Buy a cabin for the boat for $100 each as a foreigner - alternatively 'pretend you're Azerbaijan' and only pay $60. No, don't do that (good advice from Lonely Planet) as a crewman will rent you his cabin (complete with girlie pin-ups) for $10. We were later told by a friend that the captain rents his cabin out for $20, and for a few dollars more you can enjoy his personal services, if you're a female passenger!IMPRESSIONS........

- A really buzzing (if poor) place
- Real traffic going somewhere
- Thriving markets
- Cultivated fields
- Less fences and more action
- Respectful wonderful people
- Weird procedures for booking ferries

TRAVELOGUE.......

We chose to enter Azerbaijan by a quiet boder crossing in the north-west of the country so that we'd be in the right area to see the Caucus Mountains - hey these people are real Caucasians! The crossing was a little slow, but when you've set aside a day for the crossing (always a good idea), what's the hurry? Everyone was pleasant, nobody wanted bribing and the World Cup was on the TV in the border post.

For the first time ever we underwent a medical test before we were allowed in the country. First the doctor asked if we were "OK"? A bit of a trick question there. Then he enquired about vaccination documents - and then he waved away that question when we pointed to the panniers on the bike - the certificates were in the botton of one - he didn't want to wait an hour for us to find them. Then a cursory thermometer under the armpits and the most interesting part of the procedure - a radiation test. Out with the little electronic gadget and whizz it over our bodies, one at a time. And bizarely Georgie came out 20% more radioactive than me. Only later did I realise that she was sitting next to the TV and the discrepancy was probably due to the beta radiation the TV was giving out!

And so out into a beautiful lush countryside, with all the usual domestic animals, but the Georgian pigs had been replaced by water buffalo wallowing in muddy pools and ditches. The farmers were gathering in hay and one of the funniest sights ever has to be seeing a Ural sidecar outfit piled about 3 metres high with hay. I wanted to wait around to see what happened when the exhaust pipes got hot.

Buffalo pretending to be African

Into the first town and we decided to try to find a bank for money-changing. As soon as we stopped the usual crowd of men gathered, but in stark contrast to the crowds in Georgia, they kept respectfully away from the bike. Huge enthusiasm and friendliness - money-changer summoned - money changed - invited for tea - stories of our trip. We were happy to be in Azerbaijan. A blessed relief!

The warm welcome

Immediately we started to regret our decision to shoot through Azerbaijan as quickly as possible. The guides that we had read before leaving had pointed us towards staying in Georgia for a couple of weeks and Azerbaijan for a couple of days. WRONG - we should have done it the other way round!

Thence to a small old town called Saki, where there is an old Caravanseri (a silk-road coach-house for camels) converted into a hotel. This was to be our base for the next couple of days allowing Georgie to see the first England match in the World Cup. The hotel was a weird combination of beautiful restoration and spartan living. The electricity would be off most of the day and the only water in the room was freezing cold (straight off the mountain), but it was cheap, the restaurant was good and it suited us.

It's worth mentioning at this point a curious ploy found in Azeri restaurants. You order some food and they bring it out, along with other dishes "you might like" - often little things like cheese or jam. You have to send back the extra dishes or you'll have to pay for them - even if you don't touch them. Bloody cheeky, but it happens throughout the country. We've not found the practice anywhere else (yet!).

I did some bike maintainence (!) including removing the leaking oil cooler and replacing it with a by-pass pipe.

We visited the local mansion - a "Khan's Summer Palace". Beautiful glass and latticework, and we discovered that there is a difference between Sultans, Khans, Emirs, ... But like Dukes and Earls, I'm too disrespectful to remember who's above whom.

The bike was parked outside the hotel and so got a lot of attention from the locals, including from the local bike club - a 3 man band. They invited us out on an evening's ride-out - an offer that could not be refused. This time Georgie decided to join the party, even though the format was undefined.

The bike club turned up, lead by Elgar (or a Russian version of that name) on his Jawa 350. I later found out that the front brake on the Jawa didn't work (when I was riding it at about 50kph, going into a corner!). The other 2 members were on Minsk 125s - very similar to BSA Bantams. We never really caught their names, but they looked like characters from "Dick Dasterdly's Catch the Pigeon" - weird old helmets, goofy smiles and odd-ball antics. One brought along a huge video camera to capture "the day the foreigners fell off".

First we had to ride round town in convoy, to show all the locals our machinery. Then a challenge - the local "big dirty hill". We all stopped at the bottom of a limestone track, with a hairpin half-way up. The recent rain had turned the fine limestone powder into a firm porridge, but it looked do-able. We then had 10 minutes of them asking us "problem da?" and "problem yes?", and we replied "problem nyet" and "problem no". So they'd have to go up it and we'd have to try. The pull was a bit squirly, especially with road tyres and touring pressures, but we got up it cleanly - much to their surprise - English honour upheld!

A ciggy and photo stop and it's back down the hill (and I thought we'd be dirt riding all night). This time the porridge was more of a problem, clogging our bikes' front mudguard until the wheel almost stopped turning. The wheels on the 2 Minsks clogged up completely and had to be "sledged" down the hill. Ten minutes of poking out the mud with shitty sticks ensued.

Minsk man at the top of the dirty great hill

More riding round town and we were off to the local beauty spot / health spa for tea and cakes with the boss-man.

Later Elgar revealed that he's been a tank driver most his life, fighting in Ngorno-Karabak, picking up hand-grenade wounds in his back and legs in the process. Now that's close quarters fighting!! We swapped addresses and headed for the hotel. I have visions of a long stream of waifs and strays from the former Soviet Union turning up on my doorstep in Manchester, much to the amazement of the people who I've rented the house too - huh huh!!

Next day it is a 350km push on to Baku, where we plan to get a ferry across the Caspian Sea to Turkmenistan. And the heavens opened, and stayed open most of the day. I was already soaked to the skin by the time I'd loaded up the bike, and didn't get dry again until a day or so later.

We spent the day riding up and down valleys that funnelled the rain down the roads. Sometimes there was so much water running down the roads that you couldn't see the pot-holes at all. Then my old "whitewater kayaking" experience came in handy - reading the lumps and bumps under the water from the shape of the waves on the road.

One valley we went through was an eye-opener - like riding through an abbatoir. As in other places, when one roadside stall sets up, another dozen identical ones are sure to follow. This valley seemed to think that it was a good idea to slaughter and butcher sheep on the edge of the road. First we saw carcasses being cut up, then a very freshly skinned carcass, then one half skinned. And all around were live sheep waiting to meet their makers (or at least unmakers!). Luckily we avoided any views of some poor animal's last moments. A mile later we stopped for lunch and enjoyed four REALLY fresh lamb kebabs.

More miles and the countryside lost its vegetation and the Azerbaijan that I had imagined came into view.

Then into Baku, a pretty nice place, like an Soviet/Islamic version of Liverpool - but here the rain stopped as we arrived rather than starting. What to do at 6pm for "2 drowned rats on a Beemer"? Hotel and relax, or find the ferry port and see what's up? Off to the ferry and our first (but probably not last) experience of an "alternative booking process".

We really didn't realise that it could be so difficult to book and get on a ferry. In Europe we're used to a 2 stage process: buy a ticket from someone then turn up at the allotted time and get on. You might have some negotiation about special discounts, maybe some customs shenanigans to go through, and perhaps the boat might be run late - but all really within the bounds of the imagination. Not here! All assumptions were up for discussion.

Over the next 2 days we were to discover that the concept of "what time does the ferry leave here and arrive over there?" are alien - after a while you stop asking, and later you realise it all depends on "when the train arrives and gets shunted onto the boat". And the best way of finding out when you'll arrive is to use your GPS to calculate an ETA.

How the train gets onto the ferry

The idea of a ticket for the bike and 2 people is just as weird - hell let's buy a ticket for Georgie and a "Bill of Lading" for the bike rider. Ticket sales - well first you have to go through customs and passport clearance (!!), because there's no point selling you a ticket if your documents are not in order. Port tax - a little man will catch you as you ride past his office and tell you to come back 2 hours later!

Buy a cabin for the boat for $100 each as a foreigner - alternatively 'pretend you're Azerbaijan' and only pay $60. No, don't do that (good advice from Lonely Planet) as a crewman will rent you his cabin (complete with girlie pin-ups) for $10. We were later told by a friend that the captain rents his cabin out for $20, and for a few dollars more you can enjoy his personal services, if you're a female passenger!

Cabin with girlie pin-ups

On the day we arrived in Baku we spent about 2 hours trying to nail-down the procedure, before giving up and deciding to come back the next day.

One last challenge for the drowned rats before retiring - get into the hotel - an old ferry boat moored in the centre of Baku. The Kompass Hotel also has a seedy restaurant and disco and is a brothel - lovely. The room checked out ok, even if the plumbing in the loo was a bit smelly, baggage up to the room, and so to security arrangements for the bike. Ride the thing up the stairs, through a door and onto the ferry's old car deck. Seemed like a bloody stupid idea, but once we press-ganged (nautical note there!) a bunch of spectators we managed the feat. It was all very improbable, but by that point in the trip "the improbable" seemed to be "the usual".

Up the stairs into the brothel boat

The big win of the day was a curry house for dinner - ah bliss.

We managed to sleep through the sounds of Azeri "bizneezmen" and Russian tarts dancing and arguing and next day we rejoined the search for a procedure at the port. We arrived at about 1pm as the only vehicular passengers (save for the trains that turned up some time after midnight) and we managed to get onto the boat by about 6.30pm. Some sort of record in itself? We quaffed the beer we'd brought along and waited for the boat to sail........

Next morning we woke up and to our surprise we were at sea. But no engine noise and vibration like on a normal ferry? A quick investigation on deck revealed that the engines were quietly turning over and we were making a heady 10 knots (compared to about 25 on a normal ferry). Oh well, settle back, enjoy "the cruise", soak up some rays and fritter the day away.

We knew that the lush vegetation of Georgia and Azerbaijan were behind us and a long stretch of desert lay ahead in Turkmenistan ... mmmm