From Sary-Tash to Chinese border and beyond -

Left Sary Tash for China border early at 6am, all of us are getting quite used to the speed of getting ready first thing in the morning. Eggs were served for breakfast and black tea. Extremely crisp and cold outside where we were staying, but because it had snowed in the night, our surrounds changed dramatically.
Packing the bags on the top was finger numbing and precarious getting on the roof of the car with all the ice on it.

Our first port of call, about 70 km drive through the Irkeshtam Pass – one road through Irkeshtam to the Chinese border. During this short journey we reached temperature of – 5 degree C and a height of 12,440 feet – amazing !
Very rugged harsh terrain, saved a lot of travelling time because of the quality of the road we were on.

Had to go through several checkpoints before reaching the Kyrgyzstan side of border control. They were pretty good, now to the Chinese side.

As we approached the official Chinese border crossing, again by passing about 25 large trucks, we could see officials coming out. One by one, all smartly dressed came to greet us. There were six of them. Asked for passports as usual, but also told us they officially have to inspect the whole vehicle including our luggage. They were friendly but official. I stayed with the vehicle, whilst they removed the items from within. It was freezing outside and the officials were extremely thorough. Peter, Kirit and Manvir were led inside to passport control, always a bit of a niggly feeling when you get separated like this.

The car inspection was pretty efficient, although we will probably have to repack the back of the vehicle – we don’t have a boot. I rejoined the guys and thankfully before I did, I left my ruck – sack in the car. I am glad I did this, because the customs guys were still checking the ruck – sack contents and in particular the thousands of photos on Kirit’s iPad. It would have been another two hour wait if he wanted to go through my iPad – he didn’t ask me and we all quietly slipped through.

It’s amazing that after nearly 7 months of planning, this particular date for entry into China was quite specific, since we had planned to meet our Chinese guide today, more impressive if you also factor in, almost 6500 miles of travelling we have already covered to date.
Fortunately, we were successful in meeting our guide at the first of the two Chinese border controls we had to navigate, he had all our paperwork relating to our car. We then drove to the second customs point – getting through this, we all felt would be the last of the major border crossings we would encounter for the remainder of our trip. Easier said then done, the one and a half hours it took to reach, especially on the superb road we were still travelling on, was the comfortable part. On reaching our second destination the waiting was horrendous. They completed most of the formalities including passport control and rechecking our baggage, but took an absolute age to conclude, the vehicle documentation. When they informed us we couldn’t take and tomatoes and cucumbers, which were going to be our previous nights meal, through with us – all three of us started frantically eating it in the customs area, this was our lunch. Because I have been caught (I maintain, quiet innocent on my part) taking photos of previous border controls. With the Chinese I wasn’t going to take any chances and produce photographic evidence of us eating vegetables in customs for the blog, at the risk of being dragged away. Temptation was too great, managed a few snaps!

It’s also funny, actually not really funny for me, but we are eating very lightly at present and definitely in the last week or so the main meal is, for the present NO MORE. Peter loves this eating format, he can live on vegetables and sparkling water forever. But in fairness, out of the three of us, he is the only one it seems who has not put on any weight on the trip!!

The Final destination for the day, after crossing this second bit of the Chinese border was Kashgar. The scenery between the two border checkpoints was again exceptional – vast and endless.
We were finally given clear by Chinese customs – alleluia! Just could not understand why this much time was taken. Very much Chinese inefficiency on border control. However, even after 12 hours of traveling, we all had great satisfaction in having achieved a little personal milestone – we have driven all the way to China – it’s a great feeling.

Reached Kashgar pretty late, another two hour drive from border control. Have lost another couple of hours, we are now 7 hours behind UK. Again smooth roads, any potholes we encounter in China especially to major destinations will be frowned upon, especially when the Chinese are well know for their construction. Initial appearance of the roads, very well signposted.
I wonder, starting this part of the trip will break some myths about China and Chinese people: methodical, disciplined, perhaps oppressed, not very interactive – we will see.
Met our actual guide Bing, who will be our guide for the entire China trip.
Nice guy, I’m sure he will save us a lot of time and effort.