It took 13 days to travel to the Doha Asian Games for the equestrian team of Kazakhstan, which suggested the transportation of horses to Doha is a sore issue.

The six Kazakhstan riders and their seven horses traveled by truck from the base in Germany.

"It's complicated but we had to do it," dressage competitor Sergey Buikevich said.

"Every other option would have been too expensive or too long in quarantine."

For financial, visa and quarantine reasons, the Kazakhstan team took the road instead of flying to Doha like all the other teams competing in the 15th Asian Games.

The team from Kazakhstan was based in Germany before going to Doha. The trip from north-west Germany is 6,700km long and lasted five days longer than expected because of border problems in Turkey and Syria.

The convoy went via Austria, Italy and by ferry to Greece.

From there it continued to Turkey, Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia to Qatar.

Kazakhstan equestrian team was not the only team suffering the transportation nightmare. Malaysian riders have been forced into their own fund-raising or to dip into their pockets to fly their horses to Doha. Each pallet of three horses from Malaysia costs RM86,425 (23,400 U.S. dollars).

When Doha and Kuala Lumpur were duking it out to win the votes to host the 15th Asiad, Doha once promised to provide a jet to fly all the competing horses to the Games.

Source: Xinhua