Reaching the border was more spectacular than expected. The mountain chain covered with snow was beautiful and the cold was something present the whole time.
Exiting Iran was very simple and I was even able to receive the exit stamp, even though they refused to do so. Basically it is something which a lot of people avoid to not have future hustles with it. My passport is “ruined” in that matter anyway, so it was cool to receive it. At the entry I was asking for it as well, but they really didn’t want to do so.
Entry office of Turkmenistan
When approaching the border of Turkmenistan it was such a weird vibe somehow. The officers were friendly to me, but on the other hand had a lot of time.
I had the letter of invitation and everything else I needed to receive the visa without any issues.
They said that they were searching for my driver and it took in my opinion too long to find him. The whole searching part was taking over three hours and it was very annoying.
Another guy from a side office called me and said “for $50 I can make you get through faster!” I didn’t feel like paying extra at a border at which I would be able to enter at almost 100%, so it would have been a waste of money. So far I never had to bribe someone, probably in the future it will be different.
After three hours my driver arrived and helped me through the rest of the process. I had to pay for a PCR Covid Test, which was even less than a fast test. They were doing it improperly, without a name and without a mouth. It was just money making, so annoying.
The visa was paid and other things as well. I was inside Turkmenistan and happy that the waiting time was over.
Getting to Ashgabat
After being through it was time to first take a bus, to a zone from where you were allowed to use your private car. The bus was filled until the last centimeter and I used my new bought suitcase to sit, which demolished it a bit, cheap quality.
On the way we saw many antelopes, which are very known in Turkmenistan. They were running around in smaller numbers and into the snow covered mountains. It was very cold outside, something I wasn’t actually expecting.
Once we were at the end of the bus ride, we were changing the car to the private car of the driver. He was taking me to the hotel in the center of Ashgabat in which I would meet Felix for the first time in person.
My first impression of Ashgabat was mixed. First it was impressive to see this white city out in nowhere after getting through the mountains. My second impression was that it was weird to have it like that. Only white buildings and white cars with streets which were not as crowded.
Meeting Felix and eating traditional food
Meeting Felix for the first time was great, right away I heard this east German accent, but understood each other right away good. Weird to see each other after texting for months.
He was flying into Ashgabat the night before and already stayed a night in the hotel.
It was a very shitty hotel for the price we had to pay.
In Turkmenistan the government is ripping off the tourists and that’s one of the times you can feel it.
We went out together with the guide through the city and he explained a few things to us while we drove to a restaurant. He was changing some money for us, to a bad rate which we found out later on that trip.
The restaurant was quite cute. It was a yurt and we were able to order traditional food with a tablet. There were some vegetarian options at a quite good price actually.
I was expecting it to be more expensive when I saw the place.
Seeing more of the city
Now it was time for sightseeing. We were seeing one guarded monument after another. Adding to this, nobody was on the street. Sometimes there were roads completely empty besides some soldiers protecting the sights.
It was forbidden to take pictures of the soldiers, even when it was being done from a distance without seeing faces or something like that. I still don’t understand why it needs to be protected by soldiers. It is unlikely that a tourist is getting there without a guide and adding to this, it is unlikely that someone would demolish it.
The whole “not taking pictures” thing was being taken quite seriously. Also by locals who are on the scale, basically nobody. They try to be the big boss and want to show off by telling tourists what they do is wrong, even though it is completely bullshit. Luckily we had a guide with us. There was a guy with whom it felt a bit like that he would have chosen violence while getting changed.
Few soldiers were talking to me to delete the pictures, which I was doing after of course.
Getting the pictures back wasn’t said against it though.
Same in Afghanistan.
The city was very clean, that is something you can’t see differently. It was so clean that it feels quite unreal again.
Many records
Ashgabat is full of world records, the city with the most marble rocks built into the constructions. One of the worlds records was also, the biggest indoor ferris wheel.
First I don’t understand why people would even want to do it and second it is basically a ferris wheel with some construction built around it.
Felix and I went there and it was not in use at the moment. The owner was starting it just for us. It was also quite cheap. So basically we were the only customers in sight.
We went inside and were going one time around. It wasn’t as special, mainly because it was so dirty that you were not really able to look outside and especially that you were not able to take any good pictures of it.
There were also other world records, the guide was telling us about, but honestly I wasn’t remembering them, all records were about some type of buildings.
Local Bazaar
We went to a local bazaar where Felix wanted to buy a magnet and I was getting some handmade socks, which just looked amazing.
I tried to get the price down but wasn’t really working so well.
Further to the bazaar there was a German guy talking to us from the side and wanted to welcome us to Turkmenistan. He was there with his younger wife. He was offering us to meet him for a beer later that day. We exchanged contact and didn’t know if it would be legit, but we thought of it.
He was a diplomat from Germany.
Wedding house
There was a house, which looked very fancy, where everyone had to go, when they wanted to get married. It was on top of a hill, with a view over the city.
Actually quite cool there. We were taking pictures from the outside of the building and tried to get inside as well.
We stopped right away and were forced to not take any pictures. They were so paranoid somehow or afraid, I actually don’t know.
After long discussion, the manager came to us and was super friendly and showed us around the house. Now we were able to take pictures of everything and no problem was there. He was explaining the place to us and showed us traditional clothes as well.
Seeing the diplomat
After the tour of the day was done, we went back to the hotel where we had internet which was enough for EMail. Quite weird to go back into the past and communicate only with EMail, I kind of liked it though. The contact was less, but combined with more quality.
Nevertheless, Felix was texting with the diplomat and he was sending us a private driver to pick us up in the hotel.
He took us up and we gave him a little bit of money after we arrived.
We were in his apartment and were offered a German beer and some snacks. He was telling us all the insights of the country which we would have never heard otherwise while traveling there. I will not get into detail, because the government is reading articles about their country. Not sure if this will be seen, but I don’t want him to get into trouble.
Just that you know, the countries politics seem to be really fucked when talking about the treatment of the foreign people and also the locals.
It was very nice to get those insights, but he was a bit weird and it felt that he wanted to kick us out quickly. The cool thing was that he had an unfiltered internet and could use everything freely, as well. Whatsapp and everything else was functioning again, which is usually impossible without a VPN.
What’s up next?
Next week you will read a bit more about the trip in Turkmenistan, so stay tuned!
