Come to track our progress?  Check this link, our satellite safety device also does location tracking.  Check it out!

OUR LOCATION AND PATH! SUPER AWESOME! 

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/gogl.jsp?glId=0UHpQN838FOXDunvSD0Jg83Q4lGtfXB4q 

Back Safe and Sound

So I am back in Seattle now, had blueberry pancakes for breakfast and enchiladas for dinner.  Went to see Inglorious Basterds over lunch and shared a pretzel with Tami.  In effort to remember and record as much as possible I am going to give a thorough Mongolia update even though it is well after the fact.

Starting in Osh, Kyrgyzstan we were pushing really hard as Chatham wanted to make the Mongol border by Friday.  On the way we ended up wearing through another of the old tires that had been on the car for probably well over 10 years.  The steel belting was abraiding and coming through the tread and tire wall.  It went flat, we had to solve this problem.  I pulled over at the next gas station, filled up the tank and then changed the tire to the spare.  The spare ended up going flat and topping that off the gas station attendant called the police on me.  The police showed up, watched me finish changing to the spare tire and talked to her, probably telling her that she was being a giant dork.

We rolled into town on a flat spare.  I found the first tire shop and had them do the local norm, which is put an inner tube inside the tire and inflate it.  I spent the next few hours driving around town looking for a tire shop that could sell me a correctly sized single replacement tire or four new tires that fit the car.  Eventually I found a shop that directed us to another shop that carried more than a couple random used tires.  At something something Boktok shop we looked at the tires and talked to the guy using the few words we shared in common, hand gestures, and drawings.  Eventually we chose a tire and purchased four of them.  At $25 a tire installed with two more potential explosive failure tires I did not want to risk it.  This was probably around when my old laptop was stolen, which ended up costing us the rest of the day after we got the tires.  The tires we ended up with were Ukranian Rosavas, Rosava being a brand.  They ended up working pretty well for the price.  They are still on the car and will be viewable when the car arrives in a 20' container from Ulaanbaatar, which is another small story.

So we were delayed an entire day and fell behind the Irish guys who pushed ahead to reach the border.  We ended up pushing on through Russia in one go, up to Barnaul and then down the the Tsaganuur, Mongolian border entrance.  We arrived Friday night, but had been told via text message that the border would be open Saturday, which is different from our previous information.  We slept at the Russian exit border and woke up with snow everywhere.  We passed through both borders relatively quickly.  As Americans with a Carnet du Passage we did not need a visa, nor did we need to do any of the special car stuff that the other rally members had to go through.  So we got through in about two hours.  At this point the roads promptly turned into non-existence and there were multiple parallel tire track trails over the Mongolian steppe which was littered with glacial till sized from smaller than a breadbox to larger than a breadbox.

Turns out that we straight when we should have taken a left.  We bypassed Tsaganuur and ended up going directly to Olgii.  Coincidentally the Irish had busted up 2 of their tires and it had taken quite a while to fix so we caught up and traveled out of town together to Khovd and then Altai.  Altai turned out to be not so big, but we did find a shop that had trolli gummi hamburgers and some other gummi snacks that we picked up.  I am sure it is not as nutritious as mutton based everything, but it did not taste like mutton, the mutton was disgusting and horrifying.  Eventually I started to have a gag reflex to it(around the time we arrived in Ulaanbaatar).  So we passed through Altai.

This part I am a little fuzzy on though.  At some point we passed through a snowstorm at midnight on a mountain, where Chatham split and caved in the oilpan.  This is once again another story.  We ended up in I think Khovd, maybe another town at a mechanic's shop.  Which is once again another story.  They fixed the oilpan, the broken oil pump pickup, the spun bearings(with improperly sized ones from some non toyota), stole a few of our tools, and tried to price gouge us.  So yeah, we left the town and made it through Altai and on into the edge of the Gobi almost to Bayankhongor.  The engine had completely screwed itself the bearings the mongol mechanics installed spun again, broke a connecting rod which then punched its way through the side of the engine... which did not stop working.  It kept on going, both Chatham and I knew it was probably the end but I drove it up to the top of the next hill where we stopped, observed, and mourned.  Then got a tow from the Irish into what I think was Bayankhongor.

At this point the Irish were going to go ahead and we were going to arrange for a truck to take us to Ulaanbaatar.  They had a tire fixed and I set about getting the cash and arranging for the truck.  Once I got the cash, which took hours, we had multiple truck drivers at the tire shop within a half hour.  The first guy wanted 500000(1 usd = 1450 tugrug).  I offered him 350000 he said "no."  Onto the next truck driver, he asked 400000, I said 350000 + a jerry can of fuel we had left over, he said "yes" right in front of the other truck driver.  Honestly this was really satisfying as the other guy was an ass.

We loaded the starlet into the back of a different driver's box truck, which was not the original plan, but hey whatever.  We used a mound of dirt and some wood planks to load the car.  We were told the trip was 12 hours and the driver only needed to pick up his sister.  By "12 hours" and "sister" they meant 30 hours, and his sister, 2 refridgerators, an oven, some random packages, his brother's daughter and his own wife.  Also he had to get fuel, put air in the tires, and replace the oil pump.  So after 9 hours we left on our 12 hour journey.  Which they had failed to include meal stops, ice cream stops, tire failure, more meal stops, and bathroom stops.  Even though there were 4 of them we still had to stop for the driver to nap.  About hour 24 I started to feel pretty decently sick.  We had propped one of the truck's back doors open in order to let air and light in.  The downside to this was it also sucked large amounts of gobi sand and diesel fumes into the box.  Eventually we arrived on the outskirts of Mongolia where we unloaded the car using another mound of dirt plus miscellaneous rocks, spare tires, rolls of canvas, parts of broken curb, and one piece of wood.  We sort of just pushed the car and crossed our fingers, the left rear wheel clipped the toe of my sandals but easily missed my actual toe.  The car rolled and bumped out of the truck.  We tied the car up to the back of the truck and towed it as close as possible to the police checkpoint.  Turns out the truck driver could not enter the city with his truck.  It also turns out his brother is a police officer and could tow us into the city with his car, for 15000 tugrug.  Once again this meant something slightly different, it meant the brother called the checkpoint and told them to the let the truck pass with us in tow.  We entered the city through a back service/industrial road and eventually go to the sketchy side of town where we met his brother.  His brother led us to their house where they dropped the family and the truck off.  The brothers then got in their car and towed us using the car to the finish line.  We paid them and they went on their way.

We pushed the car into the finish line parking lot at around midnight on the 20th/21st.

We stayed at the fancy hotel naratuul the first night and then switched to the Golden Gobi II for the rest of our stays.  Chatham spent 2 more nights, I spent 5.   I spent most of the rest of my time arranging the return shipping of the car as I could no longer drive into Russia and "dispose" of the car.

Shipping was expensive and it was not worth it except that the taxes on importing the car to Mongolia were between a significantly more and double the cost of shipping it.  This also means that the starlet will be viewable likely sometime in October.

At the end I was burnt out, physically and mentally exhausted, covered in bug bites and scrapes, very dirty, and homesick.  Two of the Irish guys and myself attempted to go to the Mongolian Shooting Program as there were tales and video of people shooting rocket launchers for $74.  There were also a pile of other soviet guns you could pay to shoot.  Turns out since last year they had permanently shut the program down, I am sure there is a good story behind it, but the language barrier was a little too tall to figure it out.

Bye bye and thanks for following, I am back in Seattle and happy, hit me up to go to lunch or something if you are curious about even more specifics,

Derek

the internet ate the better update

HUGE UPDATE LOST, I HATE THE INTERNET

Russia was quick.

Mongolia was amazing.  Got stuck in a snowstorm, saw camels and yurts(grz?).  Car engine exploded out of the side of itself.  Hired truck to take us last 400 miles, turned into 30 hour debacle through the Gobi.  Ask me about it some other time.

Will update later when not angry with the internet.

Party debrief at some point.

Derek

The Stans

We are about to leave Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.  Mortimer has apparently been stolen or some such thing so tracking us wont be possible.  I am twittering and trying to include locations.  Not really sure how it is working out.  Pamir highway went well.  We will be trying to reach the Mongol border by Friday afternoon so we will be moving very fast through Khazakstan.

I am at about 900 gb of video recorded.  Safe and healthy, meeting people, eating good food, eating bad food, learning things, and too much other stuff to go into detail about right now.

Car Problems and Wedding Crashing

The electrical system went haywire in the car due to an alternator failure.  I have not been able to charge anything including my phone in 2 days or so.  I was also trying to use the Mongol Rally sms update service, which is not working or something.  I will look into it.

After being milked of hundreds of dollars for the cross caspian ferry(prices for locals was and order of magnitude smaller).  Then it happening again on the other side of the Caspian, Chatham and I found that our wallets were essentially empty and we just entered a country where the number ATMs could be counted on one hand.  We spent the afternoon tracking down a "24 bank" in a casino up the coast.  We then fueled up and were dead set on getting out of Turkmenistan as soon as possible.

We left Turkmenbassy for Asgabat.  That afternoon the car battery overflowed and boiled the liquid out of itself, leaving us stranded.  Luckily we had 3 plucky irishmen with us in another car, they were able to tow us to the closest town with their Suzuki Alto.

It appears that in this part of the world, most stores are always open for business.  We arrived in the town, talked with a local who pointed us down the street to a car parts shop.  We towed the car the 500 meters to the car parts shop and by that time there were about 10 locals milling about looking at the car and  talking with us.  We got out opened the hood up showed them what was left of the battery and they understood.  Chatham recommended purchasing 2 batteries, which was not cheap but was worth it in the long run.  After getting the slightly larger battery to fit in the car the number of locals was up to about 25 guys and 10 or so children.  The Irishmen were playing soccer with the kids and eventually gave them their soccer ball.  They took all of us into the local general store and we loaded up on water, food, and miscellaneous terrible local sodas.

We got  on our way that evening but found that half of the car's lighting system blew so we stopped early and slept slightly off the side of the road.

Fast forward through Asgabat which was impressive in its' own way.  We stayed at a fancy cheap hotel and used the swimming pool the next morning.  An embassy worker from the US embassy in Khazakstan gave us his car and told us to contact him when we were passing through.

The next morning we put Asgabat behind us only to end up finding that the battery was not the root problem but the alternator.  We did not have time to stop in Turkmenistan for repairs as our transit visas were running out.  We pushed on to Uzbekistan and were hoping to reach Samarqand.

We had to stay one more evening in Turkmenistan because of the headlight issue.  We stopped in another random town(Mary maybe?) to find water and look at the car.  We were still travelling with our Irish friends, Matt, Mark, and Geoff.  While taking care of our cars, we managed to get invited into a wedding reception.  They made us eat, drink, dance, and made a few of us give speeches in unintelligible english to very confused newlyweds.  The reception had around 200 hundred in attendance, probably more.  We left after the speeches as to not continue to steal the spotlight from the couple.

We left the town and slept roadside again.  Just drove the next day, and stopped in Turkemenabat to get cash.  Could not find any place to withdraw and had Blake wire us money through Western Union.  We moved on  and got into "no man's land" between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan for the night.  We spent the night eating and drinking with Tahir and his friend.  Tahir and his friend are both Turkish truck drivers.  They made us food at the side of Tahir's truck, we provided a bit of alcohol and then we moved into the "bar" they have set up in no man's land.

Tahir showed us where there was a hose that we could use to shower, we had to squeeze through a broken fence to get to it though.  A hose can provide a nice shower when you are parked in something akin to a garbage dump.

We got through the Uzbek border first thing in the morning and arrived in Samarqand around 2pm.  We looked for a garage for a little bit, but were unsuccessful.  We stopped, checked out the centrium merket(bazaar) and at shaslik for dinner/lunch.  The Irish folk split ways with us so we could look for a garage some more.

After being scammed once, meeting up with 3 other rally teams, and wandering a bit we found ourselves at the Isuzu repair shop in town.  We arrived after closing time, but remember what I said about things being open all the time.  He helped us find another shop/person/group just down the road.  He hopped in our car and we drove their.  At that shop we met another dozen or so people.  Phone calls were made, and another different Uzbek hopped in our car and took us into a different town called Jomboy just outside Samarqand.  He led us to someone's personal alternator repair shop.

They took apart our alternator while the car was once again surrounded by about two dozen people.  Apparently the coil was blown and was beyond repair.  Chatham managed to explain to them the concept of fitting a different alternator to the car.  We a bit of doing the mechanic guy managed to get it on the car and make it work.  So now our Toyota has the radiator or a Nissan, the alternator of a Daewoo, and the horns of a Jaguar.  The next problem was headlights and it was already dark.  Chatham and Sharov(a nice Uzbek family man) went to another closed shop that opened up after hours for us and picked up fog lights, high beams, and a gallon of oil for an oil change.

While the mechanic/electrician worked we were invited to have dinner at Sharov's house.  We accepted his invitation, met his family, and had a wonderful evening.  They asked us to stay another day, but we unfortunately had to turn them down as we have a schedule to keep and Irishmen to catch up with.

We left and slept at the Tajik border.  A Tajik soldier woke us up in the morning to put us through entry and customs.  So today we drove over an absolutely insane mountain pass and coasted into Dushanbe where we have met up with Mark, Matt, and Geoff.

There are details and events that I am leaving out for time's sake or I am just forgetting at the moment.  Good news is that there is still plenty to write about.

Derek

The future

I forgot to tell you about what the future has in store for us.  We are currently trying to get our azerbaijan visas, as Iran rejected us 2 days before the trip.  Something we expected, but frustrating it came so late.  Once we get the visas we will be driving onto Baku in Azerbaijan where we can get a ferry across the Caspian sea.  Azerbaijan is a malarious area so I will be starting my doxycycline today and continuing it througout the trip.  Hopefully it doesn't mess me up too much, and even more so hopefully chatham does not get bit.

We have signatures all over the car now, including many different businesses and people.  Additionally a handful of police officers and border guards.  We continue to find that the landscape of these places are very beatiful.

Had dinner in "Freedom Square" last night, there is a giant gold statue on top of a large pillar in the center.  It is a guy riding a dragon with a spear.  Wikipedia/travel it.

Tbilisi internet cafed

Hello from a Tbilisi internet cafe.  Things are going well, Chatham is currently printing off our Azerbaijani visa documents.  Tbilisi is amazing, they have really ecclectic architecture, nice people, and tons of figurative public art.

In eastern Turkey we had tea with the guys from Emek Taksi.  We talked about what we could, they signed our car, and we are now friends.

Last night we were trying to find the Azerbaijan Embassy and a husband and wife helped us find it.  Thanks to Dodo and Vahko.

Sorry this update is so disjointed but this keyboard is driving me nuts.  We visited the Hagia Sophia and the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul before we left.

Met up with Sandy from the Raging Watters team again this morning, he informed us that with a voucher we can save like $90 each on our Azerbaijan visa.  Time to talk to the LOI company(letter of invitation).

So since the beginning of the rally I have missed somewhere around a half hour of travel video total, maybe less.  We are 9 days into the event and I have about 500gb of video.  Ack.

Internet cafe, so no photo updates.  Sorry.

Derek

In Istanbul, meeting more people

We have more signatures on the car and will hopefully visit the Grand Bazaar and the Hagia Sophia tomorrow then be off to a meet up of rally folk at a lake near by in the evening.

To clarify, as far as updates go.  I have been sticking to chronicling my experiences.  I have not been made team blogger or anything of the sort.  This just happens to be something I enjoy doing and a good way to keep a travel journal(that and so you know I am alive).  I have been leaving Chatham's experiences and what he is doing out because I would be uncomfortable speaking for him.  Also it would be best represented and by him.  We talked tonight about it, apparently people thought that I was updating for both of us.  He said he was going to try and do some updating of the blog so you guys can know what he has been up to and contributing.

We are staying in the Grand Signeur in downtown Istanbul.  It is nice being a place where the dollar does not feel so frail.

I shaved yesterday after about a week or so of not doing so.  I don't think I have ever looked forward to shaving more.  It is amazing what facial hair will pick up when it comes to gross stuff.

We continue to get people talking to us about our journey.  More and more I feel like I should get the car home.

I don't mean to toot my own horn, but the recording is working much better than expected.  The 2tb external drive I brought is holding together.  It has become necessary to dump data to the drive while moving, this is not ideal, but I managed to set up a third world shock mount for the hard drive.  This matches the third world camera mount I am using.  The camera mount involves a taped up box of floss, two small C clamps, gorilla tape, a 1 quart plastic paint cup quartered, a bolt, 3 washers, and regular maintenance.  The thing does not have the macgyver brand on it, but it is implied.  I will try and get pictures up.  We have yet to pass a camera shop that has professional camera mounts.  There will be some very strange things on the video when done.  Additionally it doubles as an audio recorder for almost the entire trip, so maybe I can cut the funnier discussions with border police together.

We ate lunch in a small Greek farming town today.  The restaurant was the local hole in the wall lunch place for local farmers.  We had a tomato, cucumber, cheese salad, and fried fish.  Now when I say fried fish, don't think fish sticks.  Think 10" to 1' long fish as you would see them in the sea, then fried without batter.  We had to tear the flesh off of the fish ourselves, it was actually pretty cool.  It was also quite delicious. 

Derek 

European Update

So it has been a while since we have had access to the internet.  I am staying in a cheap run down motel in Thessaloniki, Greece.  It has internet, 2 beds, and a shower, which is what counts.

The launch was a bunch of fun, we had people talking to us constantly, and I don't mean in an exageratted way.  As in we would finish one conversation and would be in another within 30 seconds to a minute.  Everyone loved the car.  There were a lot of what people are calling "cheaters" this year due to the 10 year rule(that we went around).  Many of the positive comments involved things like the car being "closer to the spirit of the rally" and a "proper car to use."  The down side of our car is we can't donate it in the end, but then again, all of you did donate a large sum of money.

We took the 7:30pm ferry from Dover to Dunkirk.  We drove into Belgium and slept in the car in a gas station/rest stop/truck stop parking lot.  We were promptly joined by other rally goers who were caught red handed drawing on my window saying that we were "cute when asleep."  Flattering and surprising for both parties involved.  We hung out with them for the evening, morning, and spent the afternoon on the road with them(4 other teams).

Towards the evening we rolled into Nurburg, Germany, home of the famous Nurburgring.  The Nurburgring is a 22km racetrack that is open to the public, assuming you can pay the euro per kilometer and that you car is safe.  We had to remove the roofrack and shift some things around, but they let us go around.  The car performed... bravely.  Chatham went round first and passed hopefully the most embarrassed mercedes driver of all time.  I took the second lap and pushed it hard to the point that I spun.  So yes, I have spun on the Nurburgring.  Also about 2 minutes behind me there was a 4 BMW pileup that shut the track down.  This apparently scared Chatham quite a bit.  Afterwards a photographer tracked us down and told us we were effectively hilarious/awesome and gave me his business card.  He said he had photos!

That evening we joined up with the Rolling Cones and their giant pink utility van.  We traveled with them for the evening and traveled with them almost all the way to Klenova Castle for the party.  We stopped at the Czech dollar store and picked up a few things before the party.

The party was absurd and incredible.  They had one stage for three sequential acts, additionally for those electronically inclined they had a techno yurt.  The mongol rally goers managed to horribly litter the castle grounds and some group even broke a statue.  Kudos to them for being horrible people.  Insult to injury, someone stole the head that fell off the statue.

I ended up looking around the party for a while after grabbing food.   I met a few people and wandered the castle grounds before the party started.  Once the party started I purchased two beers, one for myself and one for myself.  I went to the top of the castle to enjoy my beers and survey the landscape by myself.  I was joined by a local who turned out to be a sculpture major from a school in Prague.  Probably the highlight of the party, though watching drunk european men attempt to showcase their strength by generally failing to lift a stone about 4 inches in diameter larger than a basketball above their heads while drunk, close second.

Camped in the campgrounds that night.  We woke up and sorted the car before leaving just after noon.  We drove away towards Austria and met up with the Rolling Watters there.  Two very nice gentlemen, father and son team.  We camped with Sandy and Andrew that night at a rest stop on freeway, Chatham once again slept in the car.

I started feeling a little bit better the next day just in time to enter the Balkans.  There is a lot to write about the Balkans, I will just try to summarize it.  Bosnia is in a bad way but getting better, also the landscape is nothing short of astonishing when green at least.  Every Albanian is currently working to improve their country.  They love Mercedes, as in half or more of the cars in their country are old Mercedes Benz from Europe, it is where Mercs go to die.  Also due to American foreign aid, they really really like America, like a lot, like we are a sports team.  I like Ablania too. Slovenia and FYROM(Macedonia) are by far the most affluent and most developed.  All of them have horrid pollution, Slovenia and FYROM have the least, while Albania is the worst.  Smelling and seeing open garbage fires is not something I wish upon anyone.  Overall though, the countries have very nice landscapes, they grow crops, and are not the absolute horrible shitholes that the media puts them out there as.  Not that I felt particularly safe, but I also was not shot at.  Check the places we drove through using the tracking device.

We made it out of the Balkans today and into Greece.  The people were seemed very similar though, just with much more money, education, and stability.  

We met a nice man named Stefanos tonight.  He has 4 children and loves them.  We got him to sign our car.  He also treated us to drinks on the Thessaloniki waterfront, and we had a very interesting and educational conversation.  Now we are here in our budget motel happy to have a bed.  Last night we slept in the car for 3 hours in downtown Podgorica.

I am sure there was more, but I just can't remember right now.

Derek 

hoops hopped, pickup postponed

So the amazing story of the shabby shipping company continues.

The last two things, which were a 14-day european green insurance card, and customs documentation and processing have been completed.  Not in time to get our car today though.  Early tomorrow we will be waiting at the office to get things finished up and pick up the car.  Assuming that the port does not require only people with specific hair colors to pick up the car or something similarly annoying.

The costs of of the last few days were high.  However the fact that Iran turned us down for a date made things cheaper but a lot less fun.  So about half the money for Iran went into other expenses, like train tickets, a visa, and an extra documentation expense at the port that was not expected.  

Chatham seems to be sort of holding together, he is listening to a lot of audio books on his ipod nano.  He does not have much to do as I am the name on all the paperwork so I have to do it.

Good news is that Belgian beer is delicious, go out today and get some Leffe.  It is delicious.

Derek 

Who loves hoops, I love hoops!

So I need to get a European Green Insurance card, and customs clearinig documents on top of the paperwork I already have.  Time to do that, also I can only get the insurance card in brussels somewhere.  Time to go.