Ulaan Baatar and onwards!!

We made it to Ulaan Baatar!!! After the last post it took another 2 days to reach the capital. No problems with the van along the way and we spent our last night camping in Mongolia under a full moon…ahhhh.

Now we’re in the capital staying in a great hostel [The Golden Gobi for anyone coming this way] while we wait for our train to Beijing which we’re taking tomorrow.  Beds are expensive while the Olympics are still on but we’ll head on after a couple of days to Shanghai. From there around the country, then Seoul to visit our friend, Paul, Japan and then Perth to Larry’s sister Karen and family!!

For now its ’see ya’ from Mairead and Larry on the Mongolia Rally. We made it and raised a fantastic E3,000 for two great charities with all your help.

Thanks everyone and see you soon!!!

Mairead and Larry

 

The Van

We handed over poor old ‘Lighty’ yesterday to the Mongolian Charity ‘CDPF’. We were overcome with emotion, and nearly, yes nearly, got in to drive it back home!. Some pics to follow…

Anyways, Mairead has given me permission to write a post about the van so here goes;

Some quick facts and figures for all you anoraks out there!; 

-  trip distance just under 15,000kms,

- 5 litres of engine oil burned

- two sets of rear leaf springs thrashed

- 1.5 litres of injector/engine cleaner

- 1020 litres of diesel, max price per litre: Turkey @1.70euro, min price per litre: Iran @1.5cent / litre

- 1 puncture (Altai, Russia)

- worrying rattles, squeaks, bangs, rumbles & vibrations – mmm quite a few at the finish line…

Early on in the rally we were aprehensive about driving the van too hard on the motorways and possibly blowing it up prematurely. Fortunately it proved to be well able for the pace and we comfortably notched up 600 – 700kms each day through Europe. Our daily routine checklist consisted of oil, coolant, fan belts, tyres, sump guard, radiator damage and leaf spring condition.  

Apart from the rear suspension breaking about 500kms before the finish line, the van didn’t miss a beat right through the rally. With over 200,000 miles on the clock, thats no mean feat. The horrendous condition of the roads from Turkmenistan onwards eventually took its toll on the rear leaf springs which were already quite corroded from years of driving on salty winter roads in Northern Ireland. The sound and sensation of the van being pounded by endless ‘washboard’ roads and unaviodable potholes(steer around one and you end up directly in another, invariably even bigger one that that which you sought to avoid!) is one which will stay with us for a long time.

When the suspension did eventually give up, Kealan & I managed to repair it enough using some excellent metal banding which Kealans friend Simon had given to him on the rally launch day! This repair enabled us to keep going until we got to a town, and possibly a mechanic…

After a night spent in a families’ ger, we did manage to enlist the services of a local ‘mechanic’ who worked with me all day to replace/repair the rear suspension. Neither of us speaking word of each others language. Nice. One side was completed in a matter of hours, but the other side proved to be a very different proposition. Completely corroded bolts would cause the biggest problem. In the end, after over 10 hours work, we had to compromise and finish the job with a new spring ‘grafted’ to the broken old one on one side. Kealan from CorktoMongolia got stuck in during the final stages, overseeing the work by torchlight. $160 and the aforementioned 10+ hours of work, and we were ready to tackle the last 500kms to Ulaan Baatar. Next morning on the road, I felt that the ‘weak’ side would not withstand the punishment of the roads, and so decided to beef up the existing repair job with the VW Transporter suspension spring which we brought as an emergency spare. I’ll put up some pics to explain how this worked, but basically the Toyota spring is a ‘leaf’ or flat spring, and the VW spring is a coil or round spring - used together provided a setup which allowed us to drive at normal speeds on the terrible roads and not worry about the suspension collapsing again. End result – we made it through the last 500kms using this system!.

All in all for a 15 year old machine which no doubt had a hard life right through, it performed excellently.

Just a quick note to say thanks again to everyone who helped with getting the van ready for the trip – particularly to Mervyn for prepping the van to the highest level - some man! Also thanks to Jamie at Paschal Powers’ Auto Breakers for pulling those spare wheels out of nowhere at the last minute, and to Dave Hayes for donating and modifying the excellent roof rack and sump guard (funnily enough I left that to the last minute too ) Oh and a big thanks to John Brett at Clonmel Tyres for finding and donating the excellent off road tyres.

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Right, that was my post. Over and out. Larry

 

Mongolia at long, long last!!

We’re in Mongolia!! At the moment we’re about 500k outside Ulaan Baatar in Tsetserleg. Whoah. Whoah. What an amazing country but by God we’re working for it.

It took 6 hours to get out of Russia at the border and then about 20 minutes to get into Mongolia. We had tarmac on the Russian side and then on the Mongolian side they just stopped and from there we had dirt roads. So far we’ve travelled 800km from the border, 20km of which has been tarmac. The Liteace of course really comes to the fore on the dirt roads The ‘roads’ are dirt tracks which come in various degrees of silliness - craters, boulder fields, swamps, rivers, mud, sand…and pretty much everything else apart from nice smooth oh so beautiful tarmac. Many a time we’ve had all four wheels off the ground, heads hitting the roof, legs off the floor and back down again for more.

There are also no signs whatsoever in the country for where you want to go. The dirt tracks become so bad that new ones form beside the originals so you just see streams of tracks running out into the distance and you have to pick which one looks the best and go for it. We’ve gotten lost a good few times but seem to find our way. Each time we’ve gotten lost hasnt been wasted time. In our ‘lost time’ we’ve met up with many lovely families who’ve invited us into their gers and offered us local food and tea and in one case Mongolian vodka from a teapot at 10am. Nice.

The countryside is stunning – mountains, lakes, rivers, valleys, spotless. Loads of amazing wildlife and tons of wild horses, camels and the countryside is filled with goats, yaks, cattle and sheep being herded across the land by nomadic herders. There are gers dotted all about the landscape. More so than we thought. And like Iran we’ve gotten a wave and a huge smile wherever we go.

The first two days were the toughest of the journey so far. We went in the Western border of Mongolia and chose to cross the country by the Northern route which is reputed to be the hardest. Of the first 100km we had to pass through boulder-ridden mountain roads, swamps, rivers. We were pulled out of the swamp by a Russian minivan and by the Lada Niva at a river when we cut out in the middle of crossing it. It was all worth it though as it brought us through some amazing countryside and those first few days were the most memorable.

Liteace….mmmm she’s been doing a sterling job but 3 days ago we sadly lost both sets of rear leaf springs. The right side first then like an old couple the left side went soon after. Larry spent one whole day fixing it and bodging it with a local ‘mechanic’ and a whole ger community looking on. End result we’re back on the road with 500km to go, ratchet straps, metal binding and rubber tubing keeping the whole show on the road :-} Liteace dedicated post to follow. Bet you can’t wait.

We got our first shower after 2 weeks last night [we have been washing in rivers and lakes!] and are taking off tomorrow for the final leg to Ulaan Baatar. Will update this post when we get there :-}

 

Russia

Only a small post to say we entered Russia safely. So far we’ve seen areas of lots of huge, huge farmland. On our first night four car loads of us camped behind a gathering of trees on one of these huge farms. Cooked up a storm of friend potatoes and had some Russian beer.

Now we are in Barnaul in Russia. We’re both still getting sporadic doses of the sprints. We are setting off tomorrow all going well to make it into the Altai mountains on the Russian side to see the total eclipse in more fitting surroundings than a smelly city.

So far Russians are nice but a bit scary. We hope to be in Mongolia on the 4th August if not earlier.

RUSSIA UPDATE!

Since we last posted here we got the full solar eclipse outside Barnaul. It was really surreal. We watched it with a family of Russians who gave us their floppy disk to look at the eclipse through. There was a random American man cycling through Russia and Central Asia who stopped for it too. The cows were mooing and the birds were confused and legged it en masse.

We then spent 3 fabulous days camping in the Altai Mountains near the border with Mongolia. The scenery was spectacular, camping spots everywhere by rivers, forests, mountains, lakes! All the nice stuff we didnt have in Turkmenistan [hee hee Turkeymenistan is getting a bashing again!]

Had a surprisingly nice time in Russia. Many people in other countries along the way had warned us away from it but yet again it luckily wasnt true!

 

Kazakhstan

We breezed through the border officials as we exited Uzbekistan but were asked for our first bribe by a Kazakhstan official…ahhh how cute. NO!! was our response. We got through without giving a cent but lost a coloured glittery pen to an official who was in charge of opening the gate to leave us into Kazakhstan. Damn it they were for the Mongolian children!! Meanie pants.

We spent our first night in Shymkent on the hardest bed in the world. We then drove on the next day with Kealan and Claudine in our little convoy and camped in the evening on grassland at the edge of a village. During the evening we were visited by practically the whole village. They laughed at the lads’ tent and said they would be very cold in it. Larry showed them some photos on his camera one with him in his tent in Ireland camping. Kazakh people may now think all Irish people live in tents. Sorry guys.

We were given a present of a giant water melon by local children and shown family photos. We also got a visit by the police to check up on us. Then another car came by to laugh at the notion of staying in a tent.

We had a lovely sleep and were visited again in the morning by some friendly men and were given locally made balls of cheese that were very salty and unfortunately inedible.

We left for Almaty a big city in the south east of Kazakhstan. We stayed one night as the hotels were very expensive – $140 for one night with no air conditioning! Tsk. Had a good night out on the town as we met up with two ex-pats who filled us in on a thing or two about the country…very interesting…

We left Almaty the next day and spent it camping at a lake further up the country. Think Ireland is dirty…the place was nearly a rubbish dump it was that bad. We were kept awake all night by silly young Kazakhs and left the next morning in a grumpy mood.

Another night of camping with the mosquitos and we stayed our last night in Semey in Northern Kazakhstan. It was the site of numerous nuclear bomb test in the Soviet era and supposedly a whole city nearby was wiped out with 2 million killed. Its never been mentioned and was covered up by the Soviet government of the time. It was a very poor city.

Next day we left Kazakhstan which we liked – friendly and not so friendly people, nice countryside. We never got to use some Borat quotes as apparently they actually really do dislike any mention of it. Boo. On to Russia!

 

Uzbekistan

After being made wait outdoors for 3 hours in the intense heat by the Turkmenistan border officials we eventually, thankfully, mercifully made it out with our sanity and into Uzbekistan where we had to go through their border procedures.

All the borders we’ve passed through followed the same routine. First checkpoint where you’d be approached by guys selling the next country’s currency, and a passport check. Next point machina passport check. Next point endless realms of red tape and big stamps. Next point machina search by officals where they look at your fancy camera and route around your belongings. Next point buy insurance or pay for some document that you need. Then its a ‘welcome to our country’ and away we go.

As regards the Uzbekistan border, we’d heard a lot of things about the police and how they were fond of the ole bribe or two but we had no problem at the border, in fact the men were quite handsome.

We exchanged some dollars with the black market money changing guys on the Uzbek side. They wouldnt touch the Turkmenistan manat and we’ve found this to be the case everywhere we’ve tried to change it so far. We dont blame them. Larry did the money changing business with them and used an impressive PJ Gallagher whistling action to interpret what he wanted. They laughed. PJ could do well over here.

We were elated to be out of Turkmenistan and celebrated with a big bottle of cold coca cola and fanta by the roadside.

On to the old town of Bukhara for us. Throughout central Asia there are numerous police checks where there’s little huts and barriers where you’re either signalled to pull in or continue. They’ve also discovered speed cameras and the police hide out in every nook and cranny of the roads to catch you. We were stopped by a couple of Uzbek police but we managed to have a laugh with them and we didnt have to pay out any bribes throughout our time in the country. Apparently it was a hell of a lot worse a couple of years ago where foreign tourists were stopped often and had to give money to corrupt officials.

There seemed to be more history and culture on show in Uzbekistan than Turkmenistan. In Bukhara we stayed in a lovely B&B set around a courtyard and decorated in the Uzbek style with a fridge and lots of colouredy walls and Islamic decor [will get pictures up on flickr soon...dire descriptions].

After Bukhara we went to Samarkand which is well known in central Asia for its beautiful old mosques and medressas [Islamic colleges] which are centuries old. And indeed they were lovely [pictures to follow when we find computers with USB ports!]

Lots of French and other tourists here in Uzbekistan surprisingly! This meant the food and service was better throughout the country. More meat on sticks.

After a dose of the trots which seems to have left its dirty hand on everyone on the rally so far, we left Samarkand and Uzbekistan and on to Kazakhstan….We liked Uzbekistan…did we mention that we didnt like Turkmenistan??

 

Turkmenistan

We have lots of other names for Turkmenistan at the moment and none of them are flattering. We just crossed the border today into Uzbekistan and out of Turkmenistan and oh my God how glad are we.

It was one big disappointment. In Iran we were spoiled with such lovely friendly people, in Turkmenistan we were either laughed at or treated with disdain. They really dont care about tourists and only care about charging them 5 times the normal price.

The capital Ashgabad is like a wonderland-twilight zone. It has about 10 golden statues of Turkmenbasy their previous president that I counted over the city and countless rows of marble faced buildings. Yet when we left the capital to drive across the roads in the country they were in the worst condition I’ve ever seen. But along the way drivers are treated to quotes from his book, Ruhnama.

We spent about 3 hours getting out of the country today and would never go back again or advise anyone to go. We can send you pictures…

 

Iran

Wow what an amazing country. We’d been told great things about the people in Iran but nothing prepared us for how kind, welcoming and helpful the people were.

The border crossing into Iran from Turkey was eventful…Larry had to declare that he had one fine bottle of champagne for ’special celebration’ in Mongolia. This did not wash with the Iranian border official [alcohol is banned in Iran] who frogmarched Larry through the customs area to the toilet (making sure everyone knew that he was a bold boy). He had to pop it in the ’skiloo’ in front of the officials but the bottle prematurely popped and made the officials jump back in shock at the ‘explosion’! But they said all was ok after the bottle was dumped down the toilet.

We had cars beeping and people waving at us everywhere we went. A couple of people pulled up and stopped their cars just to say, ‘Welcome to Iran’. And the other guys with us even had their petrol paid for them by an Iranian family after they had not enough rials to pay. On that note the price of diesel was ridiculously low throughout the country with the average 50 litre fill up costing about a dollar! We love Iran

I had to wear a head scarf and cover up so was in turn roasting for the whole Iran experience but it was worth it! Would love to go back and visit other cities in Iran in the future. And would recommend everyone to go!

 

Turkey

At the moment we’re in Bukhara, Uzbekistan and finally we’ve gotten on the internet. Here’s a couple of posts on the different countries so far….

Turkey first – we stopped in Istanbul for a half day off and met up with other ralliers for dinner. We had a bit of trouble getting to where we wanted (lack of signposts and drivers were mental) so we thought it would be better to abandon the cars in an underground carpark for the day.

Istanbul was fabulous! Spent a lovely evening listening to the mosques calling out for prayer and taking in the sights and sounds of the old part of the city.

The rest of Turkey was just as good as our experience in Istanbul. People were friendly, chatty and helpful. The roads were good but deteriorated a bit towards the Eastern part of the country towards Iran.

The diesel price was crazy high and we spent a lot of money getting across the big country that is Turkey.

We had two police escorts in turkey, one to our hotel and the other out of the maze of roads in Istanbul.

 

Latest update…!!

So turns out there’s a lot of driving involved in this driving overland to Mongolia lark so we’ve only got a day off today and we’re in Istanbul, on day six.

We left for London last Friday the 4th July by taking the ferry from Rosslare. The ferry was at 9 and we left Clonmel at 6.30am. We had not slept. All Thursday night was spent packing the van, packing our bags and sorting stuff. I had one hour doze which was riddled with thoughts of what the hell are we doing, can I back out now and stay in bed?

Said our see yas to the family bright in the morning and kept ourselves awake by drinking from a bottle of coke and I told Larry a story to keep him awake as we drove down to the ferry.

We made it at a tight squeeze and Kealan and Claudine from Cork who are Team Cork to Mongolia joined us on the ferry. We were away. With a little snooze in a Stena Lines ferry we arrived in Fishguard. On to London for the launch on Saturday where we met other particpants in the rally and the lovely Lorna came along for a gawk at us.

We set off in a convoy in traffic congested London for the channel tunnel to France.

In France we stayed in a cheap hotel in Dunkirk on Saturday night.

Sunday we drove from there to Wurzburg in Germany where we camped for cheapo euros. Monday we drove from there to Graz in Austria [south east] where we camped for less cheapo euros. Some poo coloured slugs were remarkable here.

Tuesday we drove from there to Paracin in Serbia. Nice spot more about that in later posts.

Wednesday is Larry’s birthday. We drive from Serbia through Bulgaria into Turkey. We stay in a town near the border. We are escorted to our hotel by the police.

Today, Thursday the 10th we are in Istanbul. We are heading out now for some beers with other people on the rally that is why this is rushed. Shall write more when have the time But Istanbul is great so far.

More later!!