This is the travelblog of
Cyril Ducau and
Niccolo Manno on their adventure from London (Cyril), Munich (Niccolo) to Hong Kong on motorbikes.
It took us short of 3 months to do 20,000km on bikes, trains and planes. We crossed the following countries together:
Austria - Italy - Slovenia - Croatia - Serbia - Bulgaria - Turkey - Georgia - Azerbaijan - Turkmenistan - Uzbekistan - Kyrgyzstan - Kazakhstan - Russia - Mongolia - China - Hong Kong
On this site you will find some info on both of us, our bikes, some of our friendly helpers in Hong Kong and London and loads of pictures on our trip.
Samarkand to Tashkent
After a pleasant evening with fellow travellers, we left Samarkand to Tashkent. On the way, after our now traditional shashlik stop (grilled lamb), we found a garage that would help us change Niccolo's tyres for about US$1.
The ride took us through very nice landscapes and unlike the previous day, the weather was very pleasant with about 20 degrees and some sun. Oddly enough, the main highway is now literally cut by the border with Kazakhstan and we had to get around and add a good 60km to our journey.
We failed to find good accomodation in Tashkent and were a bit disturbed by loud music and noise from the drunken owner and its friends most of the night. However, we met with Michel, a French guy who put our trip to shame... he is currently going for a 7-year round the world trip on a seated bicycle. Chef - an idea for you?
Visiting Tashkent today, we were slightly disappointed after the wonderful historical monuments of the previous days. Pretty much a Soviet town with wide boulevards and a few grand palaces. The old town bazar was very lively though and by far the largest we had seen so far.
Sad to say but the good news is that there are several western style restaurants in town and we went for a nice pizza yesterday night... Niccolo was a happy man !
A BIG THANK YOU TO:
Cyril:
- Maddy, the head of our "London HQ", special technical and weather advisor, and because she is simply the best and has been so supportive over the last few months
- My family and friends for their understanding and moral support
- Robert Roe (alias Bob) from Motoselect Franham for preparing the bike with such good care
- Anastasia from thevisacompany for helping me deal with so much red tape
- Claudio von Planta for sharing his valuable experience on Long-way Round and Long-way Down and answering so many of our questions
- Ronnie, Emmanuel and Benjamin for their enthusiast support and precious advise
- The Techtransalp team for their excellent website and advertising our adventure
Niccolo:
- clearly Manon as she has always been supportive of this trip even though this means 3 months without me
- My mother for not giving up on me, for receiving all the parcels at home in Austria and for not freaking out!
- Amy and Steve for pushing over several months to keep focus on the organisation
- Xavier, for trusting me to be in France in June and be his best man at his wedding
- Cyril, for posting our tracks on the blog
- Louis, for looking into getting Continental to sponsor us
- Romain, for getting us the Turkmen visas
- My friends for all telling me "DO IT"!
- Claudio von Planta, Sambor and Maciej for sharing their great experiences on their numerous motorbike trips
- Henry, Yau and Tan from BMW HK for their support with the bike, the preparation and the bike sale
- Yasser, Mark, Michael and Christoph from BMW Munich for their help with all the accessories and the last minute bike purchase
- Bertrand and Alice for your help with the tyres in Almaty
3 comments:
Vous avez raison de vous faire des pizzas! Avec Caro quand on etait en Chine on a passe notre temps au McDo....
Niccolo! you are starting to look ilke santa claus! do you have anything growing in that beard???
Salut les petits loups,
on pense bien a vous et on espere que vous vous amusez bien. Nicco, la barbe te va a merveille!
Grosses bises from Flynn's family
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