Japan (?) to India (via the Stans) - Times and Route

[7days1shower]

Hi all,

I have been doing a fair bit of reading and have a rough idea but now need to start locking some things in. Mainly shipping from Sydney, Australia to my first country.

At this stage I am thinking of the following

May 2014 - Australia > Japan (freight to and ride in Japan)
June 2014 - Russia > Mongolia (approx 2wks)
June-July 2014 - Mongolia > Kazakhstan
August 2014 - Kazakhstan > Uzbekistan > Tajikistan > Kyrgyzstan
Sept 2014 - China > Pakistan > India

Now from writing up the above I have some immediate questions which i hope I can get some knowledge

Questions

- Any thoughts around shipping to Japan versus say South Korea or perhaps even straight to Vladivostok from where I could take the ferry to and back from Japan?

- Is 2 weeks in early June enough to get from Vladivostok to Ulan Ude? I have read that the road is pretty much a highway.

- What are conditions like in Mongolia like in late June/July. I am hoping to attempt the middle route but I cannot deal with extreme conditions like deep water crossings or a lot of mud/slush. Should this be deffered? Of course once I get to UB I will re-evaluate south route vs middle route based on up to date information

- Am I selling myself short by allocating just a month to the Stans? Ideally I would like to drop Uzbekistan and limit myself to just Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan however it appears I can only enter China from Kyrgyzstan so my other alternative would be to enter around Almaty, and just loop through the 2 Stans. Happy to hear thoughts on this

- Is there an entry from Iran into Turkmenistan? After a halt in India I will be setting out West again through Iran and would like to visit the remaining Stans if possible.

A lot of the above is based on trying to get into North India to ride the Leh region.

All advice is appreciate

Thanks in advance