Hauz-Han

I awoke especially early in order to be at the border at 6:30am, though I might as well have slept a little longer as no-one who could inspect my passport or bike as necessary arrived until 7:30. Though when they did arrive I was dispatched to the other side of the border fairly quickly, the only hold up was with the policeman who wouldn't stamp my passport until inspecting every page 3 times & the same with me against the photo.

The Turkmen side was a little more complex but took surprisingly little time. I'd been told that great care should be taken with the customs declaration as there could be trouble if anything valuable were left off it & this were to be found on exit from the country. This form could be filled out in either Russian or Turkmen, helpfully the customs official did this but he spoke no English. Fortunately there was another official who could. I was worried that they'd want to take apart & go through my luggage, & that some things may have gotten 'confiscated' during this. I think the time it took to fill in the customs declaration borded them all of me. The only part of my luggage that received a close inspection was my medical kit. I was parted with 10 USD for a reason that I couldn't understand but it felt legitimate as I got a receipt for it.

Once I was free to go I headed straight for what I thought was the 'short cut' road to Hauz-Han, a waypoint on the road I was taking across the country. However I took the wrong road, which went to the same place but was over 100km longer. I soon found my error but was too proud to turn back to find the correct road & too stupid to see how much it added until it was too late to turn back. Once I checked the map properly I realised the only way to cycle all the way across Turkmenistan was to up the speed & sacrifice seeing Merv. The former wasn't feasible given that there was a strong prevailing wind against me that I expected to last the whole 5 days, the latter seemed silly given that I'd come so far to see it.

So I stuck out my thumb & prayed I could get a taxi to cover the extra distance rapidly to Bairam Ali (the town nearest to the ruins of Merv). By this time there was only an hoor or so of daylight. It would have been quite late had I got a taxi to Merv. Instead a rare moment of great fortune occurred saving me from dispondancy, a trio of trucks stopped within a very short time of me starting to try & get a cab. They were driven by Iranians who were driving in a convoy via Bairam Ali to Marzar-i-Sharif in Afghanistan. We strapped my bike on the back of the cab & my luggage & I got in front. It was too late to make it to Bairam Ali that night, they'd planned to have dinner & overnight at a truckstop in Hauz-Han, which ironically was where I would have likely stayed had I not screwed up my navigation. Along the way the driver told me about the economics of this trip, he was also the owner of the truck. The run from Bandar Abbas, an Iranian city on the Persian Gulf, to Mazar-i-Sharif took 7 days. Carrying his contracted cargo (of motorcycles) to Mazar-i-Sharif & whatever cargo for the returned trip would net about 3000USD. On top of this he could fill his fuel tanks in Turkmenistan where it was cheap & sell what he didn't need in Afghanistan. The latter would net him 1500USD alone.

I had dinner with them, which in delightful Iranian style they paid for. I slept outside the truckstop restaurant where we ate. The truckstop staff (also Iranian) were extremely cool, making a space available on the sleeping platform which they used & offering me tea the next morning.

I cycled 87 km in 5 hours & 50 minutes
Total so far 6029 km in 84 days