TASHKENT

Yesterday was a long and difficult one. We almost made the 700kms. without a puncture but alas just before Shymkent we had puncture #12We decided to leave it in a tire shop and check into the hotel! alas the hotel was further than we thought and Lloyd somehow found his way there and back. I was waiting outside the hotel for him when I heard a commotion and Flora was stuck over a culvert! It was very dark and hard to spot, however with the help of several local men we managed to move her without damage. Today we arrived in Tashkent after 3 hours at the border. There was much stamping of paperwork, and I was moved 4 times into different lines to be processed each time starting at the back of the line! Then Lloyd was stuck on the Kasakstan side with the car whilst I was in Usbekistan, so we passed papers to each other through the gate! Tashkent is a l.arge bustling city with European shops and the part that we are in is quite affluentMuch different to what I had expected. Tomorrow we are off to Samarkand and our last day off. We hope to do some sightseeingand shopping.

More Photos!

A few more photos of Flora have been unearthed! It is wonderful to be able to see her in action. Thanks again to Colin for finding these for us.

The last we heard Flora and crew were about to embark on a 700+ km drive to Shymkent in Kazakhstan. For the Canadians out there that is further than driving from Vancouver to Calgary in one day. (That one clocks in at about 671 km). Luckily, the next few days after this have much shorter distances.

Enjoy the photos!

Punctures seem to be the main thing plaguing Flora. To date, they have had eleven. Wonder what number this one is?

Luckily, it looks like it is not all camping and auto garages! Can you spot Lloyd in his white shirt, beer in hand? Looks quite at home!

Some photos

Hello everyone - Emma here again! I thought I would post a few photos of Flora in action. These were kindly posted to the comments section by someone named Colin. Thank you Colin! Some of you may not have seen them yet.

Also if you haven't visited the Peking to Paris website yet you should! They post daily rally reports, have some great video journals and update the race standings daily. Presently it looks like Car 41 is in 26th position overall! Not bad old girl! The Peking to Paris website will also link you directly to the Skytag site where you can see the car's GPS position.

Enjoy!

Car 41 surrounded by goats in Mongolia

At the start of the race, before the dirt and all the punctures!

DAY 12

*****Hello everyone, Emma here. This post was sent to us by email about a week ago when Flora & Crew were having a hard time connecting to the internet. Sarah originally posted it in the comments section but I will now post it here as well. Logically, it should appear before the last post, so it is one out of order. Enjoy! ********

This is our last night for camping for a while. I can’t say that I shall be sorry .Our daily routine has been up at 5-30am, brush teeth, use the lovely tent loos, no water to wash your face only a wet one! Pack up the tent and the car rush into breakfast and grab yet another egg of some sort, lukewarm tea and then hit the road for the first check in point. Lunch is eaten in the car whilst hurtling down ridged and stony tracks. Tonight we are camped on the Mongolia, Russia border. We are all hoping that tomorrow will not take 9 hours as it did last time As we still have 518kms to travel after that. We are in good spirits and so far Flora is performing . We do have trouble getting up the hills at altitude but Lloyd stops, I jump out and put a rock under the rear wheel and then he charges ahead and I run to catch up, simple really.WE will be in touch hopefully within the next day or two.

ALMATY

Arrived here to a 5 star hotel after many long days driving, camping and staying in bad hotels! We are doing fine except for the punctures again, 3 yesterday. However nothing compared to other peoples stories. ! car burnt to the ground, luckily they escaped in time. Another crew were left in the cdesert and had to morse code a local shepherd to rescue them. Someone spent 2 days on a truck sleeping in their car. Kazakstan is quite depressed and driving through the villages was like something out of the industrial revolution. Today we spent trying to buy inner tubes not easy especially when you don't speak the language. My school dramas lessons came in handy!! Off to Samarkand in 2 days.

DAY 5 REST DAY

I thought I should add that yesterday we approached a bluff which was deep sand, we made 3 attempts but to no avail, Flora just couldn;t make it. Everyone else was roaring passed which didn't help. Eventually we decided to bush wack acroos the scrub and made it to the top. Alas we have also had 2 punctures which really slowed us down and the car is running very rich so we stopped by the side of the road into Ulaan Bataar and cleaned 12 spark plugs!! I am learning a lot about car mechanics.The scenery here is quite similar to Southern Saskatchewan but it is very hot!! Tomorrow we start 6 nights of camping!! Will be in touch after that.

Ulaan battar

We arrived here last night after 2 brutal days of driving in the Ghobi Dessert, we have 6 more days to go on this stretch. We have had 2 punctures and the car is covered in sand and dirt both inside and out. WE arrived at the camp site the first night in the dark which was challenging, thank goodness for the GPS. WE then had to put up the tent which seemed so much easier when put up in the garden in Shirley. We are keeping up well so far and today is our first day off, we shall spend it cleaning and checking the car. I am afraid no photos at this stage as our camera has developed weird black spots! We shall try to get a new one today. Several cars have not made it this far so we feel pretty lucky. More in 6 days,.

GREAT WALL TO DALHAI

 

We were awake and up at 4-30am, down to breakfast and off to the Great Wall at Badaling for the start. Very exciting , people cheering, Chinese drums etc. It was nerve wracking at first trying to miss over laden trucks and having to handle the map book, the trip meter and the GPS.!! But after 30kms. Or so we got into our stride and managed very well. Let me say that after the first day we are still talking and married!! Now for a cool beer.

Passports found

Yesterday was spent sitting in the main Post Office in Vancouver trying to recover our lost passports.Basically Canada Post could not say where they were even though the package from Travcour was registered and we had a tracking number! It would seem that although you pay extra for this service all mail is put together and they have a weird or non existent tracking system. We spent 4 hours patiently waiting only to be told that they could not find it anywhere. We camehome feeling very despondent and wondering how we were going to get to Bejing. WE thought of going via London on British passports and picking up a China visa there . We had already invited some very close friends who had helped us with the car for dinner so we went ahead and just after the last guest left we received a call at 11-30pm. To say they had found the passports .!! Rather that trust them to a courier Lloyd flew back to Vancouver and picked them up! This I am sure will be the first of many trials in the upcoming weeks.

passports

 

Who would have believed that here we are 3 days from departure, packed, ready to go except!! Our passports seem to be lost somewhere between Canada customs in Vancouver and Shirley!. They apparently arrived in Vancouver from the visa company in London last Monday. They were sent registered mail and we have tracked them as far as customs. Lloyd and I are now sitting at the float plane terminal in Vancouver having flown here this morning awaiting a call from Canada Post who are trying to locate the package! If we do get off Monday I suspect that this hiccup will be minor to some we may encounter on the actual trip. As our motto says, we shall KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON!