Change of plan

On our original itinerary we were due to travel to Turkmenistan, but the Turkmen government have closed the border completely due to swine flu. We are now going to Kazakhstan, where we will travel along part of the old Silk Road to Uzbekistan, and pick up our original itinerary again.

Miraculously we have managed to catch the ferry from Baku to Aktau only one night after our arrival in Baku. This is miraculous because the ferry has no set timetable, it leaves every seven to ten days, if the weather is good, and the border officials are antagonistic at best. Our crew, Tim and Cheryl, worked overtime to get us on this boat. The customs people initially were happy to let the truck on the ferry, but not us. They insisted that we would have to get the next boat, in a week's time. After a day and a half of arguing, begging, bribing and pestering, Tim finally got us tickets for the ferry at 4pm on the day of departure, the ferry left at 8pm.

The ferry itself is not as bad as it could have been, we had heard stories about some really rough ones but this was comparatively luxurious. There was one functional, if repulsive, toilet, a cold shower, a bloke to buy tea and soft drinks from, and passably comfortable four berth rooms.

In fact, the ferry journey itself was the least offensive part of this leg. What was interminably worse was arriving in the vicinity of Aktau at 4pm, weighing anchor and waiting for the next ten hours to get into the port. Then, once we had disembarked (one hour), we waited for a further three hours in border control. Then, for a further six hours for the truck to clear border control. Total time taken to dock and drive away: 20 hours. Total ferry journey time: 20 hours. Gah!

Pics of the ferry port at Aktau, and a guy's bag on the ferry.