After rain comes sunshine

Kazakhstan, there we are. For months we talk and fantasize about it and now we are there! Our trip consists of three months. We conclude with Kazakhstan soon part 1 of our trip away. We achieved the final destination of the first part!

We, snails, arrive at a perfect spot for wild camping. We’re in Ural’sk, between the small rain drops, ready to cook. As we prepare everything, we start to notice that there are lots of mosquitoes. Trying to ignore. Okay, ignore fails. As a preparation, we bring bug spray! Spraying so, attach pants to boots, hood, and through! Adventure…. Satisfied we fall asleep.

Well, with some mosquito bites, cold and fog we wake up. Kazakhstan … it should be quite sunny, warm, dry and sandy? Adventure…

We pack our things and continue our journey towards Atyrau. Atyrau is a fairly large city, about 500 kilometers and is situated on the Caspian Sea. We will not cover these kilometers in one day. The fog pulls away and we drive on good asphalt, some 250 kilometers away. Along the way, it seems like we are famous: People wave to us, honking and we are regularly put on the picture. The people notice that we do not come from here. At the beginning of the afternoon we start looking for a place to camp. Meanwhile, we are professionals in finding beautiful, sneaky spots for camping: From the main road, side road, farmer path on, then about 1.5 km offroad through the fields, near trees.Then at dusk unfold the tent. This place, near a river, without mosquitoes, is perfect. We are in the middle of nowhere “and hang nice here all afternoon round. After supper it begins to blow. Would our tent hold this wind? It is now getting dark. The wind, which has now become more violent, makes us decide to leave this beautiful place. We retreat towards the main road, and we are pleased with our offroad course we have had in 4WD Travel in Oss. Without any doubt we dare anything. Less than a minute on the main road and it starts to drizzle, to surge, to drip and finally to rain heavily!! Phew, we are pleased with our decision. Anyway, what now? We are on the road, it’s now 23:00. We get a flashback to Ukraine where we drove around most of the night, away from the storm …. Not again!! The rain / storm is so severe that we can not continue. We do not see a thing. We decide to stop at the first gas station. We’re not the only one. It’s really busy! The station staff invites us, like many others, spend the night on his property. ” We install ourselves in our sleeping bags, and we try to get some sleep in this what uncomfortable posture. Adventure…

We are at around 5 am wake of the first sunbeams. Yes, after rain comes sunshine! While the latter dark clouds still retreating, the first rays laugh accommodate us. Most have already left, and we decide to go. Late morning we arrive in Atyrau. The streets are not made for this lot of water and lie bare. Haggard we arrive at a hotel. Go get some sleep and freshen up! We surprise the receptionist who checked us in this morning, “are these the same people who have checked this morning?” She calls a taxi to take us to the center. After we have some walking around the city, we sit down with a cocktail in the sun. How nice!
May 21, the sun shines. A perfect day for the beach on the Caspian Sea. We can’t find it and decide to ask it. Kazakhstan, where everyone wants us in the picture, they laugh at us in the place. The sea?! To swim in? No, that is not here !! About 800 kilometers from here, yes it is there!
Okay, no day at the beach … The city we have seen … we drive through … adventure …

Because the road from Atyrau to Aktobe is horrible the locals strongly advised to us, we drive 500 kilometers to Ural’sk from there to go to Aktobe, our final destination in Kazakhstan.
Glad the weather is so cleared, because we can now enjoy sleep in the tent. We are now experiencing the drought of Kazakhstan: our laundry that is drying on the dashboard is not cleaner of what a dust! It’s wonderful the way. Many raptors, beautiful steppe, emptiness, lovely people a special experience!

Aktobe we have a lovely hotel for three nights. On the first night was quite a lot of activity around our hotel and we decided to take a look. We are approached by Alisher and Sabit. They tell us that there is a forum tomorrow for young entrepreneurs from different regions of Kazakhstan where the governor of Aktobe province is speaking. They ask if we come tomorrow. The next morning we decided to just take a quick look. Once we arrive, we are within a few seconds changed clothes to VIP guests and we needed to welcom the governor, who arrived with an escort. Along with the governor and a number of journalists we pass a number of traditional activities. It was a mini-King’s day: We listen to music, watch martial arts, eat a traditional snack and drinking fresh camel milk. We participate in the forum. Thanks to Sabit who is translate everything. The governor thanked us in his speech that we are there: great fun! After the forum we are invited to plant a tree which represents the growth of the young entrepreneurs. The forum is quite important, the local and national press was also present in Kazakhstan. We are interviewed a few times and they have used us in the news (see below YouTube clip). After lunch we pull us back and we go to the Aktobe down town.

What a great city! The large square where the church and the mosque stand opposite each other, a shopping mall with skating ring and mini amusement park, we look our eyes in this city.

The night we conclude with the participants of the forum with a dance.
After these special days Aktobe we leave for part two of our trip. Border transfer of Makat – Kazakhstan to Russia Orenburg- went smoothly. Moscow and St. Petersburg, here we come !!!!

Қайтадан Келесі кездескенше!
Joren and Linda

YouTube – KZ24, nationale televisie –  nieuwsitem

Photo’s