We awoke bright and early and arranged to meet the Swiss at the port at 9am. They had been up even earlier to get their vehicle washed. We were slightly late to the port, even though oddly there was no cars on the road. However our lateness was rewarded as Elias and Marcel had arrived with coffee and croissants for us!
Full of confidence we drove up to the barrier and past the dozens of Turkmens camped outside the port, and were ushered through to a car park on the other side of the barrier. That was it. No payments asked for, no instructions and nobody to ask. So we waited.
We soon discovered there were lots of Mongol Rally people already at the port. A team of 7 Portuguese guys were asleep in their little cars, roof racks riveted of welded to the roof. A Swiss/English couple were waiting as well, very patiently as it turned out, for 5 days already for the ferry to leave. In the end they had to cancel their plans for Turkmenistan as the Swiss ladies’ fixed date visa was due to run out the next day, and were waiting for customs (which is only manned when a boat is due) so they could go to a different port and try for Kazakhstan instead. Later a British team of two would arrive, a British/Irish team in a Citroen 2CV, then finally a British team of four. Between us we waited to the really afternoon for any sign of movement from the ship or any indication from port officials of when the back might start rolling. We were to wait a long time, setting up camping chairs and staying out of the sun as it passed its zenith.
Around 4/5pm we were asked to go back through the barrier to the cabin we had visited the previous evening to present our passports, car passport (V5 document) and $40 admin fee to get our names on the list. We were then told to go back through the barrier and to to customs, a small building with no sign on the other side of the port railway line. The customs officer didn’t speak much English and took a long time checking the car passport and the insurance we bought at the border coming from Georgia. When he had completed the paperwork he took a small receipt that was stepped to the insurance, wrote $20 on it and gave it to us. We queried this, and had a great conversation, us in English and him in Azeri, until his patience frayed a bit and he processed a free more teams instead. The small room could only for with so many people and the A/C started to struggle with the bodies so all the but the “drivers” (vehicle owners) left to sit in the heat of the afternoon.
After three teams had been given the same handwritten note on their insurance receipt, the same gesturing and broken English eventually led to our understanding that there was a tax to be paid, and no we couldn’t pay him or anywhere in the port, we had to go back into Baku itself and find a post office to pay the tax! While the next teams waited for their turn in the merry customs dance, Paul, Elias from the Swiss team and Adam from the two Brit team took a taxi to the post office as it was 5pm and the whole process needed finishing before customs closed at 6. The taxi would have been condemned in the UK, and the lack of seatbelts were a bit of a hazard, but we got there in one piece. Luckily we had been to this post office before so we just had to grapple with the automated queuing system (in Azeri only) and try and get three on a single ticket to speed things up. We paid in dollars and got our change in Manat, flagged down another, slightly safer looking taxi, and headed back to the port. With a wave to the now familiar barrier guards we took our little bit of paper to customs, another guy tapped some details into a computer and we were done!
But that didn’t mean that we could now just drive into the boat, oh no. The boat didn’t start loading until night fell. It started with the passengers who had been in the waiting room for goodness knows how long getting on a bus with all their bags, then back off again without them. Then a rumour started we were to load our cars first. This was a cause for concern with us as being loaded early on the Bulgaria-Georgia ferry meant we were stuck for hours at the other end waiting to unload. Our unlikely convoy made its way around the port, even driving right up to the boat before turning around and eventually parking in a line behind a freight shed. That was around 10pm. Some people slept in their vehicles, some set up camp chairs again and the Portuguese seemed to either be arguing or joking amongst themselves quite loudly.
At around 4am there was suddenly a rousing shout from the port staff to get ready to load, doors were closed and engines started, amazingly including the 2CV which was predicted to need bump starting. Our convoy bumbled around the port, again swinging near the boat just to turn away again and park up mere metres from the hull and be directed to the passport and customs cabin. We were called in a seemingly random order to the cabin, searches were made and one by one the rally “passengers” walked up the steps to the boat and the drivers took their vehicles up the boats ramp and then down into the lower deck. Not the lower deck again!
A large crowd was in the boat’s reception area and a scene reminiscent of wall Street was being played out where passports and dollars were being passed between people and price for a seat or cabin was being relayed to the back. We couldn’t get a four berth cabin and singles were expensive so we opted for seats. It’s only a 12 hour crossing right? We were allocated seat numbers but chose whichever ones weren’t already occupied by dozing figures taking up three at a time, then we settled down for a fitful night’s sleep under the passenger cabin’s astonishingly noisy air conditioning.
Team Yes We Khan 