Day 29
In the morning, the Unofficial Official team had a fun time unclamping their car. To repay us the favor, they 'decorated' our car with pink spray paint on the wheels and duct tape on the driver-side windshield and round Lancaster Snow Sports stickers everywhere. We're not going to take any of it off.
The ferry was not here yet. Everyone was getting restless. This would be the third day that we were waiting at the port.
We spent the entire day aimlessly hanging around the port, talking to the guards, storeowners, and truckers. I personally had a very nice conversation with the on-site doctor, who sells Bonzai trees in Baku. We also spent a lot of time with the other teams who were stuck in the same situation we were. Some teams spent the whole day drinking. By the evening, there was still no ferry.
Day 28
We awoke alongside several other teams that were waiting for the ferry as well. There were five other teams that were taking the same ferry. There was a duo doing the rally on motorcycles, A Swiss couple (Pothole Pandas), an Australian couple (Aquaducks) that was at the port before us, a Canadian couple (Two Moose on the Loose) and and a two-car team that was doing the rally unofficially (The Unofficial Official Rally Team). We had no clue as to when the ferry would arrive, and the port officials had no clue either. Hoping that we would make it back in time, we went to visit the mud volcanoes that were nearby. Closer to the evening, our team set out alone to go build a castle in the middle of an empty field. It was constructed out of loose bricks and wooden pallets that we found lying around, and ended up being one and a half stories tall.
We got back to the port and asked about the ferry again. The answer was the same thing we heard yesterday- that the ferry was not here yet, but come back at 10 o'clock. We contemplated going around the Caspian for a bit, then decided against it. Even though no progress was made in terms of distance traveled, we made some new friends. All the teams sat around a large circle and recounted their past travels. When everyone went to sleep, I decided to play a prank on the Unofficial rally team, and booted one of their cars. The morning was sure to be fun.
Day 27
We arrived at the Azerbaijan border at 3:00 a.m. After a tiresome passport control, we made it into the small country. Despite it's size, it still took us half the ay to get to the port city of Alat, where we learned that the ferry was not coming today. Several rally teams were already waiting there. We traveled north to Baku, and spent the rest of the day there. The newly renovated city was home to several large events in the past couple of years, and seemed to exist in a much more present timeline than the other cities of our trip. Brand new boulevards and stadiums adorned the shoreline. Notably, the Heidar Aliev Cultural Center was an architectural beauty that stood out amongst its rectangular neighbors.
By nighttime, we were still in the city, but not in the pretty downtown area. Driving along somewhat shady roads, we got to the natural wonder of Baku- the Yanar Dag. The row of fire burned continuously on the hillside several meters in length, and looked especially charming in the darkness of the night. Sitting several feet away, we were kept warm by the natural gas flame, even though the night was chilly. We returned to the port city, and slept in a tent, waiting for the ferry to arrive.
Day 26
Ah, those Georgian roads.
We decided to take a 'shortcut' to get to Tblisi, and it took us into a mountain pass. The dirt road did things that some roller coasters would be envious of. Every kilometer was an adventure. By nine in the morning, our roof rack could take it no more and broke free of it's grip to the car. It slid forward, taking the car antenna with it. One of the rack's supports landed in the upper-left corner of the windshield. The windshield cracked.
We spent the next hour fixing what we could. we replaced the antenna with a bit of wire- it seemed to work alright- and affixed the roof rack to the car again. This time, we tied it down with rope, attaching it to the frame of the car where the doors were supposed to close. The doors still closed, but they need some persuasion now. Last but not least, the road was given a stern warning. No more fooling around like that! Shamelessly, the road kept silent and didn't even apologize. Later, though, the road got a bit better, then eventually paved, and led us to Tblisi by the afternoon.
In the capital of Georgia, we changed our oil. While the car was elevated, we took a gander at the bottom side of Sylvia. some part of it (we later realized the part was a flex pipe) had been heavily scratched up, and in need of repair some time in the future. This would be a problem for another time. We went to a Georgian restaurant and tried the local food. There probably are a combination of words that can describe how much we enjoyed this meal, but to convey this feeling requires such a high level of artistic poetry to encapsulate the entire experience that I would much rather not try than to ineptly not do it justice. I will try to describe it in a different medium: 11/10.
Day 25
We got to Samsun in the morning. To celebrate, we went to a bakery and picked up some bread. It was a huge piece of bread. The size of this thing was unbelievable: the round loaf was not much taller than a standard loaf, but spanned the length of a pizza! Breakfast for three people barely made a dent in this monster.
Again, we spent all day driving, getting to the border. Our only stops were to try out some baklava and to buy a bag of hazelnuts. By sunset, we were there. We heard of great beaches across the border in Batumi, so we were really hoping to stop by there before it got too dark. Our plans were shattered faster than a wave against the rocks.
The Turkish-Georgian border office was undergoing reconstruction, so only one booth was open. All incoming traffic would be funneled through one gate. This bottleneck caused a wait time of 5-6 hours, so by the time we got there, it was some early hour of the morning. In addition, there was some commotion with our passports- the Georgian authorities thought that they were fake. They took the passports to their lab to confirm their validity, which took about an hour or so. We, of course, were not informed of this, and were just asked politely to wait. All in all, the border to Georgia was not a pleasant experience.
Day 24
Turkey border was tough. There were mosquitos on the Romanian side, and they were ruthless. They wouldn't let us through without car insurance, which we did not have. We picked up the insurance that they sold for only turkey, for which we had to dole out over $100. Once we got past the border, though, the mosquitos seemed to disappear. It was as if they could not get through border patrol. We drove into Istanbul and spent the day exploring the city, including a walk through the Hagia Sophia. We even helped jump a BMW- it seems that our battery survived and was operational again.
Afterwards, we went to the black sea and had a swim. The waves were great and the water was nice. we watched the sunset as we finished the supermarket foods that we picked up in Istanbul. We were planning on traveling through the night, along the coast. Not even twenty kilometers in, the only road that was traveling east was blocked off. A bridge up ahead had collapsed. We had to backtrack onto the highway to Ankara before we could continue on our journey. The midway point to Turkey is Samsun, so hopefully we can get there by tomorrow.
Day 23
Our Bulgarian adventure started off when we bought a roof rack in Kazanlak and tried to install it on our car. In the end, we got some semblance of stability and a feeling of incompetence. The important thing is that it all worked out in the end, right?
Next, we drove over to an acquaintance in the city who makes home-made biofuels. He happily helped us mount a shoddy wooden pallet to the roof rack, making for a perfect storage place on top of ol' Sylvia. At long last, the huge suitcase which resided in one of the back seats could now be put on top, and the entire back row could be utilized. This was especially important, since we could lie down comfortably.
Now that we had a working roof rack, we could fill it up with some necessities. The first thing on our christmas list was a set of spare tires. We have been driving all the way up until now with no backup tires, and the potholes were starting to get good. We picked up two, and put them alongside the huge suitcase on top. Finally, we looked like all those other teams which started out with this configuration back at the start line!
To finish off our day, we visited an old soviet conference center on top of a mountain. Even though it was abandoned and locked, we found a way to sneak inside and check out the cool relics of a time long past. Especially cool was the degenerate amphitheater at the very top. There's a certain awe in seeing messages like "Proletariat of the world- Unite!" ,that used to be brightly colored and three meters tall, now in ruins and crumbling.
We drive overnight to Turkey. We shall see what happens at the border.
Day 22
Early in the morning, not long after the previous post, we stopped at a grocery store to pick up foodstuffs. The spam chicken that we got turned out to be less edible than we hoped. The bargain price at the carrefour got us 400 grams of this meat, which we thought would go nicely on bread as an open faced sandwich- we didn't eat much on that day and were quite hungry. However, upon opening the can, the mystery meat emanated a smell which had a certain association to dog food.
We checked the can: there were no signs that the contents of the container were meant for dogs. No pictures of dogs, no words that resembled the english word 'dog' or any other canine alternatives. On the other hand, there were no marks that suggested that the food was for human consumption either. It was rather cheap, and we couldn't really read what was on the label. In the end we decided to eat some of it. It didn't help that we were thinking of dog food when the stuff touched our tongues.
The whole morning we drove. When we stopped to fill up on gas, our car battery dies again, and we had to be jumped again. We vowed not to turn off our car unnecessarily. Then we drove some more. the border crossing was rather straightforward, but we knew that this would be the last easy border. The EU ends here.
Day 21
We decided that it was time to leave the Ukraine. It was fun while it lasted. We headed out by bus to Chernivtsy, and from there took a train back to Bucharest. The journey took us an entire day, which we spent by playing cards and watching soviet films. Once we got into Bucharest, it was already past midnight. When we got back to our dear car, it turned out that the battery was completely dead; we must have forgotten to turn off the radio or something. Luckily, some friendly locals offered to help. Neither of us had a jumper cable, so they drove us to the nearest gas station to pick one up. Upon returning, they jumped our car, and we set off. It was 2 a.m.
There was a change of plans that we had agreed upon prior. We would now be going through Turkey, instead of the Ukraine. With that in mind, we will drive through the night to get to Bulgaria, where we shall try to pimp up our car.
Day 9
The entire day was basically spent on a bus.
We were dropped off at the border city of Chernivtsi at 2 a.m., where we stayed until 9 a.m., at which point we took another bus to Kiev. We arrived in Kiev at 7, and fuddled with the metro for two hours until we eventually got to where we were going. when we finally arrived at the apartment that was going to be our home for the next two weeks, it was already dark. We were warmly greeted with a meal and a bed.
I'm not sure whether to count this hiatus as part of our rally trip or not. On one hand, we are still abroad, technically still traveling. On the Other hand, we now have a stationary place to sleep, we do not have our car with us, we can return to a regular three-meals-a-day food plan. We aren't really making any progress towards Mongolia for now. It's almost like we have arrived to wherever it is that we were going. As a compromise to these two points of view, I will continue blogging of our adventures in Ukraine, but only around once a week until we get back on the road.
Expect a jump in the day counter above for the next post.
