It is with regret that I had to leave the team in Baku and fly home early. I had reached my £2000 spending limit and was only half way to mongolia! It was also looking doubtful that we would make it all the way to Ulaan baator before i had to be in Norway on the 15th of August and therefore borowing more money only to go a little bit further and then sack it due to time seemed silly. A difficult decision may be on its way for both snack and punz who also have appointments back home at around the same time.

The journey through Europe took longer and cost much more than expected. Petrol prices remained at british levels all the way up until turkey when they got even more expensive, approx €1.7 per litre. Needles to say our funds were obliterated.

Crossing the caspian and entering Turkmenistan proved far more difficult and expensive than anyone could have predicted. the ferry ticket alone was approx $200 each plus $100 or more for a visa on the other side, let alone what the turkmenistanis chose to bill for the privelige of bringing a car into their dusty country. A cock up in london also meant that the azerbaijani border control were not aware of our invitations to enter the turkmenistan and so refused us access to the ferry. After two days of frantically going backand forth between embassies and many expensive phonecalls to london, the invitations were faxed through. Meanwhile we were all sleeping rough in an abandonned train yard in the ferrry port, anxiously waiting for a ferry to show up.

Last I heard the boys had successfully borded the ferry and are on their way over the sea. In addition to...[Read More]