Any trip around the world requires a certain amount of paper-work and administration to be completed prior to departure, and taking your own vehicle seriously increases this. This section will detail the paper-work which had to be completed for Hector and for us.

Hector:

Before we left we made sure that all of the documentation for Hector was correct and up-to date. This meant sending off the Vehicle registration document to the DVLA three times - once to get the registered address changed to that which we are using whilst we are away, once to get the vehicle details correct and once to make sure that the new engine number was shown, as this is what gets checked at most border crossings, along with the chassis number.

After the registration doc was correct we applied to the RAC for a Carnet de Passage en Duannes, which is effectively Hector's passport. Every time we enter a country outside of the EU, the carnet is stamped to show that we came in with the vehicle and it is stamped again on exit to show that we left with the same vehicle. Thus we are prevented from illegally importing Hector into a country and selling him there without paying any import taxes etc. The carnet was arranged with the help of Paul Gowan at the RAC who is very knowledgeable and is prepared to explain everything to you if you have any questions. I should also point out that the carnet is also very expensive for us, as the cost is based on 10% of the value of the vehicle multiplied by up to a factor of 5 depending on which countries you plan to travel through. Iran and Pakistan being 2 of the priciest countries, we had to pay 10% of Hector's value (£5,000) multiplied by a factor of 5 - plus admin fees etc etc. Another good reason not to do a trip such as this in a brand new/expensive vehicle - imagine what the cost would be for a brand new, fully kitted out Land Rover! Once your journey is complete, you send the carnet back to the RAC and they refund 50% of the cost.

As well as fully up to date insurance documents, we've also applied for an International Certificate For Motor Vehicles. This lists all of Hector's details in a variety of languages, so that customs officials etc who don't  speak English have all of the information necessary for their paperwork easily to hand. Hopefully this will make them more disposed to allowing us to cross their border with the minimum of fuss and hassle.

Mark and Amy:

Before we left we got ourselves new 48 page passports, so there's room for all of the visa's, stamps and other marks of officialdom which we shall no doubt accumulate.

Talking of Visa's, before we left we sorted out our Visas for Iran, Pakistan and India. For the Iranian Visa we used the services of Magic Carpet Travel, who sorted everything out for us and were excellent - we got our 30 day visas with absolutely no trouble at all. There was, in one of the Land Rover magazines recently, an article written by a chap who was taking his family from the UK to Kathmandu. He didn't arrange his visa's before hand and had enormous difficulties trying to sort them out in Turkey - it took him over 3 weeks with numerous trips to Ankara...stuff that! The Visas for Pakistan and India were simplicity itself to arrange - print of application forms from the internet, complete at home making sure that everything is correct (tip: for contacts in India put down the British High Commissioner and Deputy High Commissioner...) then toddle off to the respective embassies in London to submit the forms and pick up the Visas. Another tip - the Indian Embassy Visa section opens before the Pakistani one, so go there first. If you've done everything correctly you should be in and out within 2 hours as long as you get in the queue at about 07:30. Then get the tube over to the Pakistani Embassy and repeat. We had both of our Visas by 11:30am, and spent the rest of the day shopping and relaxing in Hyde Park!

We've also got International Driving Licenses, again arranged through the RAC and again they list all of our details in a variety of languages.

Having had all of our jabs bought up to date we have inoculation record cards, as well as the prescriptions for the medicines that we're taking such as the anti-biotics.