Wednesday, 14 October 2026

 

Start: Aktobe (KZ) 8:00

Arrival: just east of Atyrau (KZ) 15:00

 

Total: 583 km

 

 

Aralsk - Aktobe - Atyrau - Astrakhan. This part of the world had a thing for towns beginning with an A. We started mixing them up in our heads. This mixture of gravel, exhaust fumes and sand was Aktobe's morning breeze, right? "I have a headache", Sonia sighed when she got out of bed. I offered a sympathetic hgrruph, busy unclogging my lungs. An unpleasant task at the best of times, but six weeks in the Central Asian dust bowl had brought my early-morning cough to a new level. After breakfast, we both felt better. Onwards, to Atyrau!

 

 

I turned out of the hotel parking lot onto the main city street. Two large signs: Make a right for Samara and Straight on towards Astrakhan. "Nice, the two only towns pointed out are both not in Kazakhstan, but in Russia", I said, driving straight ahead. Astrakhan, that's where we were headed. Right after Atyrau, that is.

 

The road towards Russia was in much better condition than yesterday's sorry excuse for a highway. Although just a two-lane country road, traffic was sparse enough to make good speed. As you can see from the pictures, variations of the road are all I have to offer to illustrate today's ramblings. Incidentally, can you guess what Sonia did yesterday evening? A hint is in the first picture. Looks good, po-moemu.

 

 

Today, it was decidedly windy on the steppe. At one point the sidewind got so strong that I slowed down to 90 km/h. Just as well, the average speed limit, which they checked at intervals, was 100 km/h, and I had probably exceeded that. Time and again, a huge tumbleweed tumbled right into our path. "They're doing it on purpose", I said grimly. "They're waiting for a car to come and then get under its wheel." Sonia nodded. "They're having fun. Kids." We giggled. But I really didn't want to get such a thing under my car again. Spoiler: We managed to avoid them all.

 

In Sagyz, we stopped at a gas station, honouring our motto: Half-empty tank - pull into the nearest station. "Silny veter", I struck up a conversation with the gas pump employee. He nodded. "Do you think it will get even windier?" I asked, fearing a repeat of the storm we had gotten into earlier this year in Spain. He pondered the question. "It's always windy here", he finally said. I guess it takes more than a stiff breeze to faze a desert dweller. We chatted while we waited for Sonia to pay at the cashier. He finally asked where I had learnt Russian. "Samostoyatelno", I answered. Self-study. "Me too", he said. "You don't have Russian classes at school?" I asked, surprised. "Yes, but I didn't pay attention." We both laughed. Bonding over school bashing. Works like a charm.

 

 

Back on the road, visibility soon deteriorated and the world took on a yellowish tinge. "Is that fog?" Sonia asked, pointing at the houses of the aptly named village of Mukyr. "Nope, that's sand", I declared. A sandstorm, really? I was having enough fun and adventure as it was. The car in front of us disappeared into the haze. Soon it was our turn to enter the cloud of dust. The "sandstorm" actually only lasted for about half a minute. For some reason, the (cursed?) village of Mukyr was shrouded in a thin layer of sand particles, but the area just behind it was not affected. Spooky.

 

 

Endless steppe. The road went on and on, losing itself into the horizon. The rear view mirror showed exactly the same picture as looking out the front windshield. An endless hilly highway. A road-trip dream.

 

We need not have gotten up that early. The ride was such a breeze that already at 3 pm we reached the Keruen Inn motel on the outskirts of Atyrau. What to do? Try to find a road south and check out the Caspian Sea? There seemed to be none. The delta of the Ural River (him of continent-dividing fame) was more than an hour away from here. Sonia was in no particular hurry to behold the Caspian Sea, and I had had the pleasure some years back in Baku (check out my trip to the Caucasus here). So for today, and probably the entirety of this roadtrip, the Caspian Sea would remain unseen by my sis.

 

 

Instead, we lounged on our motel bed, ate yummy ramen noodles and made plans for the next few days in Russia. And then we put our head down for our last night in Central Asia. Tomorrow: Back into Europe.

 

Last pic for today: Horses at our motel on the motorway near Atyrau. First they came over to graze on our side, then they crossed back to the other side. I'd say the grass is always greener, but it really isn't. Yellow all around. LOL