Cyclists: post your travel tips here!

[terrymy]

We are two cyclists, and we took the train from Aktau (station "Mangyshlak") to Astana (station "Nurly Zhol") a few days ago. The ride took about 45h, and we arrived on time. We read on the "Cycling in Kazakhstan" page that we might be able to store our bikes in the space between compartments. Be aware that you CANNOT take the bicycles along as they are - at least not on this specific train. They must be folded or disassembled (similar to Russian regulations). We shared a 4-bed-compartment with a man who told us that fully assembled bicycles CAN be properly stored, if the train features a baggage wagon which our train did not include. He did not know, though, how we could find out in advance, if a train would feature a baggage wagon.

We don't know how we eventually succeeded to convince them to take our bicycles on board. Maybe because we speak Russian or because we asked about every conductor in every wagon if they had any space left for two whole bicycles. In the end, our bicycles were stored in a completely empty (passenger) wagon at the end of the train, and the guy who was in charge of it asked us to pay him 2000 Tengge in return for this favour.

Oh, this is my dream to visit Mangyshlak! Somewhere there the archaeological site is located, I saw the findings - great things. Thank you for the tips about cycling there! Glad that you could bring your bicycles on the train