This was the border crossing we had been dreading, for a number of reasons.
Medications:
First on our list of worries was the strict Uzbek rules regarding the carriage of medicines. There are a number of horror stories on travellers websites and blogs from people who have unintentionally transgressed these rules and been subject to hotel arrest or prison awaiting trial.
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hubb/northern-asia/uzbekistan-medical-kits-warning-57823 - is just one such warning
Costs of accommodation, translators, legal representation and fines have quickly mounted for these unfortunates, who were eventually lucky to escape without vehicle confiscation.
Carrying any medicines derived from morphiates or opiates is risky, as this can be viewed as drug trafficking. This includes medicines that are freely available over the counter or with a prescription in the UK and elsewhere.
We have read examples of people who fell foul of the back ache pain relief and sleeping pills that they carried.
To be balanced the majority of people have no issues at all, and a few people have outright pooh-pooed these blogs as alarmist.
We thoroughly researched all our medication and read every label, before taking the decision to jettison £30 worth of medicine, which is frustrating but nothing compared to the potential costs and hassles mentioned above, however small the risk.
Prescription cocodamol, mouth ulcer treatments, sore throat spray and our dental first aid kit all contained some kind of ”…caine” on their ingredient list, and a Romanian cough medicine whose labels were unfathomable also joined the pile of discarded meds.
We did not have the necessary notarised doctors letters for other prescription meds (precautionary antibiotics, Diamox for altitude sickness etc) and even considered knocking something up ourselves on the laptop, but in the end did not bother.
Electronics:
We have also heard of the requirements to declare everything (cash and electronics) on the customs entry form, and similar tales of items that were found and were not declared being subject to confiscation. Being very useful in Morocco we had bought two CB radios, in case we joined another vehicle in convoy, and we also have our satellite phone. I emailed the Uzbek embassy in London for clarification on these but, not entirely unexpectedly, had no reply.
In the end we vaguely declared them as two radios and a mobile phone, along with every other piece of electronics we carried.
We braced ourselves to lose the CBs if required…
Cash:
Again, we had to declare everything we carried and in every currency.
Black market currency exchange is significantly better than official bank rates, so we held $500 dollars cash back, hidden and undeclared in case we had any awkward questions regarding the amount of cash we left with (in hindsight this was not really necessary?).
It is worth a mention that the way Uzbek customs handled our paperwork made a complete mockery of the above, and put me (as driver) at risk of a transgression…
Time:
Lonely Planet and various blogs warned us to expect a 7-hour crossing…
Our first hassle was finding the border:
The main M39 Shymkent – Tashkent road ended in a barbed wire barrier across the road and access for foot passengers only. The touts descended with demands to get in the car and drive us to the right border, and then seeing we only have two seats, started waving car keys with offers to drive us there.
Garmin then tried to re-route us across another nearby but closed foot passenger border, near Saryagash, which resulted in a fantastic piece of good fortune that we were too pre-occupied to take full advantage of.
Whilst I handled the hoards of inquisitive “gentlemen” who surrounded the car, and shoved their heads in through the open windows to have good old nose around, Cheryl changed Kazakh Tenge for Uzbek Som and got the most phenominal exchange rate. Approx. 15% better than anything we subsequently got in Uzbekistan, even on the black market! We got over 3000s to the dollar equivalent, compared to 2,600-2,700 black market and 2,200 official rate within Uzbekistan!
Our top tip – check the rates for Kazakh Tenge for Uzbek Som before the border!
We drove 70km south to the crossing at Yallama-Chinaz , stopping to top up both diesel tanks, both jerries, and another 10 litre plastic container that we had stashed on the roof. This was over 200 litres diesel capacity, and with the subsequent issues buying diesel in Uzbekistan we are glad we carried every last drop…
Exiting Kazakhstan was relatively straightforward, although the customs forms were a bit of a pain again. Having calculated and recorded exactly what cash we were taking into Uzbekistan we were similarly honest (the hidden $500 excepted) in our Kazakh declaration.
For some reason they took our hard won Russian customs form off us, despite it having three months validity for subsequent Russian crossings.
I think our currency honesty back-fired slightly as the visible sums involved prompted the customs “lady” to insist that we “declare” $10 after passport control in order to receive our customs form back.
This made no sense at all, until it became clear that this was a payment for Christ knows what. We asked for, and got, a hand written receipt ripped from scrap paper and twigged that we had just been stung…
We then queued in baking heat in no-mans land for two hours, watching a multitude of foot passengers cross in either direction whilst the two cars ahead of us were slowly processed. During this period two trucks were let through ahead of us, but were still stuck in customs when we left – hours later.
We decided to split the cash, electronics and medicines declarations between us and filled out the dreaded customs forms. Rejoining the queue we encountered the situation where Cheryl and I were processed entirely differently as Cheryl was, in effect, on foot, and I was a driver. Unbeknown to me customs deleted everything off Cheryl’s form as it was not part of her hand luggage, and told her that as driver, anything in the vehicle was “his problem”.
Great – I now had only half the stuff we carried declared!
We were also told to put “No” against the carrying of any medicines (despite carrying enough to make our own mini-series of Casualty).
Cheryl was quickly processed and I joined a queue in the sun around the side of the building for drivers. I handed my forms in – and the office then emptied – lunch time. I used the time to befriend a Russian lady and her two sons and a Belarussian truck driver.
Over an hour later, lunch was over, my passport was stamped, and the customs form was given the once over…now for the vehicle checks.
We have always viewed border crossings as a game, and our survival strategy is to allow a full day for any crossing in our itinerary, and approach the game with whatever patience and good humour we can muster. It also pays to get to know your fellow travellers, who often help out, advise and guide, and in this case got all frustrated and shouty at the officials – which took the attention away from us a little?
Customs dude indicated he wanted the vehicle emptied, every last box of it.
“No Problem” we smiled, and started the process, very, very slowly.
The game is “Who will bet bored first?”
We find enthusiastically showing them every last bit of kit rapidly accelerates them reaching the tedium threshold.
We unpacked boxes onto a table, worryingly positioned adjacent to the foot passengers queue – who now had access to our possessions, should the fancy have taken them. It was impossible to keep an eye on the three guys opening doors, poking about and going through our bags on the table, but we did the best we could.
Whilst Cheryl busily explained that our second row storage was bolted to the floor and could not come out, I was asked to go through the medicines box.
I was quite getting into the charades of miming bad stomachs, sneezing and headaches when my nemesis in the form of a box of “ladies products” was pulled out.
I pointed to Cheryl who was otherwise engaged and shrugged, we all had a good luck at the “applicator” cartoon on the side, and then for some utterly unfathomable reason I stupidly unwrapped one and mimed smoking it. Customs attention had luckily moved on elsewhere from my immaturity, and with only 10% of our boxes removed and examined, boredom kicked in and we were told to pack it all away again. Which we did, very, very slowly.
We were out in just over seven hours.
Immediately after the gate we pulled over to buy the requisite green card insurance, but were diverted by a policeman who wanted us to register.
He enquired after our green card and then offered to walk us over to the booth whilst asking what currency we wanted to pay in?
Now. Why on earth would a copper be getting involved in the purchase of insurance? So, the first copper we met in Uzbekistan was the only bent copper we met in Uzbekistan. He was so phenomenally shite at hiding his intent that we actually kicked off and protested at his stupidity in the sheer cheek of his overcharging.
He and the insurance vendor were like two spectacularly stupid schoolboys finding the tuck shop open and unattended, and rather than nicking an unnoticed chocolate bar or two, make off with the till.
They passed furtive glances and shy grins back and forth before demanding over $100 dollars for 15 days insurance.
We refused and ended up parting with $5, whilst this ridiculous copper demanded a bottle of whisky as a “souvenir”.
I offered him one of the rain-stained and by now somewhat bedraggled LM Brand cigarettes we had bought for such an occasion, which he took and then actually threw on the floor in contempt.
He now turned his attention on the poor Russian lady whose car had just emerged behind us – and we were away – 7.5 hours total transit time.
Worth noting that for the rest of our time in this fantastic country we received no undue hassle from the police at all, who were professional, friendly and courteous.
Tales from other travellers:
Arriving at the Uzbek border en route to Nuxus in the late afternoon resulted in rapid two-hour crossings!
Worst case delays we have heard of:
UK Mongol Rally vehicle - held up for 19 hours.
Aussie / Dutch truck held up for 2 days pending payment of a recently instated $400 fee for large vehicles (apparently European Union have just imposed the same fee on Uzbek trucks).
Medications:
First on our list of worries was the strict Uzbek rules regarding the carriage of medicines. There are a number of horror stories on travellers websites and blogs from people who have unintentionally transgressed these rules and been subject to hotel arrest or prison awaiting trial.
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hubb/northern-asia/uzbekistan-medical-kits-warning-57823 - is just one such warning
Costs of accommodation, translators, legal representation and fines have quickly mounted for these unfortunates, who were eventually lucky to escape without vehicle confiscation.
Carrying any medicines derived from morphiates or opiates is risky, as this can be viewed as drug trafficking. This includes medicines that are freely available over the counter or with a prescription in the UK and elsewhere.
We have read examples of people who fell foul of the back ache pain relief and sleeping pills that they carried.
To be balanced the majority of people have no issues at all, and a few people have outright pooh-pooed these blogs as alarmist.
We thoroughly researched all our medication and read every label, before taking the decision to jettison £30 worth of medicine, which is frustrating but nothing compared to the potential costs and hassles mentioned above, however small the risk.
Prescription cocodamol, mouth ulcer treatments, sore throat spray and our dental first aid kit all contained some kind of ”…caine” on their ingredient list, and a Romanian cough medicine whose labels were unfathomable also joined the pile of discarded meds.
We did not have the necessary notarised doctors letters for other prescription meds (precautionary antibiotics, Diamox for altitude sickness etc) and even considered knocking something up ourselves on the laptop, but in the end did not bother.
Electronics:
We have also heard of the requirements to declare everything (cash and electronics) on the customs entry form, and similar tales of items that were found and were not declared being subject to confiscation. Being very useful in Morocco we had bought two CB radios, in case we joined another vehicle in convoy, and we also have our satellite phone. I emailed the Uzbek embassy in London for clarification on these but, not entirely unexpectedly, had no reply.
In the end we vaguely declared them as two radios and a mobile phone, along with every other piece of electronics we carried.
We braced ourselves to lose the CBs if required…
Cash:
Again, we had to declare everything we carried and in every currency.
Black market currency exchange is significantly better than official bank rates, so we held $500 dollars cash back, hidden and undeclared in case we had any awkward questions regarding the amount of cash we left with (in hindsight this was not really necessary?).
It is worth a mention that the way Uzbek customs handled our paperwork made a complete mockery of the above, and put me (as driver) at risk of a transgression…
Time:
Lonely Planet and various blogs warned us to expect a 7-hour crossing…
Our first hassle was finding the border:
The main M39 Shymkent – Tashkent road ended in a barbed wire barrier across the road and access for foot passengers only. The touts descended with demands to get in the car and drive us to the right border, and then seeing we only have two seats, started waving car keys with offers to drive us there.
Garmin then tried to re-route us across another nearby but closed foot passenger border, near Saryagash, which resulted in a fantastic piece of good fortune that we were too pre-occupied to take full advantage of.
Whilst I handled the hoards of inquisitive “gentlemen” who surrounded the car, and shoved their heads in through the open windows to have good old nose around, Cheryl changed Kazakh Tenge for Uzbek Som and got the most phenominal exchange rate. Approx. 15% better than anything we subsequently got in Uzbekistan, even on the black market! We got over 3000s to the dollar equivalent, compared to 2,600-2,700 black market and 2,200 official rate within Uzbekistan!
Our top tip – check the rates for Kazakh Tenge for Uzbek Som before the border!
We drove 70km south to the crossing at Yallama-Chinaz , stopping to top up both diesel tanks, both jerries, and another 10 litre plastic container that we had stashed on the roof. This was over 200 litres diesel capacity, and with the subsequent issues buying diesel in Uzbekistan we are glad we carried every last drop…
Exiting Kazakhstan was relatively straightforward, although the customs forms were a bit of a pain again. Having calculated and recorded exactly what cash we were taking into Uzbekistan we were similarly honest (the hidden $500 excepted) in our Kazakh declaration.
For some reason they took our hard won Russian customs form off us, despite it having three months validity for subsequent Russian crossings.
I think our currency honesty back-fired slightly as the visible sums involved prompted the customs “lady” to insist that we “declare” $10 after passport control in order to receive our customs form back.
This made no sense at all, until it became clear that this was a payment for Christ knows what. We asked for, and got, a hand written receipt ripped from scrap paper and twigged that we had just been stung…
We then queued in baking heat in no-mans land for two hours, watching a multitude of foot passengers cross in either direction whilst the two cars ahead of us were slowly processed. During this period two trucks were let through ahead of us, but were still stuck in customs when we left – hours later.
We decided to split the cash, electronics and medicines declarations between us and filled out the dreaded customs forms. Rejoining the queue we encountered the situation where Cheryl and I were processed entirely differently as Cheryl was, in effect, on foot, and I was a driver. Unbeknown to me customs deleted everything off Cheryl’s form as it was not part of her hand luggage, and told her that as driver, anything in the vehicle was “his problem”.
Great – I now had only half the stuff we carried declared!
We were also told to put “No” against the carrying of any medicines (despite carrying enough to make our own mini-series of Casualty).
Cheryl was quickly processed and I joined a queue in the sun around the side of the building for drivers. I handed my forms in – and the office then emptied – lunch time. I used the time to befriend a Russian lady and her two sons and a Belarussian truck driver.
Over an hour later, lunch was over, my passport was stamped, and the customs form was given the once over…now for the vehicle checks.
We have always viewed border crossings as a game, and our survival strategy is to allow a full day for any crossing in our itinerary, and approach the game with whatever patience and good humour we can muster. It also pays to get to know your fellow travellers, who often help out, advise and guide, and in this case got all frustrated and shouty at the officials – which took the attention away from us a little?
Customs dude indicated he wanted the vehicle emptied, every last box of it.
“No Problem” we smiled, and started the process, very, very slowly.
The game is “Who will bet bored first?”
We find enthusiastically showing them every last bit of kit rapidly accelerates them reaching the tedium threshold.
We unpacked boxes onto a table, worryingly positioned adjacent to the foot passengers queue – who now had access to our possessions, should the fancy have taken them. It was impossible to keep an eye on the three guys opening doors, poking about and going through our bags on the table, but we did the best we could.
Whilst Cheryl busily explained that our second row storage was bolted to the floor and could not come out, I was asked to go through the medicines box.
I was quite getting into the charades of miming bad stomachs, sneezing and headaches when my nemesis in the form of a box of “ladies products” was pulled out.
I pointed to Cheryl who was otherwise engaged and shrugged, we all had a good luck at the “applicator” cartoon on the side, and then for some utterly unfathomable reason I stupidly unwrapped one and mimed smoking it. Customs attention had luckily moved on elsewhere from my immaturity, and with only 10% of our boxes removed and examined, boredom kicked in and we were told to pack it all away again. Which we did, very, very slowly.
We were out in just over seven hours.
Immediately after the gate we pulled over to buy the requisite green card insurance, but were diverted by a policeman who wanted us to register.
He enquired after our green card and then offered to walk us over to the booth whilst asking what currency we wanted to pay in?
Now. Why on earth would a copper be getting involved in the purchase of insurance? So, the first copper we met in Uzbekistan was the only bent copper we met in Uzbekistan. He was so phenomenally shite at hiding his intent that we actually kicked off and protested at his stupidity in the sheer cheek of his overcharging.
He and the insurance vendor were like two spectacularly stupid schoolboys finding the tuck shop open and unattended, and rather than nicking an unnoticed chocolate bar or two, make off with the till.
They passed furtive glances and shy grins back and forth before demanding over $100 dollars for 15 days insurance.
We refused and ended up parting with $5, whilst this ridiculous copper demanded a bottle of whisky as a “souvenir”.
I offered him one of the rain-stained and by now somewhat bedraggled LM Brand cigarettes we had bought for such an occasion, which he took and then actually threw on the floor in contempt.
He now turned his attention on the poor Russian lady whose car had just emerged behind us – and we were away – 7.5 hours total transit time.
Worth noting that for the rest of our time in this fantastic country we received no undue hassle from the police at all, who were professional, friendly and courteous.
Tales from other travellers:
Arriving at the Uzbek border en route to Nuxus in the late afternoon resulted in rapid two-hour crossings!
Worst case delays we have heard of:
UK Mongol Rally vehicle - held up for 19 hours.
Aussie / Dutch truck held up for 2 days pending payment of a recently instated $400 fee for large vehicles (apparently European Union have just imposed the same fee on Uzbek trucks).