03 May 2005
Who: Tom, Greg, Leon
Where: Charles de Gaulle - Paris
That's it. D day has finaly arrived. We're at Charles de Gaulle airport
where we picked up Leon who has been waiting for us as well.
Leon's main quality is his ever lasting smile. We know that even in the toughest moments we will still be able to turn to Leon and look at a smiling face.

04 May 2005
Who: Baacka, Piero, Tom, Greg
Where: Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
The european team arrived safely in Ulaanbaatar. Walking out of the Tupolev plane, we are overwhelmed by the steppe, stretching across the horizon, inviting our nuudel side. But first of all we have important business to take care of in UB.

The mongolian team is late (a mechanical problem? ;-). The occasion for us to taste the weather: it's freezing! The wind is coming from the North and manages to find its way no matter how well you're protected.

The mongolian team arrives. Finally, the team is complete (except for Eric, who has much more important matters to attend - positives vibes to Juju and Eric, we are with you :).

A sign from the Khan? Less then 10 minutes after we united the teams, we are in an accident! Piero tried to force the barrier of a railway crossing, only to end up with the barrier inside the van!!
On the picture you can see Baacka and Greg trying to fix the barrier and Piero smiling ;)

05 May 2005
Where: Ulaanbaatar
Today is "fight the bureaucracy" day, and that won't be the last!
We start at the Police station to register the papers in our name.

After a long day, tired and stressed we are feeling depressed and doubtfull of the feasibility of the task ahead of us. It is a hard day.We are questionning our departure...

06 May 2005
After a visit to our Russian friends, we undergo major work on the van.
The main fuel tank is fixed, we change the fuel pump and we browse the technical market for spares and a toolbox.

07 May 2005
Today is an important day as we're off to the Black market to buy... our house!
It's a one triple bedroom house with central heating (needs a bit of hand work to prepare the wood), cooking facilities, wide cinema screen, very comfy, lovely but not Victorian, huge garden depending on the surroundings and the toilets are wherever you want them to be... There's no shower, but who need a shower when on holidays ;-)

We are back up to speed, whatever happens, we'll stick to the plan.

08 may 2005
Who: El loco de la steppa, da juggernaut, garcimore, leon, and Zayo (=the van, named after the discovery of the soonly famous new mongolian card game created by Baacka and Piero).
In the middle of the afternoon, we finally feel all set. Baacka and Saruul, not so sure, prefere to seat back and relax in UB (or politely let us go on our first trip together between males).
After two hours of easy paved road to the east, we turn left on a piste.
We then drive thru an all flat valley surrounded by hills, with a nice little river in the middle. The weather is great, the van is High Fidelity, we feel happy. We cross the river take some wood, and make the camp on the border of the river a few miles further.

The ger is up within two hours.

This first test is positive: Zayo carried us without any problems.
The second test was to evaluate the Nuudel cinema, in the middle of nowhere or somewhere, depending on the point of view: we enjoyed becoming lazy, in a warm ger, watching David Attenborough freezing in antarctica (Life in the freezer). We'll sleep as kids tonight.

09 May 2005
Today is a quite day, this is the first day where we have nothing else to do than sit and enjoy the present moment, in the middle of a magnificient scenery.
"Time slides upon us like nutella spreads on a toast..."
You will find a lot of phrases like the previous one, inspired by the reading of Sylvain Tesson, a french poet -"voyageur". We will call these little moments of poetry "Tessonades", they wil be within "" and you surely will recognise them... ;-)
Elle est pas belle la vie?

10 - 11 May 2005
This morning the sky is gray. It rained all night long. We head off to make a small trip on the piste to check if the field did not became a swamp...unfortunaly it is a swamp and Zayo get stuck.

Half an hour later a jeep is coming and try to help us but give up after 2 minutes. One of the person in the car is an official from the nearby town. He is absolutely drunk and insist that we have a shot of vodka with him before they leave.Difficult to say no; the vodka would probably make a good BBQ lighter! The funny part of the story is that right after their car crossed the river it got stucked as well, right in front of our ger, but on the wrong side of the river.
We spend a few hours trying to improvise some "unstuck yourself from the mud" skills.

But as you can see, our smiles never leaves our faces... in adversity, we are strong as a team...

Not going anywhere with our new skills we decide to go and seek some help (the first ger is 4 km away)... to use their tractor, spotted with our binoculars (vital tool in the steppe).

On the way we meet a police car looking for the official, their chief... We get in the car with them with the certainty that all together we will help each other. Unfortunaly the third car gets stuck inside the mud after half an hour too. The big chief was totaly drunk and always shouting to the driver. After numerous try to unstuck the cars we head back to the ger.
We'll see tomorrow...

During the night, Piero hears a tractor, struggling to unstuck the different cars... He gets up and leave to meet the guy with the tractor and get Zayo freed from the mud...
Tom and Greg are sleeping heavily...

The next day, the swamp has mainly dried but for one place which is our exit route in order to go back to UB. This time, we prepare the ground and drive throught the difficulty.

We're driving back to UB, with a few mechanical problems on the way... nothing major... we hope...

13 May 2005
Wake up call @ 9 AM.
The weather is sunny with clouds.
We leave for the Police station. There's one big room and three offices. A crowd has already gathered in the room, in a chaotic manner, like predators on a dead animal.
We've done all thre ofices, several times.
We end up paying a "tip" in order to get the yellow paper identifying the car and plates, which we can't use in Mongolia. The plates only bear "3056", just a number, nothing else, just like a race car... what an irony!
Off we go to the Ministry of Transportation.
There, we are told to coekm back in the afternoon, in order to get official papers, enabling us to carry goods and probably the vehicle across Russia, Kazakhstan and Turkey. We'll see for Uzbekistan and the other countries.
From there, we go to the bank, where they're giving us a few problems but all is fine in the end (= we get our transfered money!).
After a nice fats food, the mongolian way (= good and quickly served) we're off to the Russian embassy. Too late, they close in five minutes (time to lock the doors probably!); we're told to come back tomorrow as well as we need to have Russian medical insurance. The insurance is contracted from the Aeroflot building, probably to cut the costs. We manage to get "insured" (not sure what that means) for
6,18 US$ for both of us, for three days.
Back to the Ministry of Transportation, where we get our officially stamped papers.
We finish the day at the cybercafe where we send all needed documents to get "Zayo the van" insured for Turkey and Europe. This is "work in progress", stay tuned!
We send the aplication for an iranian visa for Tom (Greg's visa is on its way...).

14 May 2005
We don't notice the weather today as we have another busy day... will this have an end?
Teknikzar in the morning, the market for mechanical spares and all you need to "tune" your car... kakouland! We feel like home and dream in front of blue neon lights for under the car so you look like an UDO (Unidentified Driving Object), double chinese windscreens, chrome parts and other very usefull items. We won't admit what we've finally bought, nope ;-)
We make a homemade translation in english of the papers of Zayo, just in case.
The afternoon is spent drinking cocktails, enjoying UB trafficjams, browsing the blackmarket once again and the russian embassy. We got a discount at the embassy (US$ 150 instead of US$190; funny enough, you can only pay in US$ there, and only with new bills) for both visas, from the 25th of May until the 30th of May.
Rewarded by a Cass beer, from Korea.
We hold a small party at Baacka and Piero's house with a few frenchies and mongols. We show Baraka and discuss about it. The video-projector is showing everything in "sepia" tones. A bit of stress until the next day when we realise that the cable is faulty.

15 May 2005
10 AM until 10 PM
Today is Zayo's day. We're back to the Teknikzar to buy spares and make a few crucial modifications.

We spend the day doing this, as it seems that when you undo something on Zayo, you realise that the spare behind needs to be fixed as well!
A never ending story...

We get the electricity fixed as well as our 4 roof-lights, usefull in the dark nights...

Right before leaving for the restaurant we undo the wheel in order to check the brakes (when we press the brakes Zayo tends to go on the left...).
Another surprise, as it looks lik ewe need to change entirely the brakes on the right wheel.

16 May 2005
We go to the russian embassy, again! but this time to retrieve our inexpensive visas.
Mission accomplished!
Back to the black market for some more shopping. The wheel gets fixed today and we're almost packed, ready to leave...

We won't be as prolofic on the road as our communications and the update of the website will depend on the availability of cybercafes on the way.
Rest assure that we will do our best to let you know how things are going...
Thanks for reading us.

17 May 2005
Departure day
Who: Piero, Baacka, Tom, Greg
Where: Ulaanbaatar
When: 07H53
Weather: cloudy and cloud.
Let’go on the road baby! Still sleepy, we head West. After 400 kms of good paved road on which Tom enjoyed going up to 110 km/h (while El loco de la steppa was looking at the tachymeter with fear), the real stuff begins. The first 200 kms of piste will give a chance to Zayo to show its first weakness: the gear system. We’ll have to finish the drive with only the 3rd and the 4th gear…
Some of the amazing things encountered on the road.

We meet some kids in a village... one of them look familiar...

After driving 16 hours, and the first 600 kms done, we’ll stop at 2 in the morning, right on the dumping zone of the village. Baacka and Piero will sleep under the tent, Greg in the van and Tom under the van, protected from the wind. We feel tired for sure, but really anxious about this gear problem.

18 May 2005 - the day of the accident !!!
Where: 16 kms before Bayankhongor
Early in the morning, Baacka and Pierre, going for a walk, find a mechanician in the village. Within 6 hours, he’ll have opened the whole gear system, changed one piece which was broken, and put it back together for 30 euros. Great. In the mean time we decide to put up the ger, and that we will make the first nuudel cinema session here. We have lunch with the mecanicien and ask him questions about how to drive a Yaz off-road. He can take us for a short trip in order to show us how to drive. Vodka make people feel prouder and in need of proving whatever they have in their "blurred by the alcohol" mind. The mechanicien drunk about 3/4 of the bottle of vodka. Pierre proposed to delay the driving lesson to tomorrow… Greg is outside trying the van new gear system. When Greg comes back, and after a small incident where Greg refuse to drink the vodka proposed to him by the mechanicien, we decide to go for the driving lesson anyway. The driver takes us back to where Greg went, on the top of a nearby hill. We stop at the top of the hill, where a small moutain of stones topped with blue ribbons sits in the wind. They're called "Ovoo" and the tradition in Mongolia is to stop wherever there are Ovoos, take a handfull of stones and walk around clockwise, throwing the stones at their feet. We all go back into the van for a hell of a drive. It is interesting to mention that at this point, he has done exactly the opposite of every piece of advice he gave us on how to drive a Yaz. He is actually driving with his right foot on the accelerator pedal and his left foot on the brakes pedal. As the speed of the van increases as we go downhill as well as the driver fully step on the accelerator, we all realise that he is by now quite drunk, that the van starts shaking and the intersection is getting closer by the minute. Note that the intersection has the shape of a T and that we need to turn right to avoid a small ravine. It is already too late when we hit the tarmac, the van goes up in the air (no wheels are in contact with the ground for one second) and we've alrerady passed the intersection, going straight instead of right. The van ends up on its side. It's just chaos inside, with everyone on top of each other as well as all the equipment that was in the van (toolbox, luggages, oil...).
Inside we quickly check each others and rush out of the van as gazoline and oil spreads all over.The battery almost fell on Pierre and Greg got some acid from it on his face, giving him a new and particular look. Tom has a broken rib. Greg has an intercoastal pain. One of the kid has a bloody nose.
Tom is in shock, Greg wants to kill the driver and Piero is cool ;-)
This could have been much more dramatic as we were 7 in the van (the 3 sons of the drunk driver were with us).
The only smart thing that the driver can say is: Tsuiguir (which means something close to "no problem"). This makes Greg's temperature go higher!
After a few moments, to deal with our amazement, we are deeply disapointed. We could have been seriously injured. This quickly leaves the place for rage. We didn’t cry the two tears (si cheres aux yeux de Tesson).

The picture is taken from the camcorder screen.
Helped by other people, we finally turn Zayo back on its four wheels. We drive it back to where the ger is. It looks like the van is working fine!!!
In the end we only had a few minor injuries and no major problems for Zayo... shall we see there a sign of luck?
That evening, we decide to have the cinema session so we can turn the page of that day on a positive note.

The ger is full, around 25 people turn up, and we are very happy. After feeling upset and sad we finally feel that the adventure is here. We are safe, and we have been able to make our first projection.

19 May 2005
Where: Same village, in the ger.
Weather: the day welcomes us with a white sheet over the landscape; it's still snowing, and the wind is cold: this is the perfect weather to spend a day in the ger.

Our pilot is reparing the results of his stupidity still visible on the van. He’ll spend two days on it.
While he works on Zayo, the ger is running movies after movies for the kids (Hong Kong kung-fu movies, animations). We decide to invite elder people of the village for a projection in the evening of the Nuudel cinema main movie: Baraka. This is the first "crash test" of Baraka. About ten people will be there. Some leave, some fall asleep (pretty quickly in fact), and some follow with interest. Baacka helps to have a little discussion afterwards with whoever is left, but we end up having a discussion between us about Baraka and how it can be perceived by "non westerners". We all agree that it's still better than Mister Bean... ;-)

20 May 2005
Where: same village.
After waking up, we enjoy our morning in the ger around a cup of tea. We pack all our stuff back in Zayo and finally take the road of Bayankhongor where we stop for lunch. We leave for Altai (600 kms from here) at 4 0’clock in the afternoon. We will drive all night long, following jeeps on the piste, passing rivers, desertic landscapes, loose the jeeps, feel very lonely as we drive past more and more skeletons of horses or cows...
The sun finally shows up, and we stop at 8 am in a village, in the middle of the desert.
Ou cameraman and his funky haircut.

21 May 2005
Where: on the road, heading west.
We drive all day, taking turns every 2 hours.
The way we packed the van enables one of us to sleep while Zayo eats kilometers. We meet some camels on our way. They're curious and amazing animals, whatever says Sylvain Tesson (who seems to dislike camels... but what does Sylvain likes, appart from himself?)

22 May 2005
Where: on the road, heading west.
Still driving, we make a stop at the top of a hill where a Ovoo is.

There we take a team picture as this is our last day together: Backaa and Piero will head back to Ulaanbaatar tomorrow, when we get to Khovst.

Let's have a little close-up, for your enjoyment ;-)

We stop on the road to give some petrol to a lone motorcyclist.

We decide to camp on a small road. Four massive trucks stop nearby to fill their water tanks. Their trucks are loaded with scrap metal and they tell us that this is the road to China, where they're going to sell the metal.
Tom give us a chance to taste his cooking skills...

23 May 2005
Where: on the road, heading west. Reaching Khovst then heading for Tolgon.
We stop in a ger to have some tea (and ask directions!). There Greg falls in love with a baby goat (who wouldn't, looking at the picture?). But Tom, the official doctor of the expedition, remember?, advise Greg not to take the goat as there are too many sanitaries risks. Greg thinks Tom is just jealous!

We stop again on the side of the road as one of the door is broken. While trying to fix it Greg gets a small piece of metal in his eye. Tom has to do a proper surgery to get it out, right on th eside of the road. Tom successfully get it out.

After a day spent on Zayo (someone fixes the gear, again!) and some problems with th egenerator just to keep us busy, we decide to sleep and take the road tomorrow. We have our last diner together as Backaa and Piero leave tomorrow.for Ulaanbaatar. They're going have to have a 36 hours journey, with 7 other people in a jeep!

24 May 2005
Where: on the road, heading west. From Tolgon to Olgi.
Who: Tom and Greg.

Our translator and our mechanics are now gone; we feel lost like sheeps in the middle of a family of wolfves.
We drive across fascinating landscapes. We cross cols covered with snow.

We pick-up two guys who want a lift. They carry some fresh milk and some fishes (the odour is mixing with that of Greg's feet!). One of them, Emecinbek, invites us for diner with his family. We eat some fresh fish and pray the Gods that our Boots (raviolis) diet is over!

We stop by a lake and sleep there.

25 May 2005
Where: on the road, heading west.
We arrive in Olgi, the last town before the russian border, in the morning.

While Greg is havin g breakfast, Tom meets soem motorcyclists from New-Zealand. One of them has some health troubles that Tom needs to look at. We go to their hotel room and decide to cross the border with them the day after. We will carry their luggage and maybe the one who is sick, Dick. These guys are on an amazing journey: The Last Hurray.
www.thelasthurray.com
They're 72 and 60 years old, accompanied by Steven, the son of one them, Des.
Riding old motorbikes from the 50s, they're going from Beijing to Holand.
One of tghe aim of their trip is to get to a convergence point: 49' N 90'.
This is not too far from where we are and decide to go together.

26 May 2005
We leave for the russian border today. Please go to the russian section.