Flying over the desolation of Turkmenistan and western Uzbekistan, we were grateful that we didn’t have to endure what would have been an exceedingly difficult and boring ride. Yet, it felt bittersweet, as we also didn’t get to experience the slow transition in landscape and culture that we had so far on the trip. We arrived at the airport in Tashkent in another world. Linguistically, we were moderately prepared for the two national languages –Russian and Uzbek – because of the similarities between Russian & the Balkan languages and Uzbek & Turkish. Culturally, we were also very maginally prepared because of the same similarities, but, frankly, Uzbekistan is a new beast altogether.
Immediately upon arrival, we felt besieged by "NYET" – the Russian word for "NO". When we tried to find a tourist information desk: NYET, it doesn’t exist. When we tried to find a hotel room: NYET, all full. When we tried to find money: NYET, the ATM has no cash (this quest took us 4 hours before we discovered the 1 ATM in the entire city that actually dispensed cash). When we tried to upload content to our website: NYET, access is blocked (we suspect this is because the government censures the web, but it could also be that the networks are just entirely messed up. All we know is that it took about 20 trips to 8 different internet cafes before finally succeeding). Most frustrating of all was when we set out to get a visa to enter China: NYET! At the Chinese embassy, the guard wouldn't even let us in the gate to talk to a consular officer. Apparently the embassy here in Tashkent will only issue visas to people who will fly into China – and you must show proof of a flight ticket and hotel reservation before they will even let you pass Go. Overland travelers are sent to the embassy in Bishkek, capital of Kyrgyzstan. So, we will try our luck there next month! Who knows if we’ll be able to travel through China after all.
After frazzling our patience trying to get stuff done in Tashkent, we stored our bikes at the train station and took a refreshingly pleasant overnight train to Bukhara. We shared a sleeper car with a couple of very kind and fun families, with a 12 year old boy who spoke excellent English serving as our translator. Bukhara, a 2,510 year old city, is a relaxed and beautiful oasis in the middle of a vast desert. We explored the old Emir's palace, which was originally built (probably about 2500 yrs ago) as a stopover for caravans traveling the Silk Road, and visited its many blue-tiled mosques and medressas. It has been the center of Central Asian Islam at various times in history – namely the 9th, 10th & 16th centuries. In the 16th century, Bukhara was home to 10,000 students attending the city’s 100 medressas – an Islamic theological school, similar to the seminary. Throughout history, the city has been rampaged by Ghengis Khan, Timur and the Bolsheviks, but it continues to be rehabilitated in one way or another.
More special than visiting all these beautiful and historical sites was being invited into two homes to eat and drink tea with Bukharans. The hospitality here is phenomenal. We met the first family while wandering the streets. A young guy who had lived in Germany started chatting with us and invited us for tea – which really means several courses of food, accompanied by tea. We sat with several generations of the family for the entire evening. Later in the week, a South Korean woman that we met through Couch Surfers invited us to her host family’s home for dinner where we experienced the same lovely ritual of many delicious courses – yoghurt-mint soup, dumplings, bread, nuts and juicy watermelon – served with as much green tea as you will drink. Homes here are built around internal courtyards, so we enjoyed both of these meals while sitting on rugs under the stars.
After Bukhara, we went to Samarkand – another important Silk Road city that was the capital of Amir Timur’s empire in the 1300’s. Like Bukhara, the city also has many beautiful, blue-tiled and sparkling-domed mosques. Most impressive were Timur’s mausoleum, whose interior was intricately painted in gold relief and tiles in blue mosaics, and the avenue of mausoleums, a long row of richly decorated mausoleums where important people have been buried for centuries.
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Whatever negative impressions of Uzbekistan that we developed while in Tashkent were completely erased once we left the city and began riding through the rest of the country. East of Tashkent, we met the friendliest and most generous people that either of us has ever met in our lives. Every day, we were blown away by the hospitality that we encountered.
Leaving Tashkent we were very excited to be riding our bikes again and somewhat nervously anticipating the adventure that lie ahead. We had a coarse road map, a guidebook with sparse information about just a few places along the way, a few tips from other cyclists and our Russian/Uzbek phrase book. And that was it. The rest we would have to make up as we went. It only took half a day out of Tashkent to realize that finding our way, feeding ourselves and finding places to sleep would all be phenomenally easy due to the kindness of the Uzbek people.
We pitched our tent in a yard in front of a gas station, where the attendant served us tea, bread, sweets and grilled meat skewers. The next day we ended the day on a beautiful sandy beach next to a river, where we met people who shared a delicious and juicy melon while we played a game of charades to get to know one another. And the next day, as we crawled up a 7,000 ft. mountain pass, we were greeted and cheered by dozens of people, many of whom stopped to talk to us or take our picture. I guess that was our 15 minutes, and we got a small taste of the glamour of the paparazzi chase (ha!). Keep in mind that nearly no one spoke any English and we don’t speak any Russian or Uzbek, so all these interactions were accomplished through elaborate hand gestures, our maps, pictures that we brought with us of home and family, and our trusty “Point-It” traveler’s picture book (thanks Mom, we love the book). For anyone planning to travel to a country where you don’t speak the language, this little pocket-sized book is a must have. It contains photos of food, accommodations, transportation options and other essential travel things that helps you find what you need without speaking a word – and it is amazingly effective.
A highlight was arriving in the village of Budjay in Rishtan district, and meeting Nadir while looking for a place to camp. We had ridden down a farming road looking for a spot to pitch our tent, but finding nothing, we continued riding through the village. The next thing we knew, a man who spoke good English rode up beside Mario and asked him if we were looking for a place to camp. He had seen us on the farm road and, understanding what we were looking for, he decided to chase us down to offer us a place at his farm. Over the course of the next day and a half, we struck a friendship with him as he hosted us in the most gracious and generous manner. From Nadir we learned that in Uzbek culture a guest is to be treated like the father of a family – i.e. like a king. Actually, based on what we’ve read and heard from other travelers, we think that this value for hospitality extends beyond Uzbek culture to Muslim societies in general; as people talk about receiving the same treatment in Turkey, Iran, and Tajikistan. But, not being experts on Islam we’re not sure where the value comes from. What we know for sure is that Nadir treated us very well and seemed eager to teach us about life in his part of the world. We walked all around his 45 hectare farm and saw all of his diverse plantings and livestock: Mulberry trees for raising Silk Worms in the spring, cotton, watermelon, corn, wheat, tomatoes, grasses for animal feed, Poplar trees for construction wood, 840 ducks, plus several cows and sheep. We talked for hours about our lives – comparing the similarities and differences of our countries. In between our walks and talks, Nadir and his family fed us, and fed us, and fed us some more! We were only able to stay with them for one day and two nights because, unfortunately, by the time we met him, we were running out of time on our 30-day Uzbek visa and had to keep moving toward the border. Otherwise, we might still be there with these lovely people, trying to convince Nadir to let us help out on the farm (we tried to help and managed to pull a few weeds, but he was very reluctant to let us do more because “guests don’t work”!).
Later on in the city of Fergana, we met another fantastic guy named Said who, along with his friend Nadir, walked us through a two-hour odyssey at the post office while trying to send a package home! And, all the way to the border many people helped us find our way, offered us food and places to sleep, waved and cheered us on as we briefly passed through their lives. Putting all these experiences together, we were left in awe of the depths of human kindness and generosity; and humbled by the awareness that in our own countries people have so much more, yet give so much less – ourselves included. We hope to change that when we get home.
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We arrived in Osh animated from the wonderful experience in the Ferghana Valley and excited about what lie ahead in Kyrgyzstan. We spent a few days in the city regrouping and preparing for the trek through the mountains. We received a bit of foreshadowing when we met another cyclist who had just come in the opposite direction on the path that we intended to take through the mountains. Jeff’s words were: “The roads are terrible! I consider myself a strong man, but they made me want to cry!” I couldn’t help but feel like he looked at me out of the corner of the eye when he said the words “strong man”, as if to say “are you sure you’re up for this. Little woman?”. This filled my heart with trepidation, but, I decided to do it anyway. Mario, of course, wasn’t fazed by it!
At the fantastic Osh market, we loaded up on dried fruits and nuts for the journey; and then set off on our way. It took two short days on good roads to get to Jalalabad, during which time I ate something that made me sick, so we were laid up there for a few days. We stayed at a lovely homestay – a home where people rent out rooms to travelers – that had a relaxing garden in the inside courtyard. We used the time to do some wedding planning, which needed to get done one way or the other.
Finally feeling better, we set off toward the mountains, expecting to arrive on the other side in Kurtka (a town at the bottom of the Song Köl plateau) in 6 days. In the end it took 10 days! In two days, we reached the bottom of the first pass and found our first of many lovely spots to camp next to a river. The next day, we began the ascent up to the 9,570 ft. pass. It took all day but, surprisingly, it wasn’t nearly as hard as we expected. There were nice long switchbacks that softened the climb and the road was quite good. The next day, on the descent, we got our first taste of the horrible roads that we had heard about. The relatively smooth dirt road gave way to gravel, sand, ruts and washboards! What we thought would be a quick descent, covering about 70km or so, was in reality very slow. Our average speed was about 11km/hour and we only rode 35 km before it was time to set up camp for the night. It was then that the rigor of this trip really began to sink in. Luckily, even though the terrain was much drier than we anticipated, we were always able to find a nice spot to camp next to a crystal clear mountain creek. So, not only did we always have fresh water and a place to bath, but we also had tranquil places to spend a day resting between the hard riding days.
We were saddened to realize that the people in this region were nowhere near as friendly as their Uzbek neighbors. We encountered drunk men asking us for money or cigarettes, mocking young people, and lots of staring, unfriendly faces. So, we just passed through as quickly (or slowly, as it were) as we could. Once we crossed over the second mountain pass (9240 ft.), people in the villages were once again friendly. We guess that the inter-mountain region that we passed through is just so isolated that people aren’t accustomed to seeing “outsiders” and, therefore, they approached us with caution or suspicion. Plus, with our lack of understanding about the Kyrgyz culture, we really didn’t know how to interpret this treatment. Suffice to say that encountering the people was not our favorite part of the ride through the mountains!
However, we did meet several interesting fellow travelers, including 3 couples in 4wd vehicles: a Land Rover Defender, a Toyota Land Cruiser and an unidentifiable Mad-Max-like thing that can climb any mountain and survive any condition! Kindly, one of the first questions each of them asked was whether we needed any supplies. Each time we encountered one of them, we felt a pang of jealousy at their comfort and thought that one day we also want to travel in one of those! On the second mountain pass, we met Chris, a fellow German traveling by bike and camped for a night with him, staring up at the amazing star-lit sky and swapping stories about our bike travels. The next day we parted ways (Chris was traveling in the opposite direction), and we continued to Kurtka, where we arrived at the end of the day.
In Kurtka, we arranged to have horses and a guide bring us up the next mountain pass (10,500ft.) to lake Song Köl, and a driver to bring our bikes up to meet us. Song Köl is a huge lake sitting on an even larger mountain plateau at over 10,000 ft.; well above the tree line. In addition to being a nice break from biking, the horse ride up was beautiful and relaxing. We traveled up a mountain valley – the higher we climbed, the landscape transitioned from rugged, rocky desert mountains to a green alpine forest, quite reminiscent of the Rockies or Arizona’s White Mountains. In fact, most of the way through these mountains, I was struck by how much it reminded me of the mountains in western USA. The ride took two days and on the first night we camped next to a shepherd family living in their summer yurt. In Kyrgyzstan, livestock herds are moved to the highlands to graze pastures that are inaccessible in the winter. The shepherd families move up with the herds and live in yurts – large tent-like structures made of sheepskin. They are wind- and water-proof, and carpets line the walls and floors, making them surprisingly cozy, especially when there is a wood-burning stove blazing inside warming water for tea (tea, or “chai”, is a very important national drink). We set up our tent next to the yurt and the family invited us in for chai. It was a lovely evening watching the parents dote over their three young children while trying to converse with us. Again, our pictures from home and the Russian/English phrase book came in handy.
The next morning they fed us breakfast – potatoes pulled fresh out of the garden that day – and sent us packing with some snacks for the rest of the trip up to the lake. What was especially nice about meeting this family was that it was not part of our official horse tour. In Kyrgyzstan, inviting tourists to stay in yurts is a cottage industry thanks to an organization called CBT (Community Based Tourism) that, for a fee, places tourists in yurts all over the country. This family apparently did not participate in the CBT program and invited us inside as a hospitable gesture. Once at lake Song Köl, we stayed in another yurt that was part of the CBT program and, while still a nice experience, it felt markedly different – we felt “served” as guests in a hotel rather than “included” as guests in a home. However, we think that CBT is doing a great thing for many people in Kyrgyzstan by giving them direct access to tourist revenue – much needed as the country’s economy tanked after independence from Russia – and it provides tourists with more insight to life in Kyrgyzstan than they could ever gain by staying in a hotel. Nonetheless, we were very thankful to our guide Memek for stopping at his friend’s yurt, providing us a slightly more authentic experience.
Once up at the lake, we thanked our wonderful horses for the ride and did a short hike up the hill from our yurt to get a panoramic view of the place. The high meadow around the lake is immense, spanning dozens of miles, and desolate, covered only by short grasslands. Looking in every direction, we spotted large herds of cows, sheep and goats chewing on the grass; and a cacophony of dog barks, cow moos and donkey yelling filled the air. The clear blue sky was dotted with puffy white clouds that morphed into various animals, people, or whatever the imagination cared to find in them. As the sun set, the wind picked up and the temperature dropped, sending us running for the cozy comfort of our yurt.
The next morning, as we rode away to continue our journey around the lake and down the mountain on the other side, the wind continued to howl and some more serious clouds than the previous day moved in. This was a cold day. Toward the end, we climbed up and over an 11,200 ft. pass and tried to fly down to lower ground. But, it began to hail and I could no longer feel my hands or feet, so we had to set up camp high on the mountain (about 10,900 ft.). Mario, the savior, stuffed my in my sleeping bag and made a hot soup for dinner, which warmed me right up. Snug in our down bags, we were quite warm the rest of the night. The next day, we began the final day of this epic journey packing up in the hail and riding through rain until after lunch we finally reached the paved highway that would take us to Kochkor, the nearest small city. We kissed the pavement and glided through the river valley, which was, mercifully, downhill all the way!
From Kochkor, we stuffed our bikes in a taxi for the 3 hour highway ride to Bishkek, the capital city. We spent the next days in Bishkek resting and preparing for Kyrgyzstan part II – a trip around Issy Kól, another huge lake surrounded by mountains, where we will do more horse riding and some trekking.
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Once we arrived in Bishkek, we had to spend some time organizing the next stage of our trip. Our original plan had been to cycle from Kyrgyzstan into China; starting in the Chinese city of Kashgar and making our way to Tibet. But, a few unpleasantries led us to change our plans. First of all, we still anticipated issues with getting a Chinese visa. We heard that because of the problems in Urumqui, the ambassador wanted to talk to every visa applicant in person. Another requirement for the visa was a flight ticket and hotel reservations in China. And, it was still not clear if we would be granted the special permit to enter Tibet. In addition to all that, entering with a bike via our preferred route (Torrugart Pass) would have been quite expensive. You see, one is not allowed to cross the Chinese border by bike; instead one has to hire a jeep to drive you across the last several kilometers before the border and drop you off at the border. Then, you have to get out and walk across the border and hire a Chinese driver to take you several kilometers down the road before dropping you off in the middle of nowhere. All this because it is not allowed to cycle into China (but it is allowed to cycle once in China!). This border crossing procedure would have cost a few hundred dollars.
All these unknows and complications led us to the decision to skip the whole China part and fly directly to the country we were really excited about visiting: Nepal. So, we spent some time in Bishkek organizing the next phase of our trip and enjoying the advantages of a big city: namely, good food (the first in quite a while). One cannot say that Bishkek is a culinary mecca, but at least we had more choices than naan and shaslik. During our stay in Bishkek we stayed in the Sakura guest house, where we met a lot of nice people and also some other long distance bikers. It was amazing to see how many people were just hanging out, waiting for visas and telling their tales of eaving through the bureaucraric maze.
From Bishkek, we shared a taxi to Karakol with Ken, an Australian guy whom we met in the Sakura guest house. Karakol lays at the east side of lake Issy Kol, which after Lake Titicacca in Bolivia, is the second largest alpine lake. From there we went on a few day trekking trip into the beautiful Tian-Shan mountains. We hiked up to Aksai where we spent two nights. Even though it was only early September, there was already so much snow in the mountains that we couldn't cross the pass that we wanted to, so we did some day hikes instead. The up side of all the snow is that it provided gorgeous views of snow-capped mountains and we got to play in it.
After Karakol, we went on to Bokombajevo, a little town in the south of Lake Issy Kol, where we took a two-day horse ride into the Tian Shan mountains. The ride took us up to over 3000 meters and we got another taste of the life of Kyrgyz shepherds. The summer grazing season was coming to an end, so we got to see several families packing up their yurts and driving their herds down from the highlands. In the evening, we enjoyed a delicious meal that our guide, Jecki, had prepared for us and retired for another night of camping under bright stars.
On the 16th of September we arrived back at Sakura in Bishkek. There, we met up with an old friend, Piotr, who we had met over a month before in Bukhara, Uzbekistan who, like us, hoped to cycle through China (unlike us, he was still optimistic that he would get a visa). Together with him and a few other people we celebrated Mario"s birthday on the 19th until late after midnight. After only a few hours of sleep, the next morning a taxi picked us up to bring us to the airport in Almaty. From there, we flew via Deli to Nepal and began the next phase of our journey.
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