Astana to Petropavl, July 2016

Dag 58. Astana til Petropavl, 500 km

I dag savnede vi Ulrikka i bilen, ingen underholdning og mad.

Vi var helt overraskede over, at komme ud og køre på en dejlig 6 sporet motorvej fra Astana mod Petropavl, men selvfølgelig skulle politiet spolere fornøjelsen. Pludselig var der fartbegrænsning på 20 – ja rigtigt 20km/time. Og Michael kørte kun 20, så der var ikke noget at komme efter – ingen bøde.

Cows and horses - Køer og heste 

Ca. 150 km fra Petropavl begyndte den dårlige vej, der var de ved at lave motorvej, så vi kørte i lang tid på grusvej.

Vi var fremme i Petropavl kl 17.30 efter en lang dag. Hvor blev vi glade, da vi så vores hotel værelse på Green Which hotel, lækre nye værelser, trist vi kun skal sove her en nat. I morgen går turen til den Russiske grænse.

Vi gik en tur i byen, for at finde et sted, hvor vi kunne veksle til Russiske Rubler, men vi måtte til sidst tage en taxi til banegården, for at finde et sted at veksle. Tilbage på hotellet, spiste vi aftensmad i restauranten der.

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12th July. Astana to Petropavl, 500 km, driving time 9 hours

We left at 9 am today, as we had a long drive ahead of us.

Leaving Astana, we entered a 6 lane highway, going north. This was amazing, as we had only experienced bad and shitty roads so far. My joy was short lived. It ended brutally, at a check point, where we had to drive only 20 km/hour. A police car, (bastard) pulled me over, I then grabbed all my documents, and stormed over to have a discussion with him. He politely asked me to sit in his car, as I had to review his camera documentation, to show that I was driving to fast. All he could show me, was Louis’s rear number plate. This was not convincing enough ( for me), so he handed back my documents, and I proudly exited  the ‘Bastards’ car.

From this point onwards, it went downhill. The roads got worse, and we soon drove on a muddy, service road with just enough space, for 2 vehicles to pass one another.

Muddy roads - dårlige veje

Village sign - Byskilt

‘Blackie’, sadly got very dirty again, but she shook of every pothole and bump with a diesel grunt.

I, badly missed Ulrikkas, open sandwiches, and her great comments, about everything.

We even missed her documentation and paparazzi pictures of the police.

We finally reached Petropavl, at about 5.30 pm, after a long, long tiring day.

We checked into “Green Which Hotel”.

 We walked into town, to see if we could exchange, money, for Russian Rubles. We are leaving for the border tomorrow. Ended up, catching a taxi to the train station. Here we got a very good exchange rate, and we even decided to change some $.

Back, to our hotel, for dinner.

We enjoyed the food, but the beers got warm, by the time the waiter served them. So we enjoyed our warm food with warm beers. Of course Louis had Black Label.