Miles driven: 233
Time in car: 9 hours
Borders crossed: 1
On Saturday night in Tbilisi, we had heard rumblings that there may be a ferry departing the port city of Alat for Turkmenbashi on Sunday evening. So come Sunday morning, we booked it out of Tbilisi (a city drawing high praise from all team members) and made for Azerbaijan.
When we got to the border, we were expecting a 2+ hour fiasco. We were quick to learn that lines don’t really work here in Azerbaijan as we were cut by several other people while we queued for customs. After forming a 3-wide human barricade to protect our spot in line, we made it through customs in about an hour. Tanner, who has to go through an entire separate customs process as the registered owner of our Skoda, also made it through customs in about an hour and a half, much to the delight of the team. While we were into Azerbaijan with no issues, we knew that the worst of it was yet to come. We had heard and read from multiple sources that Azerbaijan has very strict traffic laws and that cops are well-known to pull over rally teams for minuscule offenses only letting you go after a cash bribe (preferably in USD) is handed over. So before we hit the highway in Azerbaijan, we put all of our wallets in our bags and only stashed a “dummy” wallet filled with 20 bucks in the glove box. The thought was, if we couldn’t avoid a cash bribe by feigning dumb, we would use the dummy wallet to show them we only had a small amount of cash and can’t afford their $200 request.
On the road, the driving through Azerbaijan was miserable. The first 100 km in Azerbaijan are on a 2 lane highway where posted speed limits topped out at 60 kph. Intermittently, the posted speed limit would jump to 90 kph for a brief section of highway before abruptly changing to 30 kph - right at section of road where there would be speed cameras conveniently placed. Mike and Dan, to their credit, followed the speed limits carefully and navigated the 100 or so speed radars and 2 dozen cops and got us to Alat without being pulled over once. As for the scenery on the drive? Without a doubt - worst on the trip thus far.
We pulled into the Alat around 4:30 PM and within 30 minutes we had our tickets for the Turkmenbashi ferry. Better yet, the ferry left tonight at 11 PM. Timing could have not have worked better in our favor. From years past and reading about the ferry, often teams are stuck in Azerbaijan waiting for the ferry for days. Last year a team had a 6 day stay in the ferry parking lot.
Needless to say, we were pretty thrilled about arriving in Alat just as the ferry was departing. Sadly however, this also meant that we had to send Dan to Baku, alone. Unfortunately, Dan’s rally terminates in Baku as he heads back to California and resumes the “real world”. Baku is the capital city of Azerbaijan and is supposed to be a modern marvel of Eastern Europe. We were planning to spend a night in Baku before catching the ferry. But, we couldn’t afford to miss this ferry as the timing for the next one’s departure is very much a TBD. So we said our goodbyes and Dan was on his way to Baku. Dan was a valuable asset to the team and he’ll be missed dearly. As for the remaining three, we are currently sitting in the parking lot waiting to board a ferry that is supposed to leave in 7 minutes but I don’t think we’ll set off until 1 or 2 am. However once aboard, it could be days before we actually disembark onto Turkmen soil in Turkmenbashi. We’re hoping for a smooth, safe, and most importantly short journey across the Caspian Sea before we get our 5 day visa to explore one of the worlds weirdest countries, Turkmenistan. - FWY
P.S - no cell coverage in Turkmenistan so it might be a few days until our next post.
Godspeed, Dan