This is our on the road map...
Day 100 Sunday, 31 October 2010
Day 56 Friday, 17 September 2010
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Hi All,Here's the official list of winners in our contest. Thanks to everyone for their support! Your hard earned cash is going to a great charity!The beginning odometer reading was 44859.The final odometer reading was 54006.Converting to kilometers, that makes it a 14,720 km journey! First Prize of the MacBook Air (and super drive) goes to Oliver Dutczak with an entry of 14750.Second Prize of a Sony Blu-Ray player goes to Emily Wendland with an entry of 14567.Third prize (to a faculty or staff member) of Fisher $100 credit and one of three IDT gift cards goes to Dr. Eef Harmsen;... Read more ... |
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After a peaceful night in Bayanhongar, we made our way to the last bit of hell road to the town of Avryheer. We knew that after Avryheer the road supposedly will be paved all the way to Ulan Bataar (UB). We were excited to see that it looked like they had extended the paved road - but alas it was under construction. Instead we were forced to take a nasty bit of road along side the "highway" which eventually veered south towards the Gobi desert. The road was grdaully taking us further and further away from the main road and... Read more ... |
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Day 39 Tuesday, 31 August 2010
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We just rolled into the Finish Line in UB! Have a lot of catching up and we will post the details soon. But we are safe and sound! Just had a cheese burger and fries washing everything down by a Pilsner Urquell! ... Read more ... |
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Day 30 Sunday, 22 August 2010
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Crossing the border between KZ and Russia was a piece of cake! The roads leading towards Barnual were excellent - brings tears to this ex-Californian's eyes. We are once again in the land of ATMs and VISA symbols at hotels, shops and restraunts. Today we will make our way to the western border between Russia and Mongolia. We've heard that the wait there can be measured in days (at least two). This means we will have to camp out in no man's land with likely other teams. Network access is likely not possible in Mongolia accept in UB so apologies... Read more ... |
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Day 29 Saturday, 21 August 2010
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After lounging in Bukhara for a luxurious day, shopping the bazaar, checking out the mosques and generally recovering, we headed off to Samarqand with 2/3 tank of gas. It quickly became clear from the numerous gas stations in various degrees of abandonment that the rumoured gas shortage was no exaggeration. The occasional station that is open is only selling propane, which we begin to understand is powering every car on the road except ours. We reduce speed and throw everything on the roof except tires in the car to reduce drag and arrive Samarqand with <1/8 tank of... Read more ... |
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Day 21 Friday, 13 August 2010
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Cut loose by our guide, we crossed the first checkpoint at the Iranian border with Turkmenista. A digression on borders. First, we are finally becoming accostomed to the notion that, unlike say the border between Canada and the US which are major traffic hubs fed by interstate highways and designed to facilitate international trade, the borders here are practialy cow paths. This threw us several times as we followed the major road assuming that must be the one leading to the border only to find that the road to the border in fact is a barely paved spur that wanders... Read more ... |
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While in Turmenistan, we were stopped by the police a few times. The guys in the big hats were just checking our papers or merely curious. We were stopped once for speeding - 110 km/hr in a 90 km/hr zone. He gave us a warning and wrote with his finger on the windscreen "90 km" in case were to forget!Our stay over in Turkmenibat (near the Turkmenistan/Uzbekistan border) was at a terribly designed hotel just outside of town. It was the usual enormous white buildings but the steps of the stairs were of different heights and the only way to... Read more ... |
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Day 19 Wednesday, 11 August 2010
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Hi All,We are currently in Mari, Turkmenistan. We've hadn't had a proper connection since the we entered Iran. We heard about the unfortunate news concerning the fatality from a Spnaish team stuck at the Iran-Turkmenistan border with no Turkmenistan visa (hope you guys get things sorted out). We will likely upload more updates soon when we get a better connection in Uzbekistan.Iran was great! The people are so friendly and helpful. We had no problems except for an apple incident (to be followupped later). Though the food was on average good - I think I can'r eat another kebab for... Read more ... |
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Day 11 Tuesday, 3 August 2010
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Yesterday Joe got his visa at 3PM! We took off immediately for Ankara - stayed at Sarp Hotel. Clean but a bit stuffy and noisy. Today we will try to reach the close to the border of Iran. Tomorrow Iran! ... Read more ... |
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