Moscow to Kazakhstan

As it turns out the insurance I bought, only covered me in Russia! Sods law that then the office was closed on the weekend, so I was the lucky one to have to drive in the whole of Russia.

We spend a whole day in Moscow, which gave us some much needed rest. We went into the centre of Moscow, checked out red square and other touristy places.

Then began the 1400 kilometer drive to the Kazakhstan border near Volgograd, this was both a boring drive, and a very long one.

We made it in one piece after an all nighter. At the border we met up with another 6 teams, then began the 7hour paperwork nightmare, all the forms needed filling out in Russian, or we could pay a "fee" to the border guards to "organise" them for us, luckily one of the teams had a Russian teammate. She spoke to the Guards who were blatantly trying to line their pockets. Out of principle we said we'd fill out the forms, then whilst we were filling them out, more and more forms appeared that needed completing, after many hours of this beaucratic nonsence in the 40+ degree heat, we were stamped and signed to enter Kazakhstan.

We continued on for an hour or so, the landscape is exactly as you'd imagine a steppe to look, burnt brown grasses, small bushes dotted around, and the occassional camel, cow or goat lining the roads.

Then we turned off the road, went along a sand bank, and pitched up with the other teams. We all cooked some food, watched the sun set. In this time the local insects started to run wild, including huge spiders and dragon flies, as well as quite a few flies, so out came the repellent, and luckily the next morning there's no bites from the bugs.