We drove to the Mongolia border, AltanBulag The procedure was smooth. The Mongolian immigration guards manages the amount of vehicle crossing the border. The road between the two is only about 500m. At the Russian side, Burythia, the process was smooth. After immigration, we were escorted to a room for interview. Fernie was interviewed first. General questions. " where are you from?", "Where are you going?", "How did you finance your holidays?". But when it came to me, first question was " Did you served in the military?", I am sure he knew all male Singapore around my age did. He was only testing me. That's was all. Then he said he has to look into our phones for security reasons. While looking at Fernie's phone, he saw a photo of our 4X4 being converted, he showed us that photo and smiled. And then he went on to look at mine. I have at least 599 photos in there. After about 20 minutes, he ok-ed us. We were led back to the immigration and custom offices. Next process was the custom check. But before that, Fernie had to get a "passengers declaration form". This is needed when we exit Russua and will be asked for when we enters Kazakhstan.
Nextcame the custom checks. All the other cars were asked to be emptied on a bench and the officers went through everything. After that, they went through every nooks and corners. They even peeped into the gaps in the windows. When the officer came to my campervan, he only requested that I open covered baggage on the roof. Then he looked at the area under the platform. Satisfied, he waved us on.
We are in Russia, the whole procedure took about three and a half hours.
A church at Butythia
The queue going into the Mongolia immigration.
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