Turkmenistan
Travel Blogs from Turkmenistan
Celeberties
... . There are always obstacles and really you can never plan on something going with no glitches, then I wouldn't be in Turkmenistan! This week I wanted to talk about two things. One is the random dance parties and second is the celebrity status I ...
Mary and Merv
... surprisingly good, but the heat was close to unbearable as we crossed through the desert. One of the boys told me that the desert of Turkmenistan is the hottest place in the world, I don't know if this is true or not, but damn it was hot! Along ...
Bureaucratistan
... on buildings. Since then he has become a prolific writer and in any bookstore there is an entire section dedicated to his writing. Turkmenistan has a huge supply of gas and oil and will be a very important played in the oil industry. Petrol here is ...
Long time, no talk....update from the desert
... happens! So that is the news. For those of you that need it, my address and phone number have not changed. Turkmenistan Lebap Velayat Turkmenabat-22 Central Post Office Mail Box 46 PCV Katy Dieters 0011 993 446 55 1 69 Feel free to ...
PICTURES!
February 1st 2005 HELLO! I GOT THE PICS OUT THROUGH SOME SNEAKY PROCESS! Via Turkmenistan, Italy, Texas, to Alicia cowdrey...I got some pics to you all! I hope this works, it might give you an idea of what I am doing. No fat jokes and no dress ...
PHONE NUMBER
Sorry for all the emails! I just got my phone number figured out.... If you feel like calling, go to www.noblecom.com and get a phone card. my number is: 011 993 446 55 169 I am 12 hours ahead of Colorado, so try to call at a normal time. I ...
Terrible Turkmenistan Trains
... station our worst fears were realised. It was terrible. Actually it was several levels below terrible. Obviously all funds in Turkmenistan get funnelled into building statues and the trains have not been upgraded since 1712. The first problem was when ...
Border Crossing
After 3 days in turkmen i was ready to leave - there really was not much to do- so i grabbed a share taxi to turkmenabat - a city by the boarder and headed off - By some freak of luck in the front seat was a lady who could speak English so ...
End Of The Line
The bikes were off on an early start from Asgabat this morning, up at 5 and on the road to escape the heat of the day. Baz and myself had a leasurly breakfast before meeting Oleg and departing with the benefit of Air Conditioning! Lovely! ...
Look im not a spy ok
Turkmenistan - the most crazy country in the world? Well after North Korea I cant think of any others. Getting the visa was a major hassle but I had to go and see this country for my self. The first issue is the boarder, mostly getting through it. ...
Turkmenbashi
... boats were able to dock, we remained anchored offshore. Now that I knew I'd just have at most 3 days to cross Turkmenistan, I planned a faster route: Turkmenbashi - Ashgabat - Mary (and then to Uzbekistan), rather than the route that I'd originally ...
You havent seen anything like it yet
... on the sat nav at about 10, to see where we were going, and thought happy thoughts, we were just off the coast of Turkmenistan, about 2 hours to go. We could be in by midday. Fat hope. We sailed right past Turkmenbashi (our destination) and kept going. ...
Back on land again
Having been told that we would be landing "Sometime tomorrow morning" we went to bed hopefully. Thankfully Martin heard them weigh anchor at about 2.30am and woke me around 3.00 to tell me that we were approaching the port. About 1km away. We got up and ...
Ashgabat
... completely leveled by an earthquake in 1948, then rebuilt with enormous Soviet concrete buildings, and then rebuilt again by Turkmenistan's "President for Life", Saparmurat Niyazov, with the help of oil and gas revenue. Niyazov, who rechristened ...
Kipchak mosque (Ashgabat, Turkmenistan)
Kipchak Mosque or Gypjak Mosque is a mosque in the village of Gypjak about 7 kilometres west of the centre of Ashgabat, Turkmenistan on the M37 highway. The mosque was constructed by the French company Bouygues, was built in the late Saparmurat Niyazov's ...
And it gets worse.
... I think the only chance this hulk has of reaching shore is a tsunami.My theory is that they wait until departing ferry from Turkmenistan is full and then swop over.Meanwhile a queue builds up in Baku and the process repeats itself.As the main cargo ...
Mary
... a number of vehicles waiting to be processed). I arranged a ride to Bukhara, and finally relaxed -- I'd successfully made it across Turkmenistan within the 41 hours that I had, and now I'd be able to travel at a much more leisurely pace for the ...
Owww, my kidneys!
... 've been to before was about that in feet.Has Roger mentioned that the reason our comunication of late has been so poor is that Turkmenistan does not link with any outside mobile phone provider - and internet is severely restricted.Bless 'em. ...
On the move again.
Martin's magical moment: The working title of my contribution today,if there was one,was going to be Popenbangenfarten to Ashgabad and indeed the day started out just like that.The car started badly and just got worse and worse.So much so that I had ...
In the land of the great Turkmenbashi
... to Ashgabat, where I was again treated to the wonderful hospitality and kindness of Central Asian people. As we arrived, Turkmenistan's great capital shone in the sunshine with its white marble buildings stretching into the distance - built at a frantic ...
We explore Turkmenistan
... bound for the Aral Sea (which is in Uzbekistan and Kazakastan). Its disappearance has led to bad environmental problems in northern Turkmenistan, with a lot of salination of the land. We will soon be able to see the country for ourselves, as we are ...
Darvaza
From there we continued on the increasingly pot-holed road to Darvaza and our campsite for the night. We probably couldn't have made it to Ashgabat that day, and camping in the desert near Darvaza gave us the opportunity to see a burning gas crater, ...
Deserts, deserts, deserts of Turkmenistan
... never-ending desert scenery, didn't help us enjoy the country. However, despite all this, we don't have negative thoughts about Turkmenistan. The people were friendly, and we always felt safe. One surprise was that it had a low-key ...
Turkmenabat
The next day it was time to make the haul to the border and cross back into Uzbekistan. We only got there 15 minutes BEFORE their lunch break was supposed to start, which meant we had to wait for that time, plus their entire lunch hour, plus an ...
The Wrath of Chinggis
Konye-Urgench is famous for being relatively untouched since Chinggis and his horde ransacked it several hundred years ago. The bad news is that there are restorations underway, the good that they appear far from complete. There were a few mausoleums, ...
Dashogus
... first leg of the journey, and made for the nearest bazaar to change our dollars into manats. Given how repressive and policed Turkmenistan is supposed to be, I expected the market to be fairly stern and subdued affair. In fact, people took quite a keen ...
The only city in Turkmenistan
... of shady-looking staff, but as far as we knew we weren't really followed around the city. After experiencing Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, I figure that the notorious security services can't really be much more clever or hard-working than the average Joes, ...
Mary, Merv, and Margilan
After a few days of relative downtime in Ashgabat we struck east towards Mary, the third biggest town in Turkmenistan. We had a new driver, Arshod, and a Toyota minivan with A/C, which was nice for how long we were on the road. On the way we stopped by ...


