start with bike things.
91 octane or less is the only fuel you will get in remote parts including all of Laos and most of China except for in the Major cities.
Don't bring any camping gear at all for Asia, Central Asia, hotels are so cheap like $10 a night.
Save the extra kilos and buy camping gear when you get to Europe. Azerbaijan heading east to west going to Europe was the first place I saw a good camping shop. The only way west from SE Asia is through China as Iran wont let big bikes in and Turkmenistan is a bitch to get a visa for and not worth the effort. China is expensive as you MUST have a tour arranged, I used Ride
China Motorcycle Tours, China Motorbike tours, Bike Rentals & Services.
Jah is the man that takes the tour and he's a top man. Ride includes Mt Everest base camp. Bikes at 4,000m + run at about half power or less, get used to it.
Brain runs at about half power too so watch the driving, Under 4,000m it all comes good and you feel like superman under 3,000m.
Cash,
China takes 4 weeks to cross, it's rather large.
For fuel, beer and entry to certain areas you need to buy national park tickets so I took US$1000
up to you how much beer you drink.
Clothing.
I ended up wearing about 6 layers and that was still cold until I wore a plastic jacket and trousers that completely stopped the wind and rain getting through.
Helmet, I used modular but make sure what ever it is you have a peak preferably removable for high speed and the peak is essential for riding into the setting sun in dust.
Also with a removable lining as it starts to stink after not very long and you need to wash it, shampoo does a good job.
Fuel is changeable take what you can get and in some places in china you need to park away from the pumps and fill up out of a watering can that you fill at the pumps and carry across to the bike.
You cant drive, get fuel or go through the MANY police checkpoints without a tour guide.
Tools.
Puncture repair outfit i had 4 punctures all up and all in the front. take spare tubes even if you are tubeless as when you bend that rim tubeless wont work, and yes you probably will bend a rim as out of 14 of us riding at least half of us had bent rims the guys with mag wheels were by far the worst damaged. Spoked wheels rule.
Tyres,
I used Pirelli scorpion trail 2 up until Cashgar in China but should really have fitted my Mitas 07's before entering Tibet. the Mitas 07's lasted me to Scotland back to London and from Phnom Penh way north back up almost to China again into Thailand and back down to Bangkok and I think I still have another few thousand km left if I push it.
Tyres for big bikes not generally available in West China or Central Asia but can be pre arranged with a tour group.
Road conditions vary from motorway , which are free to motorcycles in China but not allowed in Thailand to rough torn up zig zag roads through the Tibetan Himalayas.
Roads through Central Asia vary from and change suddenly from smooth as silk to really bad potholed crap and bull dust never loose concentration it will get you. Also in China you MUST stay at designated hotels which are arranged by the tour group, quality varies from 4 star to what's a star ??
Spares.,
You'll be lucky,
I did get a Chinese made 252 'O' ring chain in Cashgar and it's still on the bike 20,000km later and not been adjusted yet so it must be top value at $40.
Bring fork seals and any other small things, wheel bearings can be found just about anywhere as they are used in many different machines nothing special about them.
Borders and customs are no problems they just take a little time, only leaving China was a pain in the arse as it basically took all day. Bike log book and passport with relevant visa and insurance can always be bought at the frontier even in back of beyond shit hole places.
Pick you seasons well. I left Bangkok April 4 and weather was good all the way to UK where naturally it pissed down as it was summer.
Route.
Depends on you but it's either ship or fly to Russia or Se Asia.
Russia you can drive all the way to Europe but visas are the problem as it's usually a 4 week visa and that's not enough.
SE Asia is more interesting I guess with cheap hotels and loads of things going on but you need to go through China and that comes in at over US$5,000 one way.
to Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan , Kazakstan, ferry over Caspian sea to Azerbaijan or ride north around it through Russia, then on to Georgia a really nice place, Turkey also super nice and into Greece.
Now you need camping gear as it gets expensive.
Food, available everywhere but not so nice in China until you hit Cashgar which is an amazing place.
Nothing you see or do is going to be like you expected, nothing. It's all going to be much better.
My bike will at a push do 300/330km on a tank 400km is what you need in my experience so take a spare gallon.
I left Bangkok with 17,400km and arrived back with 42,485km average fuel consumption 20.7km per liter.
Fuel consumption changes quite a lot with altitude and high up I was on 28km per liter.
Oiled Pre filters on air filter intakes wer a bloody good idea kept my filters like new the whole way.
There is lots of dust and shit in the air.
Take spf 50 sun cream for your face there is no protection at high altitude and in the afternoon heading into the sun.
The whole trip was easy, the hard part is saying ' right i'm going to do it NOW'
Any other info just ask.
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Pounce
Senior Member
JoinedJan 23, 2011Location
PerthBikes'12 KTM 690R & '09 KTM 450EXC
Sunday at 5:27 AM
Thanks mate, some good info in there.
Do you have a more detailed route you can share, like did you record it with a GPS or the like?
The info on China above is great as that was a big chunk of stuff I was after.
Cheers
Peter
CrustyQuinns - West Australian Trailbike Riders
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warrimurf
Junior Member
JoinedJan 24, 2014Bikes2013 Ducati Multistrada 1200s
Sunday at 11:36 PM
no gps data from China as there is no internet there unless you arrange a VPN before you get there I didn't know about that.
I entered China at BOTEN, Laos and followed the road to Kunming. Dali, Lijiang, Nyingchi and Lahasa. tha t took 14 days.
Then on following G318 to Tingri and a detour to Mt Everest for one night then back to join the G219 heading west to Saga, Zhongba, Ngari, and Kashgar that took another 14 days some of them quite long rides and through controlled zones, no cameras allowed, and SHITE hotels. Then Kashgar, fantastic food again looks more like Morocco than China,
from Kashgar a days drive on the S212 to the Torugart Port and into Kyrgyzstan and on to Naryn. that is a long day but you need to get to Naryn as there is nothing else on the way. Naryn is back to civilisation nice Hotel even got toilet brushes (China has the worst toilets in the universe) and good food and beer. From Naryn some of us split and I headed off the main roads to Osh via Ak Tal, Karzaman and Jalal Abad and into Uzbekistan
(I made a you tube video of that bit with us falling off a lot.)
.
Osh to Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara and detour to Kiva beautiful and well worth a night or two.
Next on to Nukus a very strange new big place with nothing there,
The next stretch was the first of the longest without petrol stations. Nukus to Beyneu in Kazakstan, take some spare fuel there and from Beyneu to Aktau if you go that route.
The road from Nukus to Beyenu is a crazy mix of smooth perfect dual carriageway and broken smashed up wheel bending MX fun the last section to Beyneu was soft sand and deep bull dust for 10 or 20 miles, easily doable but with caution.
Some of the guys with more road bike style bikes went from Tashkent into Kazakstan and took the E38 as it is in better condition but watch out for police speed traps, head down and go as fast as you can and they give up the chase pretty soon.
Also some of the riders went north through Russia that way around the Caspian sea.
I went south and crossed to Azerbaijan by ferry as the Russian visa was to hard to get AUS passport living in Thailand etc.
Azerbaijan, main town actually the only real town is Baku. Stunning place surrounded by desert. floating on oil you can smell it.
From there on to Georgia.
Beautiful country, great wine, beer and food. a very christian country surrounded by non christian countries. Just a statement not a judgment. There is NO friction between the religions in my experience everyone was so nice it opens you eyes to what the media is doing to us.
Scenery was just amazing and it was the first place we camped at Happy Panda camping in a national park. Don't be put off by the name great place with stacks of interest.
Gori, Stalins birth place is there with a grim soviet museum and his armored train and ancient hill top fort.
I drove on to Poti a sea port that is full of abandoned buildings from when the Soviets pulled out, they just dropped tools and left.
Crossing into Turkey at Sarpi gave some people a hard time and refused one bike and rider entry as the bike was reg in Cambodia and he was on a UK passport it can be an issue in Turkey so we headed back inland and crossed at TURKGOZU a small customs post and had no issues at all and got him through as well.
Turkey is amazing as well and you could spend months there exploring.
Enough for now.
Any details just ask.
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warrimurf
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JoinedJan 24, 2014Bikes2013 Ducati Multistrada 1200s
Yesterday at 10:53 AM
Just a quick one.
If you go through Kyrgyzstan you MUST CANGE ALL YOUR Kyrgyzstan money into something else BEFORE YOU LEAVE the country as no one outside will touch it, NO ONE! Not banks or money exchange, NO ONE!!
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Pounce
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JoinedJan 23, 2011Location
PerthBikes'12 KTM 690R & '09 KTM 450EXC
Today at 3:55 AM
A bit like Laos & anything under 10,000 kip
CrustyQuinns - West Australian Trailbike Riders
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warrimurf
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JoinedJan 24, 2014Bikes2013 Ducati Multistrada 1200s
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Best I could do of my tracker.
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