Six a clock this morning the border guards knocked on our door and said it was time to get going. We spent the day in Astrakhan, the first big town on the Russian side. We found some great stores for outdoor gear and bought an axe, camping chairs, a shovel and mosquito jackets. But we passed on the moon shining equipment they sold in the outdoor equipment stores.

Spending most of the day in Astrakhan we needed to cover some distance in the evening, at least 250 kilometers. We have only 3 days for transiting Russia. And we never know what the roads are going to be like.

Yesterday we drove fast along a nice and smooth highway. We discussed that now we are probably finally free from all this bad roads. Ten minutes later Murphy pointed his finger at us. The road disappeared and turned in to a really, really bad dirt track with lots of deep, sandy parts. We barely could pass the 22 kilometers of this off road track. We were so very close to get stuck several times. But we managed it going fast over the sandy parts, sliding on our belly, holding our breaths and hoping for the best.

Today we drove south along the Caspian Sea. We found a beach resort where we got to borrow a house for free. The owner enjoyed to have far away guests as us.

Even though we had only a 3 day transit visa we have been able to do and see some things along our route. It gets boring just to drive for 3 days in a row. At 3 PM we arrived at the border. To get out of Russia took only 45 minutes. But to get in to Azerbaijan took us 2,5 hour, mostly because of the border guards had to check out papers again and again and again. They were not interested in our car; they just opened the door to take a quick look inside. Then we went halfway to Baku and stopped for the night at a truck stop.