From here to eternity

Granted: eternity is a bit of a stretch, but from Kutaisi (Western-Georgia), where we are now, to Helsinki is still quite a long way... Next Saturday, if all goes well, we'll be taking a ferry across the Black Sea from Poti to Ilychevsk near Odessa. The weather is great down here (20 degrees, sunshine, cloudless sky), so we hope the ferry keeps its schedule and arrives next Monday in Ukraine - but shipping schedules are there to be adjusted.

We'll spend the last two weeks of our "heroic trip" (sure, whatever) in Eastern Europe, mainly hopping capitals: Kiev, Warsaw (or Minsk, provided getting a transit visa in Kiev goes super-smooth), Vilnius, Riga and Talinn. From there, another ferry will take us to Helsinki.

So it seems that out "overland" aim of crossing the Eurasian continent will be achieved, if "by sea" is also admitted as overland travel (which we of course believe). With borders between Georgia and Russia sealed and the Azeri-Russian border open only to locals, going by sea is anyway the only sensible option: going round through Turkey, Greece, Bulgaria and Romania is quite a detour, and flying just isn't cool enough for us!

Itinerary Iran

Entering Iran near Ashgabat, we head towards the holy city of Mashhad. From there, we head for Tehran, where we intend to meet Hanna's friend Maneli and her family. Continuing South to Kashan, Esfahan and Yadz, we make our way towards Shiraz and the ancient site of Persepolis.

From there, we return to first to Tehran and then head further north towards Qazvin, Zanjan and Tabriz, exiting Iran near Meghri in Armenia.

Timewise, this is quite an ambitious plan, which we very well may have to shorten a bit here and there, as our visa only permits us to stay in the country for 25 days. It's quite likely we'll extend our visa, but we'll see.

Itinerary Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan

We entered Uzbekistan near Tashkent, continue towards Samarkand, Nukus, Urgench and Kiva. Maybe we'll make a round trip to Moynaq and the Aral Sea (depending on how easy it is and what it would cost). From there, we'll travel back to Tashkent to (hopefully) collect our Turkmen visa. Then, we head to Bukhara and cross into Turkmenistan near Turkmenabat. With our 5-day transit visa for Turkmenistan, we stop in Mary (Merv) and Ashgabat.


(It's not exactly like shown on the map, but hey.)
All this (Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan) will take us about one month.

Itinerary Kyrgyzstan - Kazachstan

The idea is to cross the Chinese - Kyrgyz border through the Irkeshtam pass, head to Sary Tash and Osh and continue towards Bishkek via Jalal-Abad and Tash-Kömür. From Bishkek, we plan to head to Karakol via the southern shore of the Ysyk-Köl lake. We will leave Kyrgyzstan and cross into Kazachstan near Kegen.

In Kazachstan, we will spend some time in and around Almaty, before taking the train towards Shymkent. From there, we travel further to Tashkent in Uzbekistan.

The plan is to cover the above outlined itinerary in about three weeks.

An Artist's View on China

(click to enlarge)

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Floris's artistic impression of what we will see in China: the television tower in Shanghai, the "Army of Men" in Xi'An, the Fortress of Jiayuguan, the Buddha-grottoes of Dunhuang, the city of Ürümqi and the market town of Kashgar.

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Note Hanna's gnome-like features!

Itinerary China

Our plan is to go through China at a steady pace, halting only at a few places of interest.

From Shanghai, we quickly head west by train to Xian, Jiayuguan, Dunhuang, Ürümqi, Turpan and Kashgar, crossing into Kyrgyzstan at the Irkeshtam Pass. In two to three weeks time, we should have covered nearly 6000 km, or roughly one third of the total distance...

The Plan

The plan is fairly simple: after we finish our work assignment in Shanghai, we go back to Europe following a version of the Silk Route. We will travel overland from the Far East, across Central Asia, the Middle East, the Kaukasus region and Eastern Europe.

These are the countries we intend to visit:

• China
• Kyrgyzstan
• Kazachstan
• Uzbekistan
• Turkmenistan
• Iran
• Armenia
• Georgia

After that, we will cross the Black Sea towards Ukraine, continuing north through Belarus and the Baltic states to reach Helsinki before Christmas.