Turkmenistan is an interesting place. It is one of the few dictatorships left in the world and it is very difficult to get in to. It’s a desert the size of Spain but with the population of Minnesota – around 6 million people. It is a very repressive state mostly cut off from the outside world, but it does have one thing: a giant hole in the ground that has been on fire for 40 years.
Now I’m from Texas, but I should also mention that Turkmenistan is hot. Really hot. Turkmenistan was so fucking hot that if you stuck your hand out the window while driving it was like having a supercharged hair dryer blasting your arm.
4 hours north of the capital Ashgabat lies Darwaza, an almost invisible village of a few hundred people. A few kilometers north and to the east into the desert is something that would definitely qualify for “Wonders of the World!” if that list was only comprised of things humans accidentally created: The Gates of Hell.
Silly Russians trying to cover up an accident
In 1971 a soviet drilling rig punctured a big pocket of natural gas, causing the entire site to collapse. With poisonous gas leaking from the ground and an embarrassing mistake to cover up, the Russians decided the best thing to do would be to light the hole on fire and let it burn itself out. It’s been burning ever since and now happens to be the biggest tourist draw that Turkmenistan has. For years the government has been actively trying to keep people away from the site, but it seems they’ve recently come around to the idea of not making it a total pain in the ass for foreigners to go look at.
Around 1pm our convoy set off from Ashgabat. Up until this point in the trip we had seen a few bad roads, but not say, fucking terrible roads. Today was a turning point. Back at home we have potholes, but that word doesn’t do the road justice. It’s a mine field. A manageable minefield, but a minefield nonetheless. It basically becomes impossible to go over 40 mph consistently. You might have a little stretch of 40 yards or so where you can drive comfortably, but it requires 100% focus because all of a sudden there could be a huge hole in the road, and even if you manage to swerve around that one you might swerve into 3 more. You have to scan the road right in front of you, 100 feet out and further, and simultaneously pick your path through all of it. The good news is that the roads become open game, in that lanes no longer exist. You drive where you can to not destroy your car. Half the time you either have to slow down to almost a complete stop, or get really good at straddling a big hole between the tires. It’s pretty gnarly.
Our first casualty
One big crater dented the shit out of our front right wheel. Wasn’t a huge deal, we have plenty of spares so we told the convoy to keep going and we’d catch up. There’s a silver lining to driving a crappy car and that is that steel rims are cheap and come standard. They hold up way better than any stylish aluminum wheel and you can hammer them back in to shape, which is what we did. Didn’t even have to swap the wheel out, Mitch just banged on it for a few minutes and voila it was good to go.
This was missing from the road. Someone was nice enough to move it over to the side.
Now I’m from Texas, but I should also mention that Turkmenistan is hot. Really hot. Turkmenistan was so fucking hot that if you stuck your hand out the window while driving it was like having a supercharged hair dryer blasting your arm. It was 105 out that day, and that doesn’t factor in the heat coming off the tarmac or the wind. It was so hot that the airflow we had in the car from the windows being down would turn any brand new ice cold drink into piping hot tea in about 10 minutes. Having the windows down was almost not even worth having a little airflow. When you think about it driving to a massive fire in the middle of the desert is quite silly.
When we got to the general area of the fire pit we were a little confused. Google maps has it listed as being in Darwaza (40.193173, 58.415959), but from the road Darwaza ended up being one house on a hill in the distance and a police checkpoint. (If you drive past the police checkpoint – pictured on the right – coming from the south – left of the little building – you have gone too far, it’s right before. Otherwise you will get stuck in the sand like all those cars) We were also told that the crater is about 8 km off of the main road on a dirt path, so it’s not exactly easy to find. There was a local on a motorcycle at a place where you could pull off the road and follow a path to the base of a hill. A cottage industry has popped up around the crater, and that’s transport to and from. Scores of blogs from Mongol Rallyers past have warned against attempting to drive to the crater yourself. It’s a sandy road so you’ll have to maintain tons of speed on a path you’ve never been on in order to maintain traction. There’s also a giant hill you have to climb in order to even start down that path and on the other side is a gradually steep one you will have to traverse on the exit. So you can either attempt this yourself or pay a local with a 4×4 to take you there. They are very aware of the rally so they try and way overcharge you to get there. The first guy we asked drew in the dirt that it would be $60 for a round-trip – for our car. Pass.
I should mention that we beat our convoy to there somehow. They had blown way past the entrance and had to circle back around and take another path to the base of the hill. Their path ended up being considerably sandier than ours, and while attempting it one car overheated and 2 got beached in the sand. Eventually everyone got to base camp where we tried to formulate a plan. The main question was about whether or not we would camp at the crater and have someone get us in the morning. That unfortunately means leaving your car and that is not ideal. In general most people seem to be trustworthy and I would like to think the guys that try to get paid for transport would self police against thieves. Don’t want to ruin a good tourist spot.
Back to the transport thing. Our car was way too low and way too heavy to attempt the trip ourselves. We found a guy with a suburban that would take us to the hill that night and pick us up around 11 or so for $10 a person, half the price of the first pitch. While waiting for the guy to come back 2 members of our team had the brilliant idea to try to get there ourselves. By team I mean Ryan and Mitch, I was very very very against this plan. The risk reward didn’t make sense, and if we failed we were going to have to pay a local to tow us out, and then probably still pay someone to bring us there. Fuck logic though… Mitch tried and failed, Ryan tried and failed. The hill up was too sandy, which we already knew. (Pictured above – deceptively steep and very fine sand) A couple teams did manage to make it up in smaller lighter cars, but a lot of them paid a consequence for that later. PAY A LOCAL TO BRING YOU THERE. Our Danish friends made it to the fire pit in their Suzuki, but on the way back the next day they destroyed their gearbox, knocked the engine loose from one or more of the mounts and destroyed their sump guard. They had to be towed out of Turkmenistan and into Uzbekistan, and it almost ended their trip. Another team in our convoy the next day had their gearbox shit the bed in Tajikistan – a new gearbox mind you – and they most likely damaged it on the way back up that hill in the morning. Find a local and negotiate.. The guy we used grabbed an older friend of his with a second car and we brought 9 people to and from for $10 a person. He even had coolers full of beer in the trunk.
Pulling up to the crater was surreal. The sun was almost set but you could see the ground glowing in the distance. It was also way bigger than I imagined. I’d be making up a number but I imagine it was at least a football field in diameter, if not bigger.You can get pretty close to the edge but the gusts of fire air that would occasionally rise from below were pretty powerful. And it was obviously extremely hot.
For a big hole in the ground that is on fire it’s pretty hard to put into words. I will admit part of that is the process of getting into the country and getting to the fire pit was such a pain in the ass that it made standing in front of it a little more breathtaking. Even still, this isn’t exactly the Louvre. Relatively speaking, if you are able to see it in person you are one of the few that has visited one of the least-frequented natural tourist attractions in the world.
THINGS TO KNOW: As I mentioned at the top of this post Turkmenistan is notoriously difficult to get into and around. My group came via a cargo ship crossing the Caspian Sea (an event in and of itself) and after finally getting into the port it took over 12 hours to go through the customs process. This was an extremely bureaucratic process that involved several pieces of paper being passed about and stamped, but as far as I could tell there was 1 very important slip they give you, which is a carbon copy of your predetermined route through the country. As you make your way across the country there are check-points galore and you will need to show this slip to each guard along with your passport. If you did notify customs that you would be traveling on that highway at any point there is a good chance you will not be allowed all the way there. You might be able to bribe your way through with a pack of cigarettes, but that’s a whole other story.
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