Astana

On Friday, we crossed the Russian-Kazakh border and arrived in Astana, the new capital of Kazakhstan. The funny thing is that this city was nothing more than a village about 10 years ago, till the President declared it to be the new capital. As a consequence, the "new city" was mainly established or build in the last few years. An example of the vision of Astana as the new capital is Bayterek, the tower with the golden egg on top. From this egg, you can see the headoffice of the state oil company, the defense ministry, the ministry of foreign affairs and the Presidents palace while turning 360 degrees. The golden egg stands for all wishes of mankind, unreachable up in a tree. Or so I was told. In this egg, you can put your hand in the presidents hand mall and make a wish. By doing so, your wish will - obviously - come true.

CB

Sverdlovsk

After a 28 hour trip by train from Moscow to Yekaterinburg (Sverdlovsk) we now see a completely different kind of Russia. We haven't seen any tourists in this 1.4 million inhabitant city, and people actually stare at us because we simply look differerent. In our perception we have certainly crossed the Europe-Asian border. The trip by train has been rather hard, mainly since we had to drink a lot of Wodka with a Russian officer who did not take "no" for an answer. However, we survived and had some time to relax at our Hotel just opposite of the trainstation here in Sverdlovsk.

In a couple of hours, our trainjourney continues. This time, it will take 25 hours before we arrive in Astana, the capital of Kazachstan. Halfway the trip, we will cross the Russian-Kazach border, a next exhiting moment.

We will let you know whether it worked out fine or not. Till this moment, we didn't encounter any problems. The Russian authorities have been rather nice and helpfull and we haven't been in any awkward circumstances. Hope you are doing fine and wishing you all the best.

Take care,

CB

Moscow

What a turbulent city. Hugh both in size as well as in diversity. We did all the touristical stuff and are heading for Kazachstan tomorrow. Unfortunately this will be the first and also last picture, since my camera broke on the very first day. Another stunning thing is that there seems to be no middle class. Either you get a sandwich for dinner at a kiosk for 50 cent or a proper meal at a restaurant for 50 Euros.

Take care people, further stories will follow soon. Keep us updated what's going on at "home" as well!

CB

Excitement

Dannyboy just wants to express his excitement about the trip. ITS GONNA BE AWESOME!

Central Asia Map

This is the trip Dan & Chris are likely to follow. Further details follow soon.

Invitation Kazakhstan

Alma has been kind enough to invite us in an offical way.

Scanned documents Chris for safety reasons