This morning I started from Cizre a small town near the Kurdistan/Iraqi border. I decided to skip breakfast as I don't like to ride on a full stomach, this almost came back to bite me later.

So I arrive at the Turkey/Kurdistan border and am queuing to get to the border. All sorts of people come up and talk with me, everyone smiling, some people tried to sell me papers that I don't need, some just wondered where I was from.

An official notices me and tells me to skip the line, I promptly do. Inside the first gate they tell me to stop and they ask me where my licence plate it. I am probably more surprised than them to see that my plate is missing. My plate was attached with 3 zip ties so the odds of it failing off is about 0.



After I show the official a picture of my plates, he makes a few calls, and he says it's ok - I can continue.

The Turkish side of the border is not that chaotic, but it takes extra long (about 2 hours) To get my stamp & registration sorted out. They take notes of my frame number and they clear me on their side.

The Kurdish side is a bit more chaotic. There is a long line of cars, many hours long, but the Turks, Kurds & Iraq:is wave for me to pass them, so I do. On the Kurdish side I do the following:

- Show my passport & registration at the first gate, they give me a paper.

- Then I have to take my luggage off (that. have locked with a steel strap) and put it through an x-ray machine

- After this I queue up for a covid check, I have a EU vaccination cert & they seem happy with it, other have to pay 50euros /80.000 dinars for a PCR test.

- Time to get the passport stamped, 30 minutes of queueing, they tell me that I need to pay for a visa, since I am not from the region. (I checked online an this seems to be standard)

- I go to another booth, no line and exchange euros to Iraqi dinars, the visa costs 150.000 iraqi dinar (around 68 euros)

- I then get to skip the line and pay for my arabic visa + stamp

- There is a small checkpoint, where they take some notes about my missing plate & they write me a note

At this point I have been at the border for several hours & I am starting to get hungry.

I drive forward and there is another vehicle check. A man who works at the border who speaks some english, asks me where I am from and if I would like some tea. I respond with a big smile and a yes, since I am starving.... He makes me some tea & I decide to eat some of my snacks that I always carry with me. On the TV I see news about how Russia has invaded Ukraine and how some of the buildings are completely ruined. The hunger, missing plates, Ukraine news & general chaos of the border gets to me - I feel deeply sad and cry on the inside as I sit there...

But the tea brakes saves me. After about 15 minutes I feel a lot better & the new friend I made at the border guides me to the next place, where I have to get a paper for the road tax.

- The road tax 30 dollars, but it's paid at another location

But I don't have the correct amount of currency... so my friend takes me to a bank where I exchange some more money. I pay for the road tax, say goodbye to my friend & I leave for the exit.


Close to the exit^

At the exit they check my papers one last time and I am free to go. As I leave border it starts to rain heavily, but I don't even care. After 6+ hours I am finally in Kurdistan! I'm tired, nervous and happy.

I've spent more time at that shitty Habur / Ibrahim Khalil border crossing than I care to remember, I hate that place with a passion!

It all started after the Iranian border closed in late December - scuppering my plan (at the time) to go from Iran into Iraq and get a proper Iraq visa at the Iran-Iraq border crossing near Basra (Al Shalamcha).

In desolation, I decided to check out the Turkey - Kurdistan border in case there was any chance for them to issue me a visa. Deep down I knew there wasn't, but I wanted to be sure before giving up. I left Turkey and sure enough, no Iraq visa can be issued at the Ibrahim Khalil border (only the stamp for Kurdistan) and I did a 180 and returned to Turkey. This is where the problem started - it turned out they did not enter me into the immigration system again when I re-entered Turkey on the same day. I only found this out at Tasucu port however when I was denied exit from Turkey to get onto the ferry to Tripoli (Lebanon), the ticket for which I had paid €1315 for (I got a refund, thankfully). It took two trips back to that shit hole Habur to talk with police and get the issue looked into.

Iran reopened their borders after 15 days and I went in according to the original plan, spent 3.5 weeks in Iraq proper and then exited to Turkey once again at Ibrahim Khalil / Habur. I had no problems on the Turkish side (I know the place pretty well now and can even recognise some of the roguish smugglers), but was astounded at how ill-organised and incompetent the Kurdish side was - worse than Iraq proper.

After a couple of hours back and forth at the Kurdish side (you need to get another slip of paper... you have the wrong type of exit stamp...) I got into Turkey and was soon on the road back to Cizre, swearing never to cross this border again (first time was in 2014 and it was a bit of a PITA then too).

For reference, the piece of paper they were trying to sell you is a passenger list, which you do need (in a car at least). The guy asked me for $20 for it, but I laughed and gave him 20 Lira. On the Iraqi side they charge 1000 dinars per copy for it and you will need it if you leave Kurdistan from that border crossing.

About the number plate, just make something, I doubt anyone will care.

EO

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EurasiaOverland a memoir of one quarter of a million kilometres by road through all of the Former USSR, Western and Southern Asia.

Old info:


In 2002 my license plate was stolen about 1/2 way across Russia from the west headed west.


I made one about the same size out of cardboard and used a Sharpie to pen the numbers and state (Montana, USA). That paper plate, wrapped with a clear plastic bag, got me out of Russia, into the USA (Los Angeles), then into Mexico and back out, and eventually back to my home base in Montana.


The fix might solve your missing plate problem.


Regards,

__________________
Sun Chaser, or 'Dr.G', Professor of Motorcycle Adventure at SOUND RIDER magazine. Professional Motorcycle Adventurer/Indian Motorcycle Racer/journalist/author/global economist/World's # 1 Motorcycle Adventure Sleeper & Wastrel
Soul Sensual Survivor: www.greataroundtheworldmotorcycleadventurerally.co m

Just for the record:

I went with the trick sun chaser recommended and made a temporary plate from cardboard. I later ordered my real plate and shipped it to Turkey.

The stolen numberplate thing seems rather odd to me. What use is it to anyone else? But I have heard of it once before, and of course such things *could* fall off after many miles of rough roads or get damaged in a spill. So I made a small lightweight flexible one that I carry in my 'tools and spares'.

A cool souvenier. Who else in eastern Turkey has a Finnish moto plate on their wall?

I entered Kurdistan with duplicates of my license plates thinking that they wouldn't notice. Well, they did and wouldn't I have had the original plates also, they probably wouldn't have let me cross.
Note: since my original license plates were stolen in Iran on another trip, I always mount duplicates.

Next time I will put the original ones on the car just before crossing the border

I had to finish my transafrica with selfmade paper number plate. Not stolen, I did push "the perfect dream road" with 150-170km/h - what was a lot of fun.

But at the end there as no Numberplate anymore. We did checkin in a hotel with color printer and did "design" a new plate who looks similar, they did laminate it for us too.

No problems with the self made version.

Surfy

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About Overlanding, Travelogues, Equipment
Trans-Africa over the west coast

1315e for the boat to Lebanon is it for single way? still working now ? thanks

I should have read this 2 days ago :-). Yesterday I crossed the same border and my experience is mostly the same with a few minor differences.
- There were no lines so it went much quicker. Just took a bit over 2 hours on the Kurdistan site.
- I had to pay 100.000 dinar for he visa.
- I did not have to specify which border I leave, every border in Kurdistan is fine. (I hope that is correct as I want to leave into Iran)

And as I understand the 30 dollars you pay is not road tax but for entering (15 dollar) and leaving the country. They told me it is important to keep the receipt to show I pais. The manager at the customs office is a former Iraq refugee that have lived in the Netherlands 15 years ago and his Dutch was still excellent and he was happy to explain it to me. I was lucky I had dollars with me as other currencies are not excepted.

With all the smiling friendly people crossing this border felt pretty smooth.

I did put my experience in the border crossing system: https://new.horizonsunlimited.com/border-crossings