Uzbekistan - Samarkand & Tashkent -from the old to the new
It was time to move on to our third Silk Road city, Samarkand, one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world (why do I feel like I've said this several times already on this trip?), and for centuries was a key stop on the Silk Road linking China, Persia, India and Europe. We'd been in touch with Rik and Kris, the Dutch couple, and found we'd be crossing paths as they were heading from Samarkand to Bukhara, so we pinned our locations on Whats App. On the way we
8 hours ago9 min read
Uzbekistan - Silk Road Gems
We had a fairly smooth crossing into Uzbekistan. The customs officials were pretty helpful and our inspection wasn't too thorough. The thing they are most concerned with here is having a drone which are totally banned in Uzbekistan. We assured them we are too old for that sort of stuff.- they didn't disagree. One customs guy told me 'be careful - as a tourist you will be ripped off'. I replied 'at least the people here do it with a nice smile'. Some facts about Uzbekistan
5 days ago8 min read
Turkmenistan - Where’s Lolly ?
Turkmenbasy was founded by the Russians in 1869 who were looking for a port to set up on the Caspian Sea. The city was originally called Krasnovodsk or Kyzyl-Su, which means red water. Following independence, in 1993 the city was renamed after the first president of Turkmenistan, Turkmenbashi Saparmurat Niyazov who established a highly authoritarian state until his death in 2006. Turkmenbashi means 'Leader of the Turkmen' and his portraits and statues once appeared everywh
Jun 215 min read
Turkmenistan - A Rough Start
We joined the queue to exit Kazakhstan before 7 am, and frustratingly had to wait until gone 9 am for them to open the gates. At the last moment a Kazakh car tried to barge in front of us, saying he was with the only other car in front of us, but Colin told him to do one. Now, checking out is usually a straight forward procedure, but after being sent all over the place to get our customs clearance, we were eventually shown into what looked like the big bosses office. Three
May 267 min read
Kazakhstan - Kindness and Natural Wonders
The drive across no-mans-land to the Kazakhatan border control took us past horses cavorting in the river. Theresa and I had to go through the passport control on foot (where the official was very straight faced) while the two Colins' took our vehicles through. The customs guys were very friendly - one sheepishly asked if we had any 'gifts', but his colleague explained that he collects coins so he looked very happy with a German coin from German Colin and a pound coin from
May 2313 min read
