Moldova/Transistria Border

[Toukakoukan]

As I went through this area (albeit briefly) a couple of weeks ago I figure I'd share my experience in case anybody's looking for information.

I was travelling from Odessa (Ukraine) into Romania, and despite Ukraine/Romania sharing a border on the black sea side of Moldova I soon discovered there was in fact no crossing.

After a little bit of research I was rather put off by the stories of corruption, delays and harrasment people had experienced at the hands of Transnistrian border officials but decided to press on anyway.

I rolled up to the Transnistria border and was waved to the front of the queue where I spoke to some friendly guards who asked me where I was from, what Russian I knew and where I was going.
They whistled appreciatively at my Pakistani/Indian visas and promptly told me I'd have to go around Transnistria and that they wouldn't let me in.

This being blatantly an excuse for a bribe I played dumb and asked "Why? I was told I could get through Transnistria!"
I was summarily ignored for five minutes and then asked how much money I had on me.
I'd read about this, they're not asking for currency control, they're finding out how much you can afford to bribe.
I'd prepared for this by taking ten US dollars out of my 'emergency fund', putting that in my wallet and hiding the rest.
"Ten dollars"
They looked upset but persisted.
"Little present!"
"What's a little present?" I asked, continuing the dumb and innocent act.
They didn't seem to understand this and placed their hat in front of me on the table and then left the room.
When they returned the hat was (surprisingly) empty, they looked a bit disgusted but waved me on to passport control.

I filled out the form and went through to customs.
They did a cursory inspection of the insides of my panniers and asked me if I had any LSD/Guns (which caused me to burst out laughing much to their annoyance).
At this point I had a stroke of very good luck, an off duty Moldovan police officer (as he turned out later to be) rolled up behind me on his Suzuki, noticed my GB sticker and vigariously pumped my hand and whisked me through the rest of that border and the border from Transnistria into Moldova!

I'm very glad that he then took me to Chisinau, as if there's one thing they don't know how to do in Moldova, it is ROAD SIGNS.
I got lost following the M1 from Chisinau to the Romanian border the following morning and ended up spending three hours driving aimlessly the down horrendously potholed 10 metre wide gravel tracks that pass for roads in most of the country.


So, in summary.

1) Tell them you have **** all money, and even then you seem to be able to get away without giving it to them
2) Get a decent map (or a guide if you're lucky enough)
3) Just stay cool, as always, with borders, getting angry only ever makes things worse.
4) Try and get the guards chatting about the bike; the guys I spoke to seemed genuinely interested in my trip and I'm sure my experience would have been much less pleasent had I been driving a car!

Hope this helps some-one!

Ciao!

- Sam