Bukhara and Khiva

I was going to blog about these two towns, where we've spent the last week, but I can't get the pictures to upload. If you can imagine two very quaint mud-brick towns, full of blue tiled domes, minarets and medrasas, you've pretty much got it. Both city centres are beautiful. We've had a lovely time... Especially as Uzbek red wine is surprisingly quaffable when served chilled!

Then today we took a trip out to visit 5 forts in the desert. Again, the pictures will do it more justice than I can and we'll upload them when we find a better connection.

Tomorrow we're off to Turkmenistan. Widely renowned as the North Korea of Central Asia, we may be out of contact for a while. Or maybe not. To be honest, they might not even let us in... They've had the borders sealed due to the risk of swine flu and although they're officially now reopened, apparently they're still wary of Brits. (As an aside, can anyone tell us why the UK seems to have 100K cases and France only has 800? This is beaucoup puzzling us.)

Gemma
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Update from Baku... the land of all things modern (including speedy internet):

Photos of Bukara:








Then onwards to Khiva...



Then our day with the forts in the desert surrounding Khiva...

(Crikey, we've gotten tanned!)

How to make friends Stan-style

Approach foreigner.

- Where you from? America?
- No, Anglia.
- Ooo... London?
- Yes.
- You know Andrei Arshavin?
- No.
- Oh.

Beckon friend over.

Repeat indefinitely.

Tashkent and Samarkand (now with photos!)

We're now on our way from Samarkand to Bukhara. Its getting more and more desert-y and hotter and hotter as we go. Its only a four hour trip and there is plenty of space in the shared taxi, as both the other passengers are women, so it should be fairly painless.

We're travelling fairly quickly at the moment as we get to the halfway point of our trip. We were only 2 days in Tashkent and a day and a half in Samarkand. We've got another week in Uzbekistan and then have to meet our guide at the Turkmenistan border. The Turkmen government is a bit paranoid and you need to have a guide with you to enter on a tourist visa.

Tashkent was quite dull. It is a big city (apparently the 4th biggest in the USSR) but doesn't really have a centre, just lots of 6 lane highways lined with ugly modern buildings. We had to get Azeri visas, some more dollars and reading material, so that took one day. Then there are a few sights and our hotel had a pool, so that took up our other day quite nicely.

Samarkand was great and the main group of enormous intricately patterned medrassas deserves its cover-photo status on most of the 'central asia' or 'silk road' guidebooks. Any of the major mosques or mausoleums would have qualified as the number one site in Kyrgyzstan or Tajikistan. I won't test the limits of my descriptive prose, but instead upload some photos when I get to a computer.

Uzbekistan feels a lot more prosperous than the other countries in c. Asia, e.g. Only 50%of the car population are Ladas and there are proper petrol stations rather than big glass jars of fuel by the side of the road, and is also a bit cheaper. This seems a bit strange given that the currency is messed up and there were trade sanctions after the police massacred a bunch of protesters in 2005 or 06. Luckily, Andrew and Zarema are planning to join us for a few days in Georgia, so we'll have two genuine experts on Central Asian economics to explain it to us. It wil be great to see them - although mainly for other reasons.

T.

P.S. What is the right adjective pertaining to 'desert'? I tried 'desertified', but I'm pretty sure that refers to the process of becoming 'desert' and I wouldn't want to imply any criticism of Uzbek agricultural policy. After all, the Aral Sea thing was the Russian's fault, right? Maybe I should just have gone with 'drier', or 'deserted'....

Penjikent and the Fansky Gory

The trip North from Dushanbe was every bit as bad as expected... We got our hopes up when our driver managed to negotiate his way through the initial roadblock and we passed the Jolly Follies landrover coming the other way in the Tunnel of Death. But half an hour further on there was a proper closure, and no way of getting past. The road was supposed to re-open at 5pm, but it was after 7pm before the Chinese truck came through beeping its horn to signal we could proceed. At this point, about 100 cars at either end of the closed section started off simultaneously, with no regard for what was coming the other way. This resulted in a spectacular demonstration of collective genius - two queues of cars, each queue three abreast, facing off against each other on a mountain pass. It was another couple of hours before they'd organised enough reversing to get some kind of stream of traffic going. The police were completely unhelpful - concentrating on extorting bribes rather than trying to sort out the stupid traffic. Trevor's suggestion of throwing rocks at any car pulling into the lane meant for oncoming traffic was demonstrative of our mood by the time it all got sorted out.

We didn't arrive in Penjikent until nearly 2am and were tired, dirty and grumpy. Luckily the only hotel in town has obviously been refurbished since Lonely Planet was written, and we were pleasantly surprised by the running water and general lack of squalor.

Penjikent is famous for the Sogdian frescos that were preserved when the Arabs burnt the city down. The best ones are now in museums in Dushanbe and St Petersberg, but there was enough old stuff to see to fill a day.

(Me and Sogdian ruins)

Yesterday we took a trip up into the Fan Mountains, to hike to the seven connected lakes near Margurzor. These were beautiful, although the water was too cold even for Trevor to swim! We took a picnic and had a lovely day walking and enjoying the lakes (and attempting to build a causeway...)

(Trev by the 7th lake)

(Me on the way back down)

(Got the camera timer to work - thanks Jamie for buying Trev and instruction book for Christmas!)

So then this morning we changed our 5 x 100 Tajik Somoni notes for a 6 inch high stack of scrappy Uzbek Sum, and took a taxi to the border. It was a pain-free crossing, made somewhat amusing by the border guard insisting we took his brother's mobile number, as he is currently studying in the UK.

We're now in a car going from Samarkand (near the border) to Tashkent (the capital), where we're hoping to get our Azeri visa tomorrow. The scenery is flatter already, and we're expecting to hit dessert before we get much further West. The other obvious difference is that women's clothing seems to have changed from the velvet salwars in Tajikistan to a much more comfortable light cotton (yes, it's 35 degrees in the shade and the Tajiks are all wearing velvet. Bizarre.)

I'm not sure we'd go back to Tajikistan - there's some stunning scenery and very friendly people, but the travel is hard and there's not much in the way of sights or stuff going on. The walking is lovely, but you'd need to bring your own kit if you wanted to do any serious trekking.

In Other News, I got a new pair of flipflops (which made me very happy)... and we realised that it is indeed possible to eat Shashlik and Naan for four meals on the trot without any serious side effects (which made Trev very happy)

Gems

Dushanbe

We're getting ready to head off from Dushanbe tomorrow to Penjikent, near the Uzbek border and the Fan Mountains. Its been a good restful few days here. Dushanbe is an attractive city, with lots of pastel coloured neo-classical Russian buildings and tree-lined streets, if a little dull and more than a little sleepy. The Tajik parliament building still has its Christmas tree up.

We headed out to see an ancient fort yesterday and for a walk (and swim, if you're brave about cold water like I am...) in the hills today, but haven't otherwise been up to much other than dragging ourselves round the museums and enjoying having BBC World in our room. Our most exciting discovery was a second hand book stall with English books for a pound (in the underpass outside TsUM, if anyone ever reads this for travel advice). Nothing remotely literary unfortunately but we are now well stocked with fantasy, courtroom drama and aga sagas. This is a big relief as we were running low of all three genres.

Dushanbe is dominated by an army of NGO workers. Every tenth car is a brand new white Land Crusiser or Nissan Patrol with a big aerial and a mysterious acronym and logo. Not sure how much they acheive from driving round Dushanbe in fancy cars other than making hotel rooms and decent restaurants way overpriced compared to other cities in the region. Of the 6 other tables in the Georgian restaurant we ate in last night, 3 were occupied by Americans. Gemma had 3 flies in her wine, but my beer was unblemished by insect life.

The trip here was a bit of a nightmare. The road from Istaravshan to here crosses two passes, both of which are being repaired by Chinese crews. The second has a long tunnel that was closed whilst they were working on it, so we sat in the dull town of Aini waiting for it to re-open from 2 until 6. We bumped into some other British travellers there who are driving from the UK to Australia in their Land Rover and were kind enough to make us tea. You can read about their trip at http://www.jollyfollies.com/. The tunnel itself was awful: Really long, dark, flooded, incredibly hot, dusty and filled with construction equipment. We've no idea how much of this we'll need to endure tomorrow. Our best guess is that we need to do the lot again, probably including the agonizing wait until the road crew finishes and the road opens. At least, that's what we're assuming, which handily also means there is no point getting up too early to set off.

Istaravshan to Dushanbe

240 km took 14 hours in a jeep. Heinous. And the Tajik guy we were sharing with aiming to pass the time with vodka wore very thin very quickly.

Proper post to follow when we've gotten over it (and found a hotel that isn't full of NGO 'consultants' driving prices up to $100 a night and more)...

Rubbish Friday, pretty good Saturday in Istaravshan

I woke up yesterday morning with a blistering rash down one side of my face and chin. It looks gross, is making it difficult to see out of my right eye and itches like hell. We have no idea what it is... top suspects are whatever washing powder was used on the pillow, bed bugs, or a pack of cleansing wipes I bought in Osh.

Then I tripped and snapped the strap on my flip flops. I got them fixed in the bazaar (the cobbler was so excited to be serving tourists that he wouldn't let us pay!) but the new strap rubs and is giving me blisters. No idea where to buy decent new ones; we're hoping Dushanbe will be developed enough to have decent shops.

On the positive side we finally bought a Russian-English phrasebook, which kept us amused on the drive to Istaravshan with what the Russians consider to be essential vocab. It contains such gems as:

- Do you have anything to declare?

Only possible answers:

- No

- I have vodka

...and...

Does the room rate include breakfast? How about 'personal services'?

Today was a much better day. We explored Istaravshan town (old, and not at all 'old-town-ified'). The main sight is a mosque that is now a medressa. Unsurprisingly, lessons came to a rather abrupt halt when we showed up outside with a camera:

Then on our way to see another mosque, we asked directions from a man who said he'd show us the way aftrer we'd taken tea in his house. So we went into his house, where four generations of family were hanging out on a day bed, drinking tea and eating local fruit (apricots, watermelon and apples). They insisted we stayed for lunch and we rolled out a couple of hours later. It was all a bit weird, but they were very excited to have foreign guests. We didn't see any other tourists in Khojund, and there's only one other in Istaravshan, so I don't think the novelty has worn off yet.

They also made Trevor wear one of their traditional hats so that we could all laugh at him, which seemed like fair payment for a free lunch!

Gemma

Down from the mountains

We've now entered Tajikistan and, more significantly, left the hills and mountains of Kyrgyzstan behind. Both Khojand, where we are now, and Osh are on the southern edge of the Fergana Valley, the richest and most fertile part of Central Asia, crossed by a multitude of rivers from the Altai, Tien-Shan and Pamir mountains that either gang-up to push through to the Aral Sea and the Caspian as the Amu-Darya and Syr-Darya rivers or, more often, disappear in the deserts of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. You can see this on the map below (last post) - Osh is in the top right and the 'and' of Khojand on the far left, on the West side of the lake.

The culture here is also a long way from traditional Kyrgyz culture. The Fergana is the centre of Uzbek culture and the people have long been settled farmers, rather than the nomadic shepherds of the mountains. As Gemma mentioned, the valley was carved up somewhat randomly in soviet times between the Tajik, Kyrgyz and Uzbek Socialist Republics, but the population is largely Uzbek whichever side of the border you're on. The Fergana is also the centre of Islam in the region. Many more women here cover their heads and western dress has become rarer. The towns feel much more 'eastern' than the more russified towns further North - there are more old buildings and more old men in traditional dress lounging in tea houses. The food is now more consistently mutton kebabs and noodles rather than Russian-style salads and meat with sauce, which is overall a good thing.

(Chess playing in the park, Osh)

(Traditional Kyrgyz hats, Osh bazaar)

Less pleasantly, it is MUCH hotter than we've been used to, and with the heat have come mosquitoes. I got bitten all down my back in our particularly scruffy homestay in Osh (bucket of water to flush the loo, bucket of water to shower - thankfully, two labelled buckets provided). I guess Kyrgystan and Pakistan were too cold for mosquitoes, and China too politically repressive.

(Main square and theatre, Khojand)

(Woman with cheeky son and gold teeth selling bread, Khojand)

We haven't seen a big difference between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan so far, or at least between Osh and Khojand. We expected a bigger contrast given that Tajikistan is much poorer (roughly half the GDP per capita of Kyrgyzstan, and the 25th poorest country in the world) and only emerged from a decade of civil war 7 or 8 years ago, but I think a lot of this poverty is in the mountains to the South and East of the country rather than up where we are. There is certainly more soviet stuff left around, including a ten foot hammer and sickle on the main street and the biggest Lenin in central Asia. The biggest difference for us is that we're staying in the best room in town. We have a suite of three rooms overlooking the main square and both the hotel's balconies. It's roughly 4 times our recent accommodation budget at $60 a night.

(Syr-Darya River, Khojand)

(Main bazaar, Khojand)

Khojand is most famous as the furthest point in Central Asia that Alexander the Great reached before turning South East towards India. He fought a famous battle at the river here (where Gemma is standing in the picture below) against the Scythians, his men floating across on inflated cow hides to establish a beach head, and founded the city as 'Alexandria the Furthest'.

(Gemma recreating Alexander the Great's victory over the Scythians, Khojand)

Tomorrow we're heading further South, stopping in the town of Istaravshan for a couple of days before crossing the two mountain ranges that separate the North of Tajikistan from Dushanbe and the rest of the country.

T.

Here a Stan, there a Stan, everywhere a...

Tomorrow we are saying goodbye to our favourite vowel-challenged republic and heading on from Osh to Tajikistan. I posted a map of the border becausue it is the most ludicrously complex thing I've ever seen. Those green bits are all enclaves (left to right are Tajik, Uzbek, Uzbek, all surrounded by Kyrgyzstan). There are some enclaves in the other enclaves. The road (and the bus) goes through all of them.

We're not sure what happens if you accidentally cross a border at an enclave (presumably you get stuck in the enclave, having used up your single entry Uzbek or Tajik visa, and unable to re-enter Kygyzstan as that visa is also single-entry). We've hired a driver to 'skirt around the enclave checkpoints' and get us to the actual border at Isfana. We'll let you know how it goes.

Fact-finders: designing these borders was Stalin's job before he got famous for all that Communist stuff. (Although I can't actually find a source for this fact, other than Trevor, so it may or may not be correct)....

Gems

Cholpon-Ata... back to Bishkek... and on to Osh

Cholpon-Ata, on the North bank of Lake Issyk-Kul, is a holiday destination for Kazakhs and Russians, and the President even has a holiday home on the Lake. For us, it was supposed to be a couple of days in the sun on the beach, but the drizzle set in before we even left Karakol.

We got a lift with a middle-aged Kyrgyz woman and her dad. There was only room for one backpack in the boot as a dead goat was taking up most of the space. They fed us kymys (mildly alcoholic fermented mare’s milk), which was foul. It tasted OK, but had the consistency of sick with lumps of gelatin in. The woman kept herself amused the whole way with our Central Asian phrase book; who knew that reading out ‘I am menstruating’ in various languages could cause so much hilarity?

We couldn’t find the hotel we were aiming for, and ended up in a dirt cheap (and unsurprisingly not very nice) room. With the drizzle still coming down and the town already explored (think Southend-on-Sea before they redeveloped the shopping centre, or Morcambe pre-Blobbyland), it was clearly good form to hit the bottle and sit it out. I don’t think licensing laws exist here - every imaginable retail outlet sells booze, mainly vodka (either by the bottle or by the shot).

When the rain finally stopped we headed up the hill behind town to view the petroglyphs – a bunch of rocks with drawings of goats scratched on them, dating from the Bronze age. These may have been more impressive if I wasn’t cold and grumpy, with an evening hangover starting to set in.

Sunday dawned bright and sunny with temperatures in the low 30s and we took a picnic to the beach for breakfast. Droves of fat Russians and Kazakhs, wearing unbelievably tight swimsuits, were already staking out areas of the beach. The house music was pumping and I’m sure it wouldn’t have been long before the vodka came out again. We decided to press on to Bishkek, where we arrived late afternoon.

We took our finished paperbacks to the one place we’ve found in Kyrgyzstan with English Language books in order to swap them. It’s a café called Fat Boys and seems a prime expat hangout (not that there are many expats in Bishkek – the British presence is only an Honorary Consulate). There was an Ozzie expat at the table next to us whose conversation we could overhear… I think being a gold explorer might be a much better job than being a management consultant.


Before we left Delhi, we had said that we’d go for sushi in Bishkek, which is about as far from the sea as it’s possible to get. So last night we dutifully went and sampled it. The restaurant was reassuringly expensive and the sushi was great, although atmosphere somewhat lacking (we were the only people in) and the Kyrgyz waitresses all looked a bit silly in their Japanese dressing gowns.

(Yes, TJ, we know your friend got sick from sushi in Russia, but we didn’t think that should stop us…)


Then this morning we were up early and caught a shared taxi to Osh. It’s supposed to take 10 hours to cover 600km, for which we’re paying 10 quid a seat in a normal car; excellent value (especially considering the zebra print interior and the fact that Trev’s scored the front seat).

In Other News, we have now learnt to read Cyrillic, which is making ordering in restaurants a much less random experience!

Gemma

Karakol

We're still in Kyrgyzstan. Probably for another week or so. We're currently staying in Karakol, the biggest town near to Lake Issyk-Kul (the second largest alpine lake in the world, lacustrine-fact fans). We spent a day on the beach. The sunbathing was good, the swimming less so. 'Issy-Kul' apparently translates as 'warm lake'. It isn't. We then walked up to some hot springs yesterday and spent the night there, before walking back today. We're planning to head to a resort on the North side of the lake tomorrow for some more beach time, if it stops drizzling.

The countryside here is the big draw for tourists, and it is suitably beautiful. I don't think comparisons with Switzerland particularly do it justice. Since the low parts of the country are around 2000m, the mountains don't look so high, but provide a snow-capped backdrop for the bright green corrugated hills that make up most of the landscape.

Kyrgyz towns are very low-key and pleasantly rustic. The streets are wide and tree-lined and as soon as you are off the main street, give way to quaint cottages with yards filled with livestock. Most streets have a couple of donkeys and goats wandering about. The tourist map of Kochkor includes the town's only four-storey building as a landmark. There are no three-storey buildings and only a couple of 2-storey buildings. The map itself was somewhat superfluous.

Towns do have a few Soviet-era concrete eye-sores and usually a lot of rusty metal. The economy withered after independence, as most of the Russian businessmen, technicians, etc. that ran things left. There are now almost no working factories in the whole country. There are quite a lot of factories around, but they are nearly all slowly disintegrating. Rusty caravans are also a common feature of both the urban and rural landscape. The government gave away all the soviet railway carriages to poor families (which I think included everyone at the time) and these are now scattered across the country on street corners, in car parks and in people's gardens.

Horses seem to be a mainstream and common transport option everywhere outside Bishkek. They're not a bad idea given that the average car is a 30 year old Lada in a poor state of repair. Our taxi back from Song-Kul to Kochkor only had one handle to work the windows, so whenever another car and associated dust cloud approached the handle would be frantically passed around to wind the windows up and the passed around again less urgently once we'd passed the dust, to wind them down again. The other problem with non-equine travel is the state of the roads. It seems that, in the 18 years since independence, establishing a road maintenace capability hasn't been a big priority for Kyrgyzstan. Even the major highways are somewhere between gravel tracks and heavily cratered concrete. The police pursuit vehicles are slightly more modern Lada '4x4s' that look like VW Golfs with slightly bigger tyres. The man we discussed how to get to the hot springs with (before deciding to walk) was keen to distinguish between these '4x4s' and 'jeeps' - only one of which could have actually made it up the track.

T.

Photos - Kashgar and Song Kul

All the photos from China are now up, as well as a first few from Kyrgyzstan. 

This is proving to be a slow and annoying proccess, so we'll probably be uploading fewer in future.

Same place as before: http://picasaweb.google.com/trevorcot