h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Perhaps even more unsettling than Gibralter Airport is the, well, Air-Jetty might be a more aposite term, outside the gulag town of Cheleken on the eastern shoreline of the Caspian Sea in Turkmenistan.

The 'building' itself is constructed almost entirely of orange formica (not a sin in itself, but its charm wears off after the first seven hours or so and, for your enjoyment during your stay, offers two beverages: bottled Fanta and canned Fanta. Don't even think about drinking this. The water, despite everything you will know by this point in your visit,is still safer.

Locals, waiting to be carried by Turkmenistan Airways over the charming and bijou wasteland known as the Karakum Desert, can often be seen huddled over portable cooking apparatus, certain in their believe that the aging Russian turboprop aircraft will be delayed for a comically implausible length of time.

On boarding your flight, you will be presented with a round bottomed plastic cup of vodka by a tearful, and visibly terrified, air hostess. You will probably not much enjoy you flight out of Cheleken airport, though you will enjoy it far more than your next flight in.

Courtesy of the Cheleken Tourist Board: 'Cheleken...Less Polluted Than It Used To Be.'

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