6. 5 July to 18 July 2011 - Almaty and Charyn Canyon, Kazakhstan The last 500 km from Taraz to Almaty was in stark contrast to the rest of our drive across Kazakhstan. The road virtually follows the Kyrgyzstan border along the snow-capped Alatau Range, and arable farming country extends right to the foot of the mountains. Now we were seeing a beautiful landscape of green trees and crops with a mountain backdrop - no longer the flat, hot desert. We have ...

5. 22 June to 4 July 2011 - The Drive Across Kazakhstan "Good luck" was the message from the last Russian official after the last check of our passports, when we crossed the bridge over the last waterway of the Volga River Delta between the Russian and Kazakhstan borders. After a two hour border crossing, our long drive across Kazakhstan had begun. It was to be a 3800 km drive across a vast landscape of either flat grassy steppes or arid desert, with litt...