Meet the Swiss

Robert and Andrea.  Both live in Zurich, Robert being from there originally and Andrea having moved there from Berlin.  Their team: Langstrasse EXT.

 

Meet the Brits

Andrew, Mark, Amy and Greg.  The gents are from Manchester and Amy is from Essex.  Their team: Genghis Style.

 

2013.08.07 — Wednesday — We arose fairly early, to the racket of local kids meandering around our tent.  We gathered pretty quickly that the pack of 10-15 kids ran some sort of carwash business and since Jon Hay was so dirty, they were intent on washing her despite our demands to the contrary (rally cars are not meant to be clean).  They drew water from a dirty, trash-ridden creek nearby and flung it haphazardly across Jon Hay’s frame.  At one point, while Matt was trying to pack up, they flung a full bucket of water over the roof and all over his shirt.  Needless to say, we were less than ready to part with any money when they demanded payment for the job that we didn’t want and had generally created an obstacle and inconvenience to our packing process.  Ultimately Ian gave the kids some Romanian coins and we quickly hopped in the car and locked the doors.  We made our way to the border (having bid farewell and best of luck to Team Fishbowl…despite still not having any photos with one of our absolute favorite other rally teams) amidst banging on the doors and demands for money.  We were one of the very first to cross the border for the day, so the process was fairly easy.  However, the person in charge of customs on the Tajikistan side was several hours late so we waited with the British and Swiss teams for nearly three hours for him to arrive.  Once he finally got there it was once again smooth sailing and we commenced the Tajikistan portion of our journey.  The first stop was in Dushanbe, Tajikistan’s capital and by far its largest city.  There we stopped at Hotel Tajikistan to look for a map of the Pamir Highway and also to rendezvous with Leroy, with whom Ian had overlapped at Harvard and who was now living in the city for a brief period of time.  Leroy pointed us in the right direction to find the supposed address for DHL, a supermarket and a clothing store (we needed to replace a lost headband and the Swiss needed warmer clothes for the mountains of the Pamirs).  Team Attila the Pun set off to the DHL address and found it with less fanfare than would be expected especially considering there were police officers on every corner flagging down cars to check their info.  However, it turns out that DHL moved from that address about 10 years earlier and were now at a new location across town.  A very nice Tajik man helped try to point us in the right direction with little success, but by chance there was another man in the building who we were told was also heading to DHL and so we followed him there (writing down directions back as we went).  The man walked in the building waited in line for one minute and then left, so we’re uncertain as to whether or not he had any business in the area or was just being nice and helping us out.  Regardless, we retrieved our package of supplies including, most importantly, fuel for our stove so that we could prepare warm meals while camping in the Pamirs (we had thus far survived on chips, nuts, salami and cheese when restaurants were not an option).  A big thanks to Ian’s brother David for generously hooking us up!  Armed with our new goodies, we made our way back to rejoin the other Rally teams.  We all picked up the necessary remaining supplies (Matt got a bit lost and wandered for a couple miles on foot trying to find the supermarket from the clothing store — they were literally around the corner from each other).  It was getting late in the afternoon so we set out to cover a little ground before setting up camp.  It was getting dark as we pulled off on a dirt road and set up camp in the middle of a large field.  Team Attila the Pun split up tasks:  Matt put together the tent and chairs while Ian prepared our first self-cooked meal of the trip (duties we would retain throughout the trip when camping).  Ramen has never tasted so good!

 

2013.08.08 — Thursday — We were roused from our sleep several times the next morning between 4 and 6 AM to loud whistling, a few “heeyah’s” and lots of “baaah’s”.  The third or fourth time this occurred we finally peered out of our tents and found a shepherd driving a herd of several hundred goats through our camp.  His dog took particular interest in our tent.

We were able to make a little small talk with another guy who seemed to also be a part of the procession (maybe the owner of the goats) and the shepherd came over and let both of us ride his horse (no one from the other teams partook).

When the Tajiks and their animals continued on their way, we packed up our camp and headed off towards the much anticipated Pamir Highway though the Pamir Mountains.

The roads to start the day were flat and fairly smooth, but as we approached the Pamir Highway the gradient began to change drastically and the quality deteriorated considerably.  Once on the highway itself, Jon Hay’s limits were tested frequently.  At one point, the Brits pointed out that they had noticed a streak of liquid on the ground behind our car, but nothing was leaking when we stopped, so it was uncertain whether or not the liquid had actually come from Jon Hay.  Otherwise, Jon handled the challenges of the road admirably and successfully made it to the Pyanj River on the Tajik/Afghan border somewhere shortly after the city of Kulyab (in the western half of Tajikistan).

While the roads were daunting at times, the people were unconditionally welcoming and genuinely happy to see us.  Almost everyone we passed waived as they went about their daily lives.  Kids would scream with excitement and come running up to our car for high-fives and every one, no matter the age, would say, “hello” in perfect English.  In addition to the enjoyment of interacting with the Tajik people, there were several other memorable moments throughout the day.  At one point, Andrea (from the Swiss team) drove about 500 meters ahead down a fairly steep portion of the highway to get a better vantage point for photos leaving Robert (her Swiss teammate) behind with the British and our completely full cars.

Rather than walk the rest of the way, Robert hopped on our roof, grabbed a tight hold of our spare tires and we made our way slowly and carefully down to Andrea’s location.  Despite our care, there’s no such thing as a smooth ride on these roads (if you’re not going over a “speed bump” you’re going through a pothole — Jon Hay is very rarely perfectly level), so Robert’s ride was not without excitement.  Other highlights were a one-lane bridge consisting of metal plates that were not attached to the base and a waterfall draining directly onto the highway in which we parked Jon Hay, got out and showered ourselves.  That night, the three teams camped in a field on an embankment between the highway and the river.

In the last light of the day, with the fading outlines of the giant mountains all around us, it seemed as though we were completely closed in.  The eight of us sat around for hours regaling stories from “back in the real world” and playing pictionary with a laser pointer on the side of the mountain (we started playing on the mountain on the Afghan side of the river, but quickly decided it was better to point in the other direction).

 

2013.08.09 — Friday — The next morning marked the beginning of a trend (the second consecutive observation making it a trend and not just an occurrence): Ian is always the first person awake followed by Matt.  On top of that, Attila the Pun, thanks to less elaborate breakfasts (including no “morning tea”…so European) and more efficient packing capabilities, takes significantly less time to get ready to go in the morning.  While Attila the Pun was almost always on the road before 9 AM on their own, driving usually didn’t start until 9:30-10:30 as part of the caravan.  The company was well worth the wait, however, and with perilous terrain ahead, we all could certainly use the helping hands.  The day followed many similar themes from the day before.  The caravan spent the entire day winding along the Pyanj (which continually gained veracity as we progressed — whitewater rafting there would be a life-threatening experience to say the least) as we followed the border-river up over the large portion of Afghanistan that juts up into Tajikistan and then back down the border on the other side into eastern Tajikistan.

There were, of course, many high-fives to be had along the way.  We made it into Khorog as the day was winding down.  Given the dearth of gas options along the Pamir Highway, we were always sure to top off our tanks and gas cans whenever the option presented itself, so we all stopped briefly.  There we met two guys from Argentina who were driving a similarly over-stickered car (though theirs was a much more well-equipped SUV), but were clearly not part of our rally.  From our discussion it sounded like they had started in Beijing, traveled throughout China, Mongolia, Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan before making their way to Tajikistan and the Pamir Highway.  Their ultimate destination was Turkey (which seemed odd given that they were heading pretty much due east from Uzbekistan and ultimately northeast through Tajikistan) and they also mentioned something about heading south through Pakistan.  It was all a bit confusing, but they were in a much larger, faster car so there was no way we’d ever cross paths again.  Priority #1 for the caravan as we made our way out of Khorog was to find a campsite before light ran out (a daily challenge for ralliers).  Light was waning as we came across a dirt road to a very flat area of soft dirt that would be perfect for a campsite.  The area, however was seemingly partitioned off into boxes with rock borders, which was strange.  And then we noticed a rock wall nearby…and a rock hut…and a member of the Tajik military…with an AK47.  We decided to find a different spot.  It was almost completely dark when we came across a small patch of shrubbery right next to the road (probably 10 meters wide and 40 meters long, 100 meters above the river).  There was a town a few hundred meters down the road (closer than we usually liked for our campsites) and barrels of hay scattered around the area, but options had been non-existent and the ability to find future options had all but disappeared along with the visibility of the day, so we set up camp.  A group of people walked by and several cars stopped presumably to check out what was going on and then continued on their way, but no one seemed to mind that we were there.  We prepared a quick dinner and then headed to sleep.  Right after people turned in, however, three Tajik guys rolled into camp and started trying to communicate with Robert (who was sleeping in a hammock –which was fairly ridiculous given how cold it was at somewhere above 11,000 feet — but that’s neither here nor there).  Robert was unsure what the men were trying to say so Ian got out of the tent lend a hand.  In turns out the men’s Lexus was about 30 meters up the road and essentially out of gas.  It sounded like they were offering to buy a liter from us (which we were more than happy to oblige), but when Ian produced our full 10-liter gas can they helped themselves to about eight liters, thanked us and left.  Not exactly what we expected, but it seemed to correspond with our understanding of the Tajik notion of generosity where there are basically no limits to sharing with others, even with strangers, even if causes you financial peril (which in our case it certainly did not).  Nonetheless it was an interesting end to a productive day.

 

2013.08.10 — Saturday — We were only a little way out of Khorog, but it was a big step because it meant that we had officially begun the Wakhan Corridor.  While the Pamir Highway turned inland from Khorog along challenging, uneven terrain similar to that which we’d experienced occasionally throughout Central Asia, the Wahkan Corridor continued to follow the Pyanj and the Afghan border with roads that’s quality supposedly paled in comparison to even that of the Pamir.  The views along the Wahkan Corridor, however, were said to be among the best of the entire rally and Attila the Pun would have nothing but the best, challenge be damned.  The first half of the day was quite similar to the previous couple except that there was an extremely noticeable decrease in traffic in both directions (aka we went from very little, to almost none and the only cars we saw were powerful 4-wheel drive SUVs) and the people seemed more surprised than anything (though still excited) to see a car like Jon Hay pass through their village.  It didn’t take us long to figure out from where these two developments stemmed.  In the town of Langar the road took a strange left turn away from the Pyanj and we were suddenly on a steep climb up a dirt road.  Matt, despite a month of practice, still lacked the foresight to realize that Jon Hay would not be able to take the first sharp switchback turn in second gear and immediately stalled out and started rolling back downhill.  We went with the rollback for a little ways knowing that we would need to build momentum to get back up the hill and around the bend, but Jon Hay didn’t seem to want to stop.  She ended up with her left wheels in a tiny creek alongside the road, inches from scratching her side on a huge rock.  With a push from Ian and a couple of the Brits we got Jon Hay back on the road and up around the first bend (in first gear).  Ian piled back in and we traversed a couple more turns before pulling to the side behind a tractor to make sure the other cars made it as well.  Both teams made it with significantly less fanfare and continued on ahead.  We pulled out from behind the tractor and built speed for the next uphill switchback and laughed about what would happen if a car was coming the other way down this one-lane road.  Well there wasn’t a car coming the other way as we hit the blind turn, but there were four donkeys carrying giant bales of grass (presumably for feeding during the winter) and little boy.  Matt slammed the brakes (and the clutch…no stalling this time) and let Jon Hay drift back down to the tractor.  After the boy and his donkeys passed, we got Jon Hay up and running and around the next few turns, navigating through a couple more groups of people and their donkeys.  By the time we caught up with the other two cars, they were sending people down the hill to make sure we hadn’t drifted into another creek/rock.  Apparently it was easier to navigate around the donkeys when you don’t come face-to-face with them while coming around a bend.  The Swiss, whose car has 4-wheel drive and a higher clearance and thus an easier time with this road, offered to go behind us so they could help if we encountered any other problems, but we made it to the top seemingly without any further troubles.  As we pulled to a stop behind Genghis Style (the British team), however, they pointed out that there was a puddle of liquid dripping from Jon Hay.  We popped the hood and it was immediately obvious that there was a problem with our coolant.  The liquid that was supposed to be cooling everything down was instead at a full boil.  The good news is that there wasn’t a leak, the bad news was that our coolant was evaporating out the emergency vent, condensing again once it hit the air and dripping to the ground.  We poured some cold water on some of Jon Hay’s vitals and waited a few minutes for things to cool down.  Luckily we’d had more than enough coolant in there so the levels were still ok, when we finally continued on.  The “roads” were often no more than the width of the car, with our tires inches from the precipice of a steep cliff (without any railings, of course); they were made of dirt with rocks jutting up out of the ground and other loose rocks everywhere .  Without any leeway to maneuver, we were often scraping the bottom of the car on the fixed rocks and shooting the loose rocks up into Jon Hay’s undercarriage.  We were certainly thankful for the skid plates added in Astrakhan.  On top of that, steering was becoming increasingly more difficult.  Could the mystery stream of liquid from two days before have actually been our power steering?  We took it slow and when we came across an abandoned house with some flat land near a freshwater stream we sopped a little early (no need to search in the dark again).

The water was cold, but we washed up and filled up some unfiltered reserve water just in case.   Unlike previous campsites, setting up next to the road did not create noise issues because it was entirely devoid of cars…except for the Argentinian guys from the previous day!  What!?!?  Had they been behind us the whole time?  They didn’t stop so who knows?  Anyway, Matt was starting to feel the effects of the altitude so he turned in early, but got little sleep.  Ian stayed up for awhile with the rest of the crew, but it was an early night overall.

 

2013.08.11 — Sunday — It took literally 15 minutes for Jon Hay to overheat the next day.  We popped the hood and despite being near the “max” level when we checked the previous day, the coolant was now down around the “min” level and what was left was boiling again!

A large percentage of the fluid must have continued to evaporate off throughout the night.  Our unfiltered water had unfortunately gone missing in the morning, but luckily the British team also had a 5-liter bottle of unfiltered water, which we used to cool off Jon Hay and fill up her nearly empty coolant compartment.

It wasn’t ideal, but it did the trick…for 30 minutes. We popped the hood again and sure enough the coolant/water was boiling again.  We let everything cool off and checked the oil thinking maybe low oil could cause excess friction/heat.  Since we stopped this time right when things just started to overheat, very little “coolant” had boiled off, so we decided to continue on as is.  However, without adding new cold liquid, the temperature gage went right back to critical levels after just a couple minutes.  The “coolant” was obviously boiling again.  We were just about as far from any semblance of civilization as we would be at any point during the trip, so it was going to be a long, slow journey or we needed to do a much more thorough evaluation to determine whether there were any remedial actions we could possibly take.  We decided on the latter option and fairly quickly discovered that one of Jon Hay’s fans had come unhinged and was sitting idly in its casing.  After several unsuccessful attempts by several different people to reattach the fan, we decided to unscrew the casing and remove the fan to take a closer look.  Upon doing so, it was immediately apparent that the notches on the fan were worn clean and thus the fan would serve us better as a passenger in the cabin of the car rather than blocking air flow under the hood.  And that’s how Fan became the fourth passenger in the car (Envelope — the one that finally delivered our car registration in Romania — earned the third spot). We screwed the casing back in place, refilled the coolant with more water, crossed our fingers and soldiered on.  The others held back a little while, but we pressed on assuming that they would catch up when we no doubt overheated and needed to stop again somewhere in the not-so-distant future.  However, low and behold, the temperature gage returned to normal levels and remained there!  The water continued to evaporate (we added new water every few hours), but what remained of the actual coolant kept things from boiling and, along with the new airflow through where Fan used to be, was able to keep things cool.  Jon Hay seemed appeased for the time being, but decided to permanently switch on her “check engine” light for good measure.  The roads were just as treacherous as the previous day, but as long as Jon Hay wasn’t overheating we couldn’t be happier.  The views were certainly living up to the hype.  The snow-capped peaks of the Hindu Kush were absolutely majestic.  Whereas our progress had been impeded by car troubles earlier in the day, our progress in the afternoon was only stalled by frequent photo opportunities.

Ian guided Jon Hay through Kargush Pass and successfully to the end of the Wakhan Corridor (where it rejoins the Pamir Highway) and thus to the end of the most perilous portion of our journey.  We’ve never been so excited to see uneven, pockmarked pavement.

We took a bunch of photos and waited for the other teams.

The first team to pass by our location, however, wasn’t one from our caravan, but rather the Argentinian guys from the past two days!  How had they gotten behind us again?  Had we passed them?  Had they ventured into Pakistan and come back?  Still so many questions.  We had plenty of time to ponder these mysteries because an hour passed and still neither team from our caravan had arrived.  We contemplated heading back, but the craziness of the roads made this a taller task than it would have otherwise been.  Thankfully, after an hour and 45 minutes we saw the Swiss team approaching, but it wasn’t until they got right up next to us that we noticed they had cracks running throughout their windshield, two driver-side windows were missing with the mirror taped on and what had been a nice roof rack full of equipment was now just a couple essentials tied down by a strap.  Apparently they had gathered a little too much speed going into some bumps in the road and done 3/4 of a roll with the driver-side ending up on the ground with the passenger dangling above by the seatbelt.  Thankfully and amazingly they escaped completely unharmed other than a small cut on Andrea’s hand.

A passing Tajik truck with two men and a boy (and a goat strapped to the roof…yes, a live goat strapped to the roof) stopped and helped the Swiss team get their car upright, gather their belongings and get back on the road.  The British team had also been there to help out, but they had worn out both of the rear shocks on their car, so it was slow going for them on the bumpy road and and they were aways behind the Swiss when they met up with us.  By the time the British team caught up with us, the Swiss realized that a couple items were still missing and decided to double back to the crash site to look for them.  It was getting late in the day so we continued on with the Brits to find a campsite while there was still light (having to dodge several undefined rodents in the driving process).  Per usual, we found a dirt road off the main highway and set up camp in a very windy field using Jon Hay as a wind block (Genghis Style left their car in the road so the Swiss could find us when they got there).  At greater than 13,000 feet of elevation, it was quite cold and most of the Brits had joined Matt in experiencing the pangs of altitude sickness so most took to their tents the second they were up.  Attila the Pun stayed up having dinner and awaiting the Swiss (we were later joined by Mark and Amy).  Just as we were starting to get worried, our Swiss friends arrived (they had to be freezing driving with no windows during the cold of the night).  Unfortunately they had not been able to recover the missing items and the more they thought about it the more they realized that the Tajik boy had been handling most of the now-missing items and that the Tajik group had acted very awkwardly when ultimately saying goodbye and leaving the crash site.  The missing items included Robert’s iPhone, an iPod and Ian’s raybans (which Robert had borrowed).  With the full caravan reunited, Matt again succumbed to the altitude and went to sleep while Ian, Mark, Amy and the Swiss continued to reflect on the stories of the day.

 

2013.08.12 — Monday — Today marked the final day of Attila the Pun’s Tajikistan visas, so we woke up early to make a strong move for the Kyrgyzstan border.  The border entering Tajikistan had closed at 5 PM, so we wanted to make sure we got to the exit border by at least 3 PM.  We were all set to head out on our own, but the Brits and Swiss decided that Kyrgyzstan sounded good to them as well (Osh would be the best place to get their cars fixed), so the caravan remained in tact…at least briefly.  Once on the road, Attila the Pun led the way, followed by the Brits and then the Swiss.  However, the Swiss must have stopped frequently to take photos (pretty standard) because they were quickly out of sight and never caught up…they knew we were in a bit of a hurry to get to the border so we carried on without them.  En route to the border, Attila the Pun and Genghis Style ascended Ak-Baital Pass to 15,317 feet elevation, the highest point of the entire rally.

 

From there, the road wound along the Tajik/Chinese border.  At one point we got out to take photos of Jon Hay with China in the background and noticed a break in the fence…so we very briefly added a 17th country to our itinerary.

From there we continued on to Kara-Kul, a large lake in northeastern Tajikistan that was created when a meteor struck Earth approximately 10 million years ago.  The lake took on an amazing bluish-green hue and, coupled with the snow-capped mountains all around, created an amazingly picturesque landscape.  In fact, we did indeed stop and take a bunch of photos.

The lake marked the last Tajik landmark before the border (though along the way we did have our first river crossing, which offered some excitement).  Attila and Genghis made our way up to Kyzyl-Art Pass and the Tajik border at 13,814 feet elevation.  Exiting the country was fairly painless, but getting to the entry point to Kyrgyzstan was an adventure in itself.  We drove for 45 minutes down choppy dirt roads with frequent switchbacks as we descended nearly 2,500 feet in elevation.  On the way we encountered yaks in the road, a stretch where we were actually required to drive along (not alongside) the river to get to the other side and finally a third river crossing so deep that the water splashed up over the hood of the car.  A video of this third crossing can be found here:  http://youtu.be/ZoXn3a1fQc8.  Unfortunately you can’t hear our yelling or the loud scraping noises as Jon Hay dragged her underside on the rocks of the riverbed.  As if all of this wasn’t enough, it began to rain shortly before we arrived at the Kyrgyzstan border.  Apparently everyone at the border crossing heads for shelter when the cold rains fall, because the only person we encountered at the border glanced at our passports, asked if we spoke Russian/had narcotics and then told us to let ourselves out the gate.  No paperwork, no stamps, less than two minutes in total.  Strange but convenient.  We waited briefly for the Swiss, but it was getting late, we had 4 hours to go until Osh and there was a distinct possibility that the Swiss stopped and set up camp rather than drive in the rain with broken and missing windows.  Ultimately we decided to email the Swiss to let them know we were continuing on to Osh and hoped to meet up with them there.  The two remaining teams booked it to Osh along fairly well put-together roads that were essentially one big descent down to an elevation of 3,250 feet (almost 10,500 feet lower than the Tajik border and over 12,000 feet below Ak-Baital Pass, our highest point of the day).  Along the way, Jon Hay decided to accompany her constant “check engine” light with a flashing “parking brake” light.  It was unclear as to whether or not this was associated with the fact that it was now a full workout to turn the steering wheel; power steering was definitely gone.  Nevertheless we made it to Osh and, once there, the six of us went out to dinner and then checked into Hotel Osh for a little r&r after six nights of camping.

 

2013.08.13 — Tuesday — We arose the next morning to find that there had been our first time change in quite some time and we all of a sudden had an hour less until checkout than we originally thought.  We quickly cleaned some clothes in the tub, washed our cookware in the sink and completely overstuffed the small bathroom trashcan with all of our waste from the previous week.  We checked out and bid farewell to the Brits  (who were hanging around to replace their shocks) and set out on our own for the first time since Samarkand.  The first order of business was to stop for gas, coolant and power steering fluid.  Fortunately Kyrgyzstan has the opposite problem from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan: whereas in the previous countries we’d needed to search long and hard for a gas station, there seemed to be one on every corner in our present country.  We identified a service station that seemingly had everything that we needed (gas, fluids, repairs) and pulled in.  In an almost no longer surprising twist of fate, the Argentinian guys were pulling out as we pulled in.  It marked the fourth time crossing paths in five days.  Crazy.  Anyway, the service station did indeed have everything we needed and we were able to refill all our necessary fluids.  Jon Hay backed out of their garage with grace and ease.  Unfortunately, she again left a streak of liquid on the ground as she did.  The power steering compartment was once again empty.  A mechanic was called in, he tightened a few connections, power steering fluid was once again added and this time it stayed.  Jon Hay was finally healthy and happy (except for the two lights on the dash).  The day from there was spent  navigating our way around the corner of Uzbekistan, which was harder to do than it sounds…apparently all roads from Osh lead to Uzbekistan (where was this when we were trying to get into Uzbekistan 10 days ago?) and then winding our way over mountainous roads, through the driving rain into Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan.  The city was amazingly well developed; it was one of the most put-together cities we’d seen since leaving Europe.  Needless to say, we were impressed.  We identified our location on the map and started making our way towards our hotel.  We were almost there when a police car pulled us over.  We certainly hadn’t broken any obvious driving laws and this didn’t look like one of the usual checkpoints we’d encountered throughout the region, so we weren’t sure what was going on.  It took a lot of back-and-forth with three different officers to realize that we’d entered an area of the city that is closed off to cars at night.  We literally had not left the road on which we’d made our way all the way north from near Uzbekistan, so why it was not more abundantly clear that we needed to detour will forever remain a mystery.  Our punishment was a hefty fine, but we somehow convinced them to escort us to our hotel and upon arrival the two officers got out and started smoking so we gave them a pack of cigarettes and they let us go.  A $3 pack of duty-free cigarettes from two people who don’t smoke in exchange for a waived fine and a police escort to our hotel…not a bad deal.  We checked in and ordered pizza and beer to the Holiday Hotel.  While Hotel Osh had been serviceable (and great relative to six days of camping), the Holiday Hotel was a huge step up.  We once again got in late, but we took some time to enjoy the amenities before turning in for the night.

 

2013.08.14 — Wednesday — We had intended to get an early start, but Matt had been up late and Ian woke up not feeling well, so we had trouble making it out even by our noon check out.  The hotel generously gave us water and we met a man in the ally behind the building (where our car was parked) who had studied in England and spoke great English (it was unclear whether or not he also worked for the hotel).  The man was very excited to hear all about our trip.  He pointed out all the places to go and things to see along our remaining route through Kyrgyzstan.  He also identified the good and bad roads and gave us directions out of the city.  We bid him farewell and followed his instructions right out of Bishkek.  We spent the day driving east across the country to Lake Issyk-Kul, a very large lake that is the fifth deepest in the world.  The lake is apparently a very hot vacation spot.  We drove along the southern side of the lake, which was supposedly very scenic relative to the north side (which is riddled with resorts), and we still came across quite a large number of locals and foreigners swimming in the water and hanging out on the beach.  We came around up the eastern side of the lake looking for Jeti-Oguz and Karakol.  We missed the former entirely and made it completely through the latter without seeing the turn-off we wanted, so we decided to just continue on.  It was about 7 PM and light was starting to wane, but it was only 100 kilometers to the Kazakhstan border so we headed that way.  A quick trip across the border could allow us to get to Almaty (and one final hotel) by 11 PM.  As with any Mongol Rally plans, execution was much harder than ever anticipated.  The first excitement came when a car attempted to pass us, but didn’t get all the way there before pulling back into our lane, nearly clipping Jon Hay’s front bumper.  As if that wasn’t enough, the same car then proceeded to go 10 MPH slower than we had been going.  Naturally we decided to pass the car right back, but as we pulled alongside, they decided they wanted to move into the passing lane as well (presumably not noticing that we were already there) and they almost side swiped us.  They forced Jon Hay halfway onto the shoulder before noticing we were there and finally giving us the lane to pass.  Two incidents in less than five minutes would have made for an interesting story, but shortly thereafter they decided to pass us again.  This time, instead of just nearly clipping our bumper, they tried to take out half the car.  They initiated a return to our lane when the back of their car was even with our passenger seat forcing us to slam on the brakes and again swerve out into the median.  What was going on?  On top of that, as we pulled back onto the road behind them, they immediately pulled off to the side of the road, let us by, did a U-turn and headed the other way.  What?  Was this a test?  Did we pass?  We were trying to figure out what had just happened when, less than 2 minutes later, a kid who was riding his bicycle alongside the road in the same direction as us decided he wanted to head back the other direction and without looking just flipped around into in the road facing us.  We had less than 15 meters to slam on the brakes and skid to a stop.  Clearly if we were going to leave Kyrgyzstan it wasn’t going to be easy.  Unfortunately, the challenge was only beginning.  From there the road quality deteriorated rapidly (which was pretty universally the case as we approached/departed any border crossing from Romania/Moldova on).  As we pressed on further and further, the roads got narrower and the potholes deeper.  Night fell and it was very slow going.  Eventually we found ourselves on what seemed to be a service road driving through puddles that were wider than the car.  The road had become even more questionable than the standard border road and it’d taken longer than it should have to find the border.  We pulled out the compass and found that instead of heading northeast like we were supposed to, we somehow were heading mainly south and a little east.  We had somehow driven to the boarder and now were following it towards China!  We doubled back for an hour, past where we thought a turnoff might be and yet we still saw no other options other than straight ahead.  It was now 10 PM so we decided to give it one more shot before setting up a camp and navigating in the daylight.  Just as we were about to give up, we stumbled across a sign indicating that we needed to take a left turn to get to the border.  We drove another 150 meters and, low-and-behold, there was a left turn sloping down from the road, almost invisible in the dark had we not known to look for it.  Back on the right track, we drove for another 20 minutes and finally found the border!  Which was closed.  Of course.  We set up camp in a field next to the border got ready for what would hopefully be a quick crossing and a full day of driving the next day.

 

2013.08.15 — Thursday — After a very cold night, we got up at 8 AM and were fully ready to go when the border opened at 8:30.  We cruised up to the first station of the crossing, were asked for our car registration….and couldn’t produce it!  Where had it gone?  We took everything out of our car and searched through all of our bags and still it was nowhere to be found.  Not this again.  Despair began to set in.  We’d had it the previous day, where could it have gone?  Did we leave it on the roof of the car and it blew away?  Did it just fall out of the car when we stopped somewhere along the way?  We were sure we’d stuffed it back in the glovebox.  And therein laid the solution.  The glovebox was stuffed so full that the registration had wedged itself in the top of the compartment, out of view when we opened the door.  Incident averted.  Phew!  We progressed to the next station and produced our passports.  No entry stamp, no problem, right?  Wrong!  No entry stamp, no exit.  No matter how many times we told them story about the Kyzyl-Art Pass crossing and their “Do you have drugs? Do you speak Russian? Ok go.” method, it was to no avail.  We even showed them our GPS tracking points that clearly identified us exiting Tajikistan when/where our passports indicated and crossing through the Kyrgyz border point, but still nothing.  How do they know this tracking thing is real?  How do they know we didn’t sneak across a border with drugs or weapons and distribute them across the country?  And if we did indeed cross at the point we say we did, how do they know we didn’t use weapons to cross forcefully?  Well, you probably would have heard about that, or you could even call and confirm that didn’t happen…oh wait, Kyzyl-Art Pass is apparently so remote that they don’t even have phones there.  Perfect.  So we had to pull our car off to the side and wait for the “big boss” to arrive sometime between noon and 2 PM.  Fortunately this window was accurate.  Unfortunately he arrived at the very end of this window and we were stuck waiting in our car for 4.5 hours.  And of course the “big boss” wasn’t going to just let us through without some personal gain.  Half the day was already gone so we did what we had to do and were finally allowed to leave Kyrgyzstan with no entry stamp, just an exit stamp (reading about Kyrgyzstan in our Central Asia book ex post facto, they specifically say that they sometimes “forget” to give you an entry stamp and that you need to demand one…pretty sweet scam they have going).  Thankfully the Kazakh side of the border was much smoother and by just after 3 PM we were finally on our way.  The question now was whether or not we stop in Almaty, the last major city between us and Ulaanbaatar.  We were already way behind on the day, but fuel and water were necessary and a final use of the internet and maybe a bed/shower (if we decided to stay a night) would be nice additions.  That’s when things got interesting (since the day had been so uneventful thus far)…but that’s in Kazakhstan and doesn’t belong in this post.