We wanted to avoid Russia and Ukraine as much as possible right from the start…its not cos we wanna get friend in the friendly Kazakh deserts but more because of the fact that it would have been too easy in Russia (its got decent roads all the way up to Mongolia) and as a result would have been more boring than watching the weather updates being in a place like Chennai (its either summer or mild summer all year long!!).

Anyway, after a bunch of discussions and many a cuppo coffe later, we came up with this of course…it might change a bit at the last moment, but for the time being, we are working with this route in mind.

View Final Route in a larger map

Interestingly once we knew that the Adventurists are offering the visa machine also for Kyrgyzstan, we jumped at it and changed our route. Of course, the really interesting bit on the route starts from Serbia onwards and gets real interesting in Turkey. I had been there in 2007, is an awesome place no doubt! My Turkish friend here is already giving me warnings about speeding in towns as its supposedly a BIG offence!

I am hoping of course that the Georgia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan bit works out finally…although we do wonder how Georgia would look like right now after last years clash with Russia. Interestingly that happened right during the time of the Mongol Rally 2008…and yes, some teams were dodging missile fire as opposed to the more sedate pothole!

Anyway, the countries we would we passing through are

1. Europe : England
2. Europe : France
3. Europe : Germany/Netherlands/Belgium/Italy – depending on last minute decision on the route (our aim being to get to Prague on 20th July for the BIG party!!)
4. Europe : Czech Republic
5. Europe : Serbia
6. Europe : Bulgaria
7. Europe/Asia : Turkey (Talks are forever going on if Turkey would find a place in the EU!!)
8. Asia : Georgia
9. Asia : Azerbaijan
10. Asia : Turkmenistan
11. Asia : Uzbekistan
12. Asia : Kyrgyzstan (latest addition)
13. Asia : Kazakhstan
14. Asia : Russia
15. Asia : Mongolia

Of course, this doesn’t mean we will stop here. Once we drop the car off for the rally people to sell it off and donate the proceeds to charity, many of us might head on further to other places. Some being China, India, back to Europe through the Trans-Siberian rail…etc etc…

Ah well, may the wind blow exactly behind our car throughout…