For those that are familiar with my trips, I tried and failed horribly to get to Turkmenistan in 2017, really long and complicated story,link here- https://aroundtheentireworld.com/the-long-way-to-uzbekistan/

so it was time to start again, 2023, and I started the planning, knowing this time I’d have to spend about $2,000, there was and still is no easier way except to book an approved complete government regulated tour which was overly annoying. So the plan began and it took about 20 business days to get the initial step out of the way, the invitation letter which I could use to get my visa on arrival at Ashgabat Airport.

Here’s a breakdown of the trip- 2 days in total

Flights roundtrip from Dubai – about 750 USD

Invitation letter- I think about $100

Visa on arrival- I think about $80

Covid test at the airport- $50

Government minder and guide for 2 days + 1 night at the hotel- $800 which included a trip to the Gates of Hell and entry into all the museums and stuff like that

Tip for the driver + guide- $70

Hotel fee was only covered for 1 night so it was an extra $60 for the other night

Additional expenses like water and snacks $50-$100

Arriving in Turkmenistan was all a bit weird, like North Korean vibes, Turkmenistan is one of the most closed countries in the world and the whole country is heavily monitored and a lot of internet censorship, like a ban on Whatsapp, Facebook, etc.. . As mentioned, everything has to be approved before you even arrive in the country, so I was communicating back and forth with the agent weeks and weeks beforehand.

.My government minder met me directly at the airport and took me to my hotel, it was about 3am and our tour was to begin at 8am. They had specified that breakfast was included in the overall price, but there was a mixup somewhere, lots of mixups throughout the 2 days, I won’t be too detailed here, and we began the trip by driving around Ashgabat, one of the strangest/coolest cities in Asia, and every single building was white, kind of weird but interesting at the same time.

The city has something crazy like 5 Guinness World Records, other weird records like highest number of fountains in public places + the world’s largest indoor ferris wheel and a couple more.

It was all eerie until I randomly bumped into Johnny Ward, from onestep4ward.com and we chatted for a long time about travelling around the world and Ireland. He had organised his own trip with a group of about 20 people from all over the world. It was such a shock to see him and he was so helpful with giving travel advice and planning ahead all the time and we shared a laugh or 2 together.

That night we went to the Gates of Hell, which took about 4 hours to get there from Ashgabat, a massive hole in the ground in the middle of the desert, and now a tourist attraction that has been burning since about 1971. They were digging for gas back then and accidentally caused a reaction opening up a massive hole and the gas has been burning ever since and will continue to burn for years more. It looked so much cooler at night.

Then it was time to leave and the guide watched my every move back to the airport until it was time to go to the departure lounge.I don’t think I’ll be in too much of a hurry to return to Turkmenistan again in the future. A cool place to go, but far too expensive and so many better and cheaper places to visit in that part of the world.