So tomorrow morning we’ll take off for the Mongolian wilderness. Our route roughly consists of heading west to Bulgan, Moron, Ulangom then the border, then Barnaul in Russia.
We’re both exhausted today, it’s really hot and 1300m above sea level. It sounds very unfit of me, but a set of stairs knocked me around today! Because we’re exhausted, we were easily startled by the ~13,000KM remaining. We’re not quite half way KM wise, but the driving should get easier from here… maybe. Kazakhstan is another story. I’m trying really hard to ignore it just now until we get our head around Mongolia.
We did find an awesome supermarket directly across from the hotel which stocked everything… even refills for out little magic washing up brush thing. Very nice.
About ₮1,000,000 (pronounced: Toogrik) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongolian_t%C3%B6gr%C3%B6g or roughly $700AUD. Even the largest centres we’ve been in (haven't tested UB) don’t take card for fuel, so cash will be king. Most towns have ATM’s. One opposite our hotel dispensed ₮400,000 in a single transaction which is good for saving on bank fees. Neither major banks could work out getting money from our cards, but the ATM’s could.
It’s been wicked cheap here. Our dinner last night cost $11 at a fancy restaurant, and tonight's with a huge red wine steak, and some other significant dish with drinks was less than $20. We filled a trolley tonight with chocolate, pringles, milk, biscuits, bananas eggs, plums, bread, and everything else you can imagine for ~$50. Sounds like a cheap ass I know, but it’s nice kind of getting ahead of what will be a European financial crisis as our fuel cost will triple and free camping may be a thing of the past.
It’s a pity our car doesn’t run on 95 octane as it seems we could pay with love.
Wandering around the markets today, unable to find any rubber bushes, we were approached by an English speaking man said ‘For a landcruiser, you won’t find it here, this is all Chinese, Russian and Korean cars/trucks’. He asked us to follow him to his car as he had one for us. Oh well, sounds good. He had an 80 series land cruiser. He had the most accurate and clean storage system of his car parts behind the rear seats. He put his hand on one container, and uncovered his set of 6 rubber bushes. He gave them to us… refusing payment. We managed to force whatever note I had in my pocket to him (around 70 cents). Amazing huh! I feel bad being a freeloader and just hope we can help others in the same way we’ve been helped. You never know, our collection of bolts, fuses and washers may help someone on the road?
Well, I’m going to bed now, enjoy and hope to see you on the road.
Here's something for when you have the ability to buy a book & read it. http://www.elephant-travel.org/Elephants_Tale.html Found an article about it in a magazine a few days ago. Is a book written by an Australian empty nester who travelled from Vladivostock to London (and then some) on a BMW with his wife. The article mentions some lessons they learnt, some of which you have written of. Is called The Elephant's Tale. The bike was called Elephant.
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