http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Asia , Kazakhstan , East Kazakhstan en-us Wed, 06 Jan 2010 13:15:58 +0000 Wed, 06 Jan 2010 13:15:58 +0000 Most people who think of Kazakhstan think of Borat. Most people who have been to Kazakhstan might think of Almaty its former capital and then there are some who decide to discover what the rest of the country might be like. I decided to go up north and to keep me company along the way I went with an English man who went by the name of Tim whom I had met in a rather decrepit dormitory in Almaty http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Semey/blog-454360.html Kazakhstan http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-449894.html In an effort to avoid my normal boring titles I was going to title my blog ldquoKazakhstan is nicerdquo and then after a few days I was going to title it ldquoKazakhstan has a veneer of nicenessrdquo but I was already sick of people making the Borat references so I decided not to reference that film at all and instead go with the title from the Beatles song which got stuck in my head. http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-401650.html gtgtgt DON'T MISS THE ENGLISH VERSION PLEASE SCROLL DOWN IN ALL OF OUR BLOGS. Tag 75 bis 9415.200 km von GalwayWir haben es geschafft Nach 4.000 km Steppe 4 Reifenpannen und der Erkenntnis dass die Seidenstrasse auch nicht mehr das ist was sie mal war haben wir dieses riesige Land erfolgreich durchquert und koennen Kasachstan hinter uns lassen. HurraErstmal dort hin zu kommen war j http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-322238.html I arrived in Almaty Kazakhstan two days ago. Yesterday my bike mule aka Jim Wilson flew in with my bike and tomorrow we start off on 12 days of mt. biking from Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan and back again. I t promises to be beautiful but grueling ride as we climb over 12K foot passes.I will write and tell you all about it when I get back to Almaty on the 11th http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/blog-305156.html Rond 7 uur 's morgens arriveert onze trein in Tobolsk. We hebben een dagje tijd om de stad te verkennen laten onze bagage achter in een locker van het station en nemen de bus naar het centrum. We zijn gewaarschuwd door onze reisgids laat je niet ontmoedigen door de immens grote en vele sovjetappartementsgebouwen die de nieuwe stad sieren maar geniet van de pracht van het witte Kremlin en kuier http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-285845.html Kazakhstan got the shortest visit of my trip despite being a huge country. It serves as more of a gateway to other places than a destination in itself. for me it was the place to collect my visa for Uzbekistan and is also the departure point for the last country on this trip the strange and foreign UKArriving in Almaty I wasn't quite sure what to expect a taste of the USSR little change from http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-282214.html I wandered past the Uzbek embassy an hour or so before it was due to open for visa applications just to get the lay of the land and see if anyone had turned up to start queueing. I spoke to the guard who wrote my name down on a list and told me to come back at 2.30pm.Instead of hanging around there I had a pleasant hour or so mooching around in Gorky Park and then psyched myself up for another http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-278938.html I'm safe and sound and alive and in Almaty Kazakhstan. Credit for this achievement is entirely due to Lady Luck and definitely not to the kamikaze fuckwit minivan driver who drove me and six other unfortunate passengers from Bishkek apparently believing he was in command of Saturn V.Normally I don't bat an eyelid at being driven at 160Kmh but when the driver has a penchant for overtaking stra http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-278599.html The border crossing between Siberia and Kazakhstan was easy no major problems We drove into the city of Semey to register ourselves the registration is a bit complicated it would take hours to do and the forms have to be filled up in Cyrillic Russian. I thought it was ridiculous as we copy the Cyrillic letters from Sasha's form we don't understand a thing. While waiting for all this bureaucr http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Ust-Kamenogorsk/blog-208486.html This statement coming from the book I recently read Christopher Robbins' In Search of Kazakhstan. Apparently the best tasting apple in the world the giant Aport Apples are from here did not see them though when we were there but with the numerous varieties and excellent taste of their apples there may be a reason to believe. I will always remember the wild apple trees lining the streets and ro http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Kazakhstan/East-Kazakhstan/Almaty/blog-207740.html