Last night our big question/decision was "where do we head to once in Almaty?". We talked about it for a long time and came up with all kinds of plans. This morning we chickened out and decided to head to the Holiday Inn according to the LonelyPlanet guide it had parking; the downside - it was expensive.

Before actually hitting the expected choas of Almaty we passed through the resort town of Kapshagai. This town is situated on the southern shores of a very large lake of the same name. To our surprise the town seemed to be a mini version of Las Vegas with at least 8 casinos situated in and around the smallish town. Note the cars wrapped in ribbons; seems Kazak gamblers are attracted by the chance of winning a new car.

Even at our first encounter Alamaty was a pleasant surprise of a city. Broad streets lined with huge trees, many parks, many nice modern buildings and monuments, many many up market shops, and lots of late model expensive cars.

Making our way into the city we followed the directions of our trusty GPS and only a couple of times had a fit when confronted with an underpass showing a clearance of 3.5m. However applying the lessons learned in Ulaanbaatar we rightly guessed that such signs were pessimistic and we managed to get our 4m truck through these underpasses without leaving any paint or body parts behind.

Without much trouble we found our way to the Holiday Inn. They found a place for us to put the truck on their property and checked in we showered and tried to relax after deducing that this Holiday Inn was costing us $300 per night. The receptionist confirmed that our visas had not been registered with the migration police but that on Monday they (the hotel) could do that for us for a fee of 10000T (US$67).

After settling in we SMS'd a young man named Arsen who we had been given as a contact (and had been keeping in contact with along our route) and about 2:00 he came by with his car and an offer to show us around the city.

So in torrential rain Arsen gave us a tour of the city which included finding the locations of the local Mercedes-Benz dealer (more on that tomorrow), a local shopping mall, one of the many local parks, a super market and then finally to Arsen's mothers appartment for dinner and an opportunity to mee the rest of his family.

The Mega Mall was in a way a real eye-opener but on the other hand just another big city mall like anywhere else in the world. But really that was the point this mall was pretty much indistiguishable from a similar establishment anywhere in the 1st world. Think Macquarie center or Belleview Mall (not Tacoma Mall).

Panfilov Park was wonderful. A forest of very old and large trees, a very martial monument to the vistims of the second world war and a colorful Russian Orthodox church.

Dinner with the family was a lively affair with a traditional Kazak dish (potatoes, onions, noodles and horse meat). Arsens two borthers and mother all spoke good English and we had a lively chat about American poitics (of which I am not very knowledgeable), the economics of Kazakhstan, why people like us travel and many other things. A very enjoyable evening. Thank you all.