I gave up on the nightclub around 1a.m after growing tired of turning down so many prostitutes. Waking up for breakfast was a struggle but it was included so by god were we going to get there. After packing up my clean clothes I headed out for a wonder around this strange city while Chris lounged in the air conditioned room.

 

Ashgabat seems intent on using the entire worlds supply of marble. Every impeccable government building is spotless white marble with a golden statue of their leader in a variety of poses outside - sometimes he stands, sometimes he sits, sometimes he rides a horse. After a few random turns on lonely streets, I was the only person around that wasn't a policeman or a street sweeper, I was abruptly told to turn around by a policeman - so I did and carried on my wondering. Taking pictures of Ashgabat isn't allowed; One team told us last night how they had been shouted at by a policeman who deleted their pictures and were then followed by people for the rest of their walk in the city. It seems odd that they would spend so much money making such a bizarre city without wanting people to see it, but I hear Turkmen prisons are a bit s&%$ so I didn't bother with photos.

 

Back at the hotel we set off to find water/beer supplies for our trip into the desert. Fully stocked up with enough water to drown a goldfish, we set off to find an ATM at another hotel which accepted Visa. We searched for the hotel by driving along an 8 lane street lined symmetrically with marble office blocks, most of which I think were empty and just for show. Once we finally found the hotel and the ATM, it was helpfully out of order. We had no choice but to return back to our hotel and change money at the exchange across the street. With money in hand we could finally set off north towards the door to hell, well after getting some petrol we could.

Without a map of Ashgabat we set about trying to find a petrol station by blind luck and taking random turns. We quickly left the fake ridiculous marble Turkmenistan and ended up in real Turkmenistan - the small houses and unpaved road Turkmenistan. We drove around for ages until I asked a policeman for directions. The policeman didn't care for my question, but a friendly local who came running across the street was the man for the job. He gave spot on directions in broken English and hand gestures, which led us straight to a petrol station. There are only really three "roads" in Turkmenistan: one which goes west towards the Caspian, one which travels east towards Turkmenbat, and the third headed north towards Uzbekistan. Since we’re heading north towards the door to hell, it made sense to head north through the city and hope we arrived at the road. It didn't work at all, we just got lost in random parts of Ashgabat instead - I suppose you could call it accidental sightseeing. After a while we ended up back at our hotel so we pulled in and asked reception, a few minutes later we were on the clear road straight north through the desert.

 

Within a few miles the shine of Ashgabat had melted into barren desert dotted with small shacks. The roads were reasonably smooth as we shot towards the gas crater, in a rush to get there before dark. We stopped at a petrol station in the middle of nowhere and the guy sneakily filled up our jerry can - apparently having extra petrol is illegal in Turkmenistan. We caught up with the other teams from our hotel at the turn off for the door to hell, which was lucky because other wise we would have driven straight by it. Despite being Turkmenistan's largest tourist attraction it isn't remotely signposted. In fact the leader of Turkmenistan was going to fill it with mud, until someone showed him how many people come to see it. In the end he didn't fill the crater but he did demolish the local town because he didn't like the way it looked by the roadside.

 

The crater is 10km from the main road, so cunning locals have started ferrying tourists to and from the crater in their 4x4s. Not ones to shy away from exercise we set off walking, while two guys from two armies (one British, one Swedish) set off running in a bizarre competition. We got half way when a 4x4 pulled up with a fellow rallier inside demanding we got in, we put up a fight for half a second then clambered in the back - passing the two runners still going a few kilometers down the track. In the 1950s soviet-era gas exploration went a tad wrong when a well was set a light to burn some gas off, the crater has been burning steadily ever since and shows no sign of stopping. For a crater which is completely on fire, it is actually quite hot. As the wind changes the level of face melting heat changes from bearable to unbearable in seconds causing everyone to back away from the crater edge. At night it is an impressive sight, with thousands of smaller flames lining the crater around one central bellowing flame.

 

Only one rally car had made the trip off-road to the crater, most of us accepted defeat when we got stuck in the first patch of sand by the roadside. Unsurprisingly the car that made it was a small 4x4, the kind guys driving offered to carry everyone's camping gear to the crater. We camped over the hill from the firey hole to avoid the heat and woke up early to see the sunrise by the crater.