Hey guys and gals,

 After a 2 and half hour search for the border last night in 40sq km area we found it only to camp down so we could be first in the Q - Still took us a good 2hours 30mins to get through thou. Roads through turkmenistan were really good and there building new roads so next years rally should have a nicer drive. We had to bribe some check point card who looked at our paper work and decided to keep it untill we gave him 10bucks. Todays been a hot day and we have drunk so much liquid.

Yesterday on 1st august was sarah's 19th birthday from registration so we cracked open a beer on here bonnet and then got the screen or sticky and dusty so wasnt a very good idea. Went for a paddle in the river somewhere in turkmenistan which has giant fish in it so we decided to keep to the shore line.

 Today arrivingin samarkand - we meet up with 3 others teams can't remember there names and also 2 other teams one from spain and other from milano. Plan for tommorrow is to hit tashkent - uzbek capitail and cross the border in to kazakastan - and start the long drive to the russian border. We have decided to slack of kygstan as its 2 border crossing only to drive 80km through the country and out the other side.

I must go - sending love to friends and relatives. xxx