Getting out of the van in the morning and slipping over they soon learned what happened when the desert sand gets wet, it was unbelievably slippery and stuck to their shoes making them really heavy. After getting ready it was time to drive back up the slope and back on the main road.
As the tracks were so slippery and too easy to get stuck on they used the original road and although very rough it provided traction. They could only drive between 20 and 30 mph without getting shaken to bits, they tried driving a lot faster, around 50 mph, which was much more comfortable but soon realised that the suspension was taking a real hiding and carrying on at that speed would soon break something. After a while the road kept changing from tarmac to sandy rubble, the roads looked like they'd been neglected for years and with no hardcore underneath don't take much to crumble apart.
A few (to them) pointless signs kept appearing, a 10% gradient when they couldn't see a hill, a no overtaking sign in a deserted desert and an uneven road sign to name a few. The road took it's toll on one team member during the morning, Churchill, one of the nodding dogs on the dashboard, had decided his head should part company from it's body, the first time it had happened on the trip, the roads were getting rougher.
After it had warmed up and the wind had blown on the tracks for a couple of hours they had dried out enough to drop back down onto them and get off of the rough road. Soon they saw a group of other cars catching them up on the road, it was the other teams that had left Atyrau after them and it turned out they'd only camped about 10 miles apart the night before. The others stopped a bit further up the road so they got out of the sand and joined them on the rough road where they'd all stopped for a flock of camels blocking the road.
Photo session over they all moved off back into the sand and carried on in the tracks which everyone enjoyed tremendously. Alan & Bernie needed fuel and as they hadn't seen a garage since Atyrau asked a local who said he'd take them into a village to fuel up, Paul & Scott followed them and arranged to keep in contact via sms with the others to meet up that night. Driving into the village was an experience, dirt tracks seemed to go through peoples gardens and cattle grazed wherever they found foliage. Reaching the 'filling station' locals filled up the Peugeot out of cans from a shed, it was probably only 80 Octane but it still ran.
Back in the sand it had now fully dried out and the dust made it impossible to follow another vehicle closely and they dropped back from the Peugeot a few hundred meters to be able to breathe properly again! They kept popping back onto the road every few miles to see if it had smoothed out so they could get along faster but every time they looked it was the same or worse so the whole day was spent on the sand tracks.
Approaching a particularly rough part they saw a Lada that had passed them at speed a while earlier, the local had hit a bump so hard that the weld on his cross member had broke and anti roll bar had come out of it's mount. Having a few tools with them Paul & Scott straightened the cross member out as best they could and put his anti roll bar back in place. The other teams had joined us during this time and they decided to find a place to set up camp as soon as possible before it got dark, this ended up being only a few hundred yards away just to the side of the sand tracks. 7 teams camped together, Paul & Scott and teams 10, 14, 25, 27, 28 & 29 and a good night was had chatting away and drinking together till late in the night.
