The Stans 2026

 Not a lot happened today, which was fine really. It was essentially driving from the yurt camp on the south shore of Issyk Kul to Karakol at the eastern end. This was kind of painful; they seem to be upgrading most of the roads and so it was all uneven, gravelly potholed roads the whole way, just interupted by short sections where they'd got around to sealing it. It was still scenic - you can just see the north side of the lake where there is a continuous line of snow-capped mountain tops paralleling the shore. We stopped a couple of times at sort-of-scenic points (which involved turning up narrower but equally bumpy roads). The first time it was around eroded sand gullies. The second time there were large red rocks. Both were actually busy with tourists because this is apparently the touristy part of the country. As well as locals coming to the lake in summer, people come to hike in the mountains and there are snow fields in winter. It was about 3pm when we eventually reached Kar...

 Samarkand has quite a few tourists - like Bakhara. There are Russians everywhere, and quite a few Chinese here; I think it's eqasy to get to. Our first stop was was memorial and mausoleum for Timur (aka Tamerlane) who was a 14th Century local Samarkand boy made good (or bad, of you were one of the hundreds of thousands he killed). He was kind of a big deal at the time, and the last of the really big nomad emperors before things changed. So his memorial was big and impressive, and moderately crowded. From there we were bussed back to the middle of town and dropped at Registan Square. This is an iconic sight, at east within Central Asia. Essentially a very big square framed by three madrasas built over an extended period. The middle one was also a mosque at times. These are very much the equivalent of churches and cathedrals in Europe. Individually impressive but hard to distinguish from one another after you've been to a few. In the last building we had an entertaining demonstr...

 Today was essentially another transit day - a bus trip from Bukhara to Samarkand (the second largest city in Uzbekistan). But you may (or may not) want a bit more detail than that. To start the day we were walked around the the Kalan Mosque- part of the mosque, minaret and madrassa complex Lynn and I visited in the evening a couple of days ago. It was quiet and cool in the morning, so we got in and out efficiently and then boarded the bus for the drive to Samarkand. Kalan Mosque By 11am we were at G'ijduvan. Which was inconvenient because this was our lunch spot and just happens to be located a lot closer to Bukhara than to Samarkand. We stopped at a pottery business and they gave us a demonstration of how to make bowls etc on a wheel, paint and glaze them. Then took us to the showroom where Lynn and I were the only people to resist the lure of Uzbek pottery. Then a standard lunch. They always go salad, then soup, then a meat main course. The dessert, which we'd had before, wa...

The full day in Bukhara and there is pretty much a routine to our non-transit days, which is a tour in the morning, lunch, and then relaxing from mid-afternoon. That's pretty much how our day went. We were bussed a few kilometers west of the centre to a closed amusement park - there was a ferris wheel and various other rides that we threated through, into the adjacent park. This must be a common tourist route (these itineraries are always pretty standard) as a number of other buses arrived after us, sometimes English speaking but often German and Italian groups. There followed a number of monuments, memorials, museums. The history of this region is complicated; all of the steppes that make up the silk road were ruled by various nomadic tribes that form empires for a hundred years or so and are then replaced. Most of them we've never heard of, though some are famous. It is hard to get invested in monuments to people you've never heard of, so we wander and most of the history...

 A full day around Khiva today, and all on foot, no transport required. The old town is not that big, only about 400m by 600m. And a lot of it is not that old, maybe 19th Century, though some parts are much older - we saw a mosque today that dates from the 11th Century (with some columns replaced and repaied at various periods). We also saw an old fort, the Khan's harem/household and adjacent palace, and a madrassa that is now a hotel. But, honestly, it all blurs into one now. Particularly as there are various rulers from different periods with names that are very hard to follow. Most of them have beards and big, black, woolly hats. I will just add a few typical photos. This took all morning and part of the afternoon, with a break for lunch in a local restaurant. Old Madrassa Fort/Archeological Site Mosque In the evening a group went out to another rooftop terrace restaurant.

 This afternoon we assembled in the foyer - the first time we really met the rest of the group - and went out on a bus to see the city. Apparently it's a Department of Tourism bus and driver. Not sure who the local guide is employed by, but I'm sure at the least he is licensed by the government. (update later in the evening - the Turkmeni local guide says the buildings are all fully occupied... the Uzbek tour leader says they were built as an employment project and many are completely empty.) Anyway, central Ashgabat is essentially marble buildings 10-12 stories high, surrounded by park. There are cars on the road but rarely people on foot and the buildings might be deserted - presumably the carparks are at the back. The people all live in white marble apartment buildings further out. Apparently people come out more in the evenings when it's cooler. Our first stop was the Independence Memorial. It was impressive and, apart from a couple of soldiers, we were the only ones th...