Kazakhstan, a country I enjoyed visiting four years ago, even with all the breakdowns I had. I was glad to be back and introducing Jean to it.
The people are fantastic, they beep their horns, smile and wave, pull up next to you at junctions and shout greetings. Always wanting to know where we are from and shaking our hands.
They also randomly donate food and water. Despite us not being unable to communicate with him much, Ayden, opened the boot of his car on a mountain pass and filled my arms with water, bread and cakes. Then drove off while we worked out how to pack it all.
The down side though is still the roads. Heading south to Almaty the first 800 kilometres had deteriorated severely since my last visit (they have paused the road building). More bolts went missing. The final 200 kilometres which had scattered road works last time were now smooth asphalt.
We met our first, and currently only, other British bikers ,Suzanne and Roger (https://drpeachy.wordpress.com), of the trip. They were putting on their rain suits as we appeared out of a torrential deluge. In the ensuing chat, and radiator fixing, they missed getting wet.
Following a night in a very basic motel (but with a good cafe attached) we got our heads down and put in a long, slow, hot, 10 hour day of pot hole dodging to cut the journey to Almaty down to three days.
Almaty is a great city, lots of parks, Soviet buildings, mosques and a mish mash of East meets West.
We took a couple of (more ) days off the bikes before embarking on a short jaunt into the mountains of Krygyzstan to cool down, from where we will re-enter Kazakhstan for a long hot ride North and West.
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