May 01 Almaty - Qabanbay (KZ)

Brrrrrriusdbcibibejksdkusdckusdiucnerivunedicbed, Oooopsss. We were just struck by a small earthquake. Nothing to worry about according the hotel manager, it happens often in Almaty.
Today we had to drive direction Semey to later cross the border with Russia. Semey is around 1200km which we will do in 2 or 3 days depending the road condition. Leaving the modern city for endless view of pure nature.

Driving through hills, fields, Salt lakes, desert, all in merely 600km. Very good weather and smooth roads. Too smooth it turned out to be as we were stopped for the 100th time by the police for speeding. Johan is getting experienced how to deal with the cops. After a few minutes of understandingly shaking his head, pretending to be overwhelmed and promising we will not do it again, they let us go with a warning and the occasional group photo. We wish police would be like this back home.

In a very small village we found a nice new hotel build for Business men driving between Almaty and Semey. Because we did not see anything remotely habitable for the past 200km we decided not to take any risks and booked a norm for the night. This was a wise decision.