Dear all,

We're planning a trip to Central Asia with 2 Landcruisers. We tried already this year however due to issues with paperwork at the Russian border we unfortunately had to turn back home.

We want to try again next year but if we can skip the whole distance we did already....we like to do so!

So we are looking for a way to ship our 2 Landcruisers from Europe to Central Asia. We're from the Netherlands so preferably from there, but also no problem to drive a bit east and board a container or train etc. there.

Destination: any place in the destination area also reasonably reachable by plane. We could go either to Kazahstan, Mongolia, or e.g. to Irkutsk, Russia. As long as we can get a lot closer to where the adventure will really start!

How does it actually work with car paperwork when importing into Russia or the customs union here? When we pick up the car we will need to go through customs procedure, or will the customs clear the car at the border without us being present there? (as we will fly to final destination)

Any experiences / tips / advise?

Thanks!
Martin

Very strange that you had problems. I have 2 German registered Land Rovers and have been in Russia numerous times and entered from several different borders: Poland to Kalinigrad, Latvia, Norwegian border at Kirkenes,via Belarus and coming back from Mongolia towards Ulan Ude and I have never had any problems. I thought that the Russian border procedure was always done very professionally and courteously. Yes, it is a little chaotic knowing where to go and what to do exactly, but I was helped by the border guards the first few times and after that it was a no-brainer.
You need your car registration and insurance documents. Of course, you need your personal passport and your Russian entry visa, which will need to be double entry if you plan to go anywhere past Kazakhstan and want to return via Russia.
They give you a Temporary Vehicle Entry Form (usually available in English) in which you need to fill in your vehicle data so they can input it into your computer. You get this stamped and you are on your way.
The customs people are also reasonable and there are no rude or obnoxious search antics.(unless you look suspicious).
It usually took me about 3 hours at each border crossing with 60-90 mins at the exiting border and 90-120 min at the Russian border. Only coming back out of Mongolia was there a 7 hour waiting line, but it appeared that it was mostly due to the Mongolian exit formalities and not the Russian entry part and to the fact that each side took their breaks and their shift changes differently which shut down the border for a good 60 min at a time before things started rolling again.

Mongolia is fantastic off road country. Be sure to have good navigation equipment and skills on board as outside of Ulan Bataar and the paved roads, there are virtually no road signs and tracks go off everywhere. It is fairly easy to get offroute.

The further west and southwest you go the worse the roads, if you can even call them that, get. Bring 2 spare tires plus some inner tubes. I had 9 flats in 14 days, and my fairly decent ATs going in were almost completely bald going back out. I even had to put a tube in one as the casing would no longer hold air.
Enjoy, and give the Russian border another run. Don't know what you did wrong, but shipping your vehicle to Central Asia is going to be more problematic than figuring out the Russian border rules. In my book it ranks as one of the less problematic borders in the world.

Oh, by the way. I returned the car to Europe by shipping from Vladivostok to Rotterdam. There is a guy (Peet) with lots of offroad travel working at one of the freight forwarders and he makes things a breeze. In Vladivostok, the only decent game in town is to use Uri Melnikov's LINKS company. Lovely Svetlana speaks both English and German and she had everything in control when I went there. I have run into numerous people that all have seemed to use them and nobody has to date expressed any unhappiness.
I am sure that the reverse; from Rotterdam to Vladivostok is also possible.
From Vladivostok it is only 4000km to Ulan Ude where the main road to Mongolia starts.
You can get to either Vladivostok or Khabarovsk with regular flights from Seoul, Korea.
Can't get much easier than that.

Your final question. I am fairly certain that customs will not clear your car unless you are physically there, so you need to show up at the destination. Also there is the matter of fees being paid and nobody will release the car to you until all the destination fees have been paid.

Hi,

Crossing the border was no issue, but we need to travel in stages, leaving the car behind each time. The problem was with the paperwork needed to leave the car in Russia whilst we would fly back home. So, we had to drive out of Russia again.

The idea to Vladivostok sounds interesting, will look at that!

Cheers,
Martin