. Hilde says we have just passed a couple of little shops, do we want to go back. We say no, as we don’t want to go down that axel snapping pot hole again. We can eat into our Mongolia stash if we need to at lunchtime. Have been running parallel to railway tracks for many more kms now. No sign of a train.<\/p>\n
Whist I prepare lunch, same menu as last night’s dinner minus the beer, Tim screws the roof back on. Comforting to know my bedroom won’t bounce off unnoticed down the road behind us. Hilde has booked us into a hotel tonight, and we should be there about 6pm. The luxury of a shower and change of clothes before dinner spurs us on. The wind nearly rips the door off it’s hinges, blows all the crumbs back into the car and Tim’s clean undercrackers go cartwheeling down the road.<\/p>\n
Still no train. There is a public safety advert at home, usually played before school holidays. A white middle class family, Mum, Dad, girl and boy, are cycling in the countryside. They play I -Spy, something beginning with T. The first time I saw it I knew what the outcome was going to be. But you have to keep watching. Train? No. Track? No. Tree? No. Something else inane beginning with T. No. Get on with it. The girl stops cycling, feet either side of cycle frame. Tracks? She asks again. Smiling, sunny, full of promise. No. TRAIN. It chills me even to think of it. You see nothing, but your imagination takes you to places you don’t want to go.<\/p>\n
Still no train. I dislike Coke. I dislike Coke Zero even more. How did you get on at school yesterday, Esme? Tell us all about it next time we phone, if you want to. Wet, squidgy tarmac newly laid, complete with designer pot holes.<\/p>\n
Suddenly, T for train. Not high speed passenger, but lumbering goods train. A friend who’s Dad was a train driver once told me, if you get hit by a speeding train, your shoes come off. Also, my brother told me that the reason you have to bend double in a plane crash is so that your teeth don’t get smashed, and you will be easily identified. Well, when I fly back from Hong Kong, I’m going to sit bolt upright all the way, even if we hit turbulence or go into free fall. Make those pathologists earn their money. How do they identify people with dentures?<\/p>\n
Two Black Cranes. White Winged Black Terns. Pallid Harrier. More first sightings. Exciting for us but not Hilde. She is only interested at looking at birds down the barrel of a gun. But she will always eat what she shoots.<\/p>\n
Imagination all over the place today, brain being shaken to mush, and not many distractions. Sorry.<\/p>\n
What do people do with all these beautiful horses? You can only ride one at a time. I suppose a few are bought or traded to make a comfortable perch for a bird. I understand you can trade for money, or swop for goods. But then what? Is there an endless circle of national stock horses going round and round, being added to all the time? I haven’t seen horse meat on any menu here. Oh, wait a minute.<\/p>\n
Just a little aside here folks. Throughout our blog we have tried to be positive. We have tried to log what we have seen without putting our interpretation on it. We have tried not to be judgmental. BUT THIS ROAD!!!!!!!! They should pay us insurance, against bodily damage to both us and the vehicle. Not to mention long term psychological and emotional scarring. Pass a lone cyclist, who is trying to savage his manhood by standing on his pedals. Good luck. To top it all, wind nearly blows us into path of oncoming lorry. Had no time to salvage teeth and I already have my shoes off.<\/p>\n
Rant over. Lumbering passenger trains with well over a dozen carriages. Notice all trains going in same direction. Single track, so there must be sidings somewhere. Ex – industrial town. Skirt around it. When I write kms I put an “s” on. Here the road signs say km. What do they do with all the spare S’s?<\/p>\n
Yesterday Hilde was talking about voice recognition soft ware. If I were to type up all my original notes from the early days of expedition, that might be useful. She said it helps to know exactly what you are saying, and if I were reading out what I had already written, I would be able to edit before I spoke. How much does it cost? Would I have to train it to recognise my Northern accent and colloquialisms? Geek offers to look into it for me.<\/p>\n
Trio of tractors racing across field. They have flat hedgehogs in KZ as well. Fancy. Pointy, jagged mountains appear. Bit of a distraction. Disconcerting when vehicles come at us on our side of the road, to avoid the potholes on theirs. Clear off my carriageway. Don’t make more holes over here, we have enough of our own. I seem to have a split keyboard. How did that happen, me or the vibrations?. Don’t like, don’t know how to change it back and geek is busy driving.<\/p>\n
Mountain range in the far distance could be RUSSIA. Notice some picnic area signs, all with a leaning pine tree on, show a dripping tap. Does that mean the water is safe to drink? Even if it comes from a spring like this morning? Now we are driving on the wrong side of the road. Sorry.<\/p>\n
Will take big bags into hotel, as well as day bags. Need to be reminded about some of the decent clothes we possess, as well as our scuzzy travelling attire. Approach outskirts of Oskermen. Automated road check. No policeman with swinging light sabre. Instead, signs telling you to travel at 30 kph. 20m away from the car in front. Cameras are mounted overhead. Traffic signals indicate whether or not you are free to proceed. The light goes green.<\/p>\n
Like all big cities it is designed on a grid system. Hilde is in front, trying out her new sat nav now it has streets on it. We collect the last fuel in the Stans. Different system. Have to pay before delivery, a local driver tells us. I count out all our remaining tenge. 8,800. About \u00a340. Think diesel is 50p per litre. What will it cost in Russia? 8,895 tenge. Will have to sub 95 tenge from Atle. Pump attendant spills fuel under driver’s seat. We are given a lovely cloth to mop it up.<\/p>\n
Big mosque. Even bigger supermarket. May get fresh produce there in morning. Overtaken by a Bentley. Artificial camels on roundabout. Bus sign says Glo Bol View. Get lost on housing estate, much to the amusement of the residents. But not the van driver who has to back up.<\/p>\n
What is the ultimate excuse of the incompetent? We didn’t get the email. Even when Atle showed the trail, the receptionist said it wasn’t her fault, and they were fully booked. That was bad enough, but she showed no concern and was reluctant to help us find somewhere else.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thursday 4th July 2013 Wake early, gentle rain. Views of hills and meadows. Everything smells fresh. Decamp quickly, no breakfast yet, and hit the road. TURN ON LIGHTS. Don’t think anyone spotted us last night. We have a better plan today. We head north to Oskemen, which means it will be a short drive to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-central-asia","category-kazakhstan"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3bX1q-fU","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=986"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/986\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1738,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/986\/revisions\/1738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapetim.co.uk\/mongolia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}