Tajikistan Pt.5

And here as an intro' for this posting is a nice landscape shot. And if you look really close, you'll see Bjorn packing his kit ready to start the days riding ... Somewhere down in one of the valley's lurks a mad Chinaman! Read on ...

Onwards to the Pamirs ... A Rocky Road

Rightly or wrongly we'd decided to snub our noses at the first part of the Pamir Highway, in favour of riding south and east on what appeared on my map to be fairly minor roads. Rather disturbingly when I looked closer and saw where it swung east and moved closer towards the River Panj that separated Tajikistan from Afghanistan, the solid line of a real road became a very thin line indeed. In common map-makers parlance this was a road only one step above a track. But what the hell I told myself, I'm a fully-fledged Enduro-Man now and can handle anything that Tajikistan throws at me ... well, maybe not anything, but I was still game for a challenge.

The stretch from Dushanbe to Kalaikhumb was a tough ride overall, and once more found myself getting twitchy as the road condition deteriorated. What I was tending to do, was to make a comparison between what I could see on my map and what I was looking at on the ground in front me. In doing so was trying to work out how bad that thin black line was going to be that paralleled the River Panj when we finally got to it. A few twists and turns across a patchwork of minor roads and we edged closer to the river and Afghanistan, so it wasn't long before I found out.

With Anzob fresh in my memory the first bit of proper unsealed stuff didn't do much to disturb my peace of mind. But it went on ... and while it was variable, for the most part we didn't come across anything too scary. It just kept coming hour after hour. And again at the end of the first day, in reviewing how far we'd come against how much further we had to go before we got back onto thePamir Highway, the lack of progress was quite discouraging. Once more we were not able to estimate the amount of time it would take with any degree of accuracy. I don't think it's much of an exaggeration, to say that distances in Europe that would take an hour, could take the best part a day here in Tajikistan.

With no accommodation around we were expecting a nights camping under the stars, and happily it looked like being a pretty good night too. But right near the end of that day's travel we'd taken a wrong turn on a section of road-building, to end up in a dead-end of a part-built tunnel. I'm sure that Bjorn will have something more to say about this, as he was on the receiving end of things. But my contribution to his anecdote is this: In trying to establish if the tunnel was accessible he approached the entrance, but instead of a simple wave or some kind of signal to give us a clue one way or the other, a Chinese-worker who was stood just inside the entrance suddenly became hysterical. You can rest well assured that even if we did speak any Mandarin, we'd have had no chance of deciphering this mad Chinaman's outburst. He was right over the top, barking ... no raging with a face like thunder. So out of proportion was his reaction, it was hard to take him too seriously, but it displeased Bjorn who took it all rather personally. Though a little later when we discussed it, he seemed to be mollified when I told him what I saw. And that the reaction was so OTT that this guy might've had a mental problem of some kind. He most certainly had anger-management issues and that was for sure!

We managed to extract ourselves from that building site, but not before a few wobbles on some wet and soft stuff that had my teeth gripped and temples throbbing. Not so long after finding our way back onto the road dusk signalled it was time to stop, so was well pleased to call a halt and settle down for the night. Part way up a windy hill we found a spot away from the road. There would be no beers this night, but we had enough provisions to rustle up some tucker and of course a nice cuppa çay.
This is Bjorn nestled into his sleeping bag, with the sun coming up in the background ...

It took the best part of another full days riding to get to Kalaikhumb, and back onto the Pamir Highway. The main stopover would be Khorag where we would be staying for at least a couple of days. It would be the limit's of civilisation 'as we know it' (Jim!). Once we reached that point things like food choice diminishes, fuel supply and quality is sparse and the advent of continued high altitude steals a lot of the summers heat away. We could even expect to be short of oxygen, with the average height of the Pamirs something over 2 Kms above sea-level.

But before I jump too far ahead of myself would like to make a brief mention of the 2nd nights stopover we had while still on this section. We'd pulled over into a ... and here am not quite sure what to call it. It couldn't be a Truck-Stop as few enough trucks plied that route for the owners to make a living from. It sure wasn't accommodation as such, as the few meagre buildings were barely adequate to house the extended family that lived there. But we did manage to scrounge both food and drink for a few bucks, as well as camping out under their trees. Before it got fully dark the owner took me on a tour of his piece of land, and showed me a number of fruit and nut trees. There were apricot and fig trees, pomegranate, pears and walnuts too. They had their own fresh run stream that flowed down from the adjacent cliffs where I'd guess nobody else lived, and so the water was clean and clear and could be used for everything. They had no tap or piped water-supply. There was no need, as the small over-flow near their kitchen was the combined washing, washing-up and drinking water collection point. The ground was little more than dried earth, brushed to get rid of fallen leaves and other detrious. Simple and to them I'd guess, quite homely.

Tucked well into my sleeping bag, I couldn't see any need to pitch my tent and so spent the night on a slab of rough concrete that served as one of their dining tables. It was a poor nights sleep too, as we weren't very far from a section that the road-builders were working on. A digger driver on night-shift was in the middle of shifting piles of dirt less than 30 metres away from where I was trying to sleep. At one point his lights shone straight onto me, so looked up to see something that looked for all the world like a dinosaur picking up a fallen tree-trunk. He eventually moved further down the track and with the noise diminishing finally fell into a fitful slumber.

Morning comes and the dinosaur's gone back to bed for the day. A quick splash in the stream as a wash, and immediately followed with the by now familiar bike packing routine and we were ready for day no.2. Surprisingly after having hours of stolen sleep, I'd woken up fairly refreshed.

Setting off armed with loads of enthusiasm and energy was determined to make some good progress this day. But we didn't get too far before I came to a grinding halt as another bit of Tajik road-building had me cussing soundly. In fact I had a fairly serious sense of humour loss on a patch of piled up gravel that served as drive-thro' for a section under construction. This forced-stop was bad enough that the bike's back wheel became dug-in right up to the axle. The only way to get moving again was to unload all the luggage and to carry it past the slope of dirt and gravel that was supposed to become a real road at some unspecified time in the future.

"Civil Engineering? Huh! It seemed very uncivil to me!!!"

While humping my luggage up the loose gravel slope cussing and swearing I also watched a convoy of small Chinese mini-buses picking their way carefully through. In going down the rise with gravity on their side, they fared better than me. These mini-van's appeared to be loaded with toilet paper ... They looked at me, and I at them. We both gave each other odd looks in passing and were probably both wondering the same thing about who we each were and where we were headed. I reasoned that there was only one place to go with toilet paper. And that was Dushanbe. They were still a good full-day's drive away with their cargo. But later when I managed to extract myself and get going again, spent some time with the conundrum of whether it was profitable to go to so much time effort and trouble to bring bog-paper all this way and across such atrocious roads. I speculated that these vehicles themselves must form part of the cargo, and were to be sold on at their destination. My best guess was that it would only be the drivers who would be coming back this way again, but instead of driving would be passengers with pockets stuffed full of money ...

We pressed on with grim determination, and sometimes had to fight with the roads. Sometimes though it was simply a case of plodding onwards till it got better. It didn't, it got worse ... Or more enigmatic at least. As the 2^nd day progressed we were to pass a convoy of Chinese trucks on some very narrow sections of 'road' (and have highlighted this word because if you'd have seen it ... ). The road wound it's way around a narrow section of gorge and hugged the side of the cliff. In some places there could have been no more than a metre between these trucks and a 30 metre drop into the seething waters of the Panj river. And don't think that the sides of the cliff was cleanly carved out neither, as there were jagged rocks left in-situ that encroached into the road. Little problem for us on bikes, but these trucks would have struggled. I suppose that in essence this is the modern day silk-route. Where traders would use any means and any route to get their goods to anyone who was willing to buy them. The enigma here, is that it's been said that China doesn't take much in the way of imports. So would these trucks be going back empty? A poor one-sided rocky road of a business if they were ...

To finish off this chapter would like to mention some of the stop-offs, we had to stand and stare across the river at Afghanistan. A country of ill-fame as one of the most dangerous spots on earth. In contrast to it's fearsome rep', we were looking at some very pretty villages. Across from where we were viewing them, they were often neatly laid out and we would sometimes be looking at fields crawling their way towards steep and precipitous parts of the gorge in search of springs and streams to irrigate for their crops. I couldn't help but notice, that even while in often poor and occasionally what could be described as dangerous state with loose rocks above and a raging river below, at least we had a road as such on our side. For all of the hours we rode alongside the Panj River I didn't see one single vehicle on the Afghan' side. I wasn't going to neither, as there was no road for them to get there on ... All that could be seen was a solitary donkey-track tracing it's way along the opposite bank, and even then in one place it clawed its way up the side of an enormous cliff face. Maybe it was the perspective I was viewing it from, but I couldn't imagine walking up that track. There was nothing that was going to stop you if you slipped and fell, until you were pitched into the fearsome torrent of the Panj, or otherwise dashed onto the building sized boulders hundreds of metres below. It looked like one of the loneliest pathways you could imagine.

Look closely ... those tiny blotches are people in Afghanistan carving a new track along the side of the river

While I was pulled over waiting for Bjorn to catch, up took the time to get a few shots of the local scenery as well as perusing the landscape in general. From that I was confronted by a sight that is now burned eternally into my memory banks.

Over on the Afghan side of the river there was a thin track that trailed its way from the left all the way along to a spot on the bank opposite where I was stood. It appeared to originate from small village a Kilometre or so distant. There was another track going off to the right, but these tracks were not connected. Both tracks truncated at a shear cliff face with a boulder the size of house at river level separating the two tracks. There was no evidence of any way up and over, so guessed the only other way for people who lived on either side of these tracks to communicate, would be to travel many kilometres in either direction before they could get up out of the gorge to find easier routes. Donkey-pace or on foot it mattered little, as the travel time had to be measured in days ... But I was looking at a group of people on the left at their dead-end, who were literally carving their way into and across that sheer cliff to enable them to connect to the other track. There were two other individuals on the right hand track too. But they didn't seem to be doing anything constructive that I could detect. They looked to be too far away from each other to communicate by shouting, so to this day don't know what they were actually doing on that side. If they were simply waiting I'd guesstimate it'd be another month or two before they could shake hands with the track builders. Or who know's? This is Afghanistan I was looking at ... so maybe they were waiting to shoot 'em!

As we watched a piece of rock bigger than a man went tumbling silently into the River Panj. They were a few steps closer to meeting their neighbours!

N.B. To qualify the above further, no boat was ever seen on that river. And besides which the river Panj moved at a high rate of knots, that seemed to spell a one-way trip for any un-powered vessel that ventured onto the fast moving water.

Tajikistan Pt.4 A Bit of luxury in Dushanbe

Rickety bridge on the way up to the Anzob Pass. The picture above is nothing to do with this chapter. It's just that I didn't get to upload it into the Anzob posting.

A bit of luxury in Dushanbe ...

With Bjorn having made arrangements to meet up with a fellow HUBB'er who worked for the American mission in Tajikistan, it was time to go our separate ways and split up from our Polish contingent. After exchanging contact details we hit the road for Dushanbe, Tajikistan's thriving capital, leaving the others to look for a campsite at a nearby lake that was reputed to be something of a beauty spot.

When the two of us went on our way, we saw that the road into the city had all the hallmarks of that crazy new road on the other side of Anzob. Snooker-table smooth and black as night, with perfect freshly painted shiny white stripes along both edges and a 3rd plumb centre, marking the middle of the highway. But in this case the surface was well hardened-off and plenty grippy with no sign of fresh tar. Grippy enough to stretch a young guy who was following us on his Rusky built Ural, a kind of BMW'ish horizontal twin engined motorbike. It was a pleasure to grab a handful of throttle on a good road with little other traffic. With Anzob behind us I felt on a bit of a 'high'. And further was a prospect of meeting Trevor who'd offered for us to stopover with him in his house. A real bed, and a shower ... and as it turned out air-conditioned comfort too.

My heartfelt thanks go out to you and your Missus Trev', as it was a genuine pleasure and was much appreciated to have the luxury of staying with you in your home. After weeks on the road in often meagre accommodation and at the time four consecutive nights of sleeping under the stars, our diet and ablutions were often wanting. So to have access to a fully functioning kitchen and a hot shower ... Ooooh, I can remember the sensation of gently warm-water running over my head and skin after days of .... well, the best previously was that douche in the mountain stream and as nice as it was, was bloody cold. This was blissful warmth and then to get out into the refreshing coolness of air conditioning, and more ... a washing machine to clean our clothes. A big pile of dusty smelly clothing went in, and came out fresh as a daisy an hour or so later. Ah bliss! Oh, and I haven't finished yet. Oh no ... Trev's neighbour had a wireless Internet connection, and while neither me nor Bjorn could get our email accounts up, we could get Skype up and running. To be able to 'phone-home' was a big helping of 'cream' poured lavishly over the top of this treat in Dushanbe.

We were even invited out for Trevor's birthday celebration on the Friday night, which I remember for the vodka toasts accompanied by sometimes lengthy speeches. Clearly out of the Russian tradition I half expected the glasses to be thrown and smashed on the floor. But instead they were kept for more refills. I found I liked this tradition very much, though was to change my rather befuddled mind somewhat the next morning. I was told later that it couldn't possibly have been the vodka. It must have been that one and only beer I drank ...

I also remember Dushanbe for bike maintenance. And if I was to recollect accurately a pretty good deal labour-wise too, bearing in mind the number of hours put in by the mechanic. However one shadow over that memory is that I had failed to follow my instinct, which was to buy some new oil when I first saw it, shining in a nice yellow Shell™ container, as-sold by the sole Shell distributor in Dushanbe. It was only a 10 minute walk away and could have easily returned to buy it, but after chatting with our intrepid mechanic he assured us he can get the same stuff ... that led to my rather optimistic assumption that he'd get the same stuff with a 'trade' discount. Foolish boy! This ain't The West y'know. Ya better learn fast and when you see something you know is Kosher ... even if it's costly, then get yer wallet out, pay the asking top-dollar price, and forget any hoped for discounts.

It was a hot day when we rode off to the garage to begin the much needed oil-change, tyre swap for our new knobbly TKC80's, and in my case new chain and sprockets. The garage turned out to be an oil-stained bit of dirt down a side-street and ah well, hey ho ... we're tough well-travelled-bikers so just get on with it without complaint. And to be honest it was kind of fun getting smeared in gunk n' gunge, but all the while getting stuck into the much needed jobs and in doing so were making some real progress. The sun moved across and with it came the heat. It got hot, then hotter. But we were all blokes together, so could wander about in my shorts without fear of driving any of the Tajik' ladies insane with lust leering at my unclad torso. The afternoon came and one of the last jobs was to refill with new oil. Off went our mechanic and Bjorn and they returned a short while later with what appeared to be the same stuff that I'd looked at in the Shell distributors the day before. Glug, glug, glug ... in it goes. Fire it up to spread it around the engine before letting it settle for the final top-up, and ... it doesn't sound right. Never mind, it's been a busy and hot day and was keen to get finished up and back for a shower and treat of treats ... cold beeeeeeer!

The final few millilitres go in to to get the correct level on the oil-tank sight glass... and that's it, we're finished. Again we fire up and ride off back to Trev's place. And on that return trip just know that somethings wrong. It really doesn't sound right at all. And further the engine is sluggish and doesn't pick up as expected when opening the throttle. This oil sure ain't quality 10-40 as it's running more like 20-50 ... and not only that, 20-50 on a cold day before the engines warmed up. In keeping going I hope against hope it'll 'settle' in. Whatever that means. But well, you can guess that it didn't and these symptoms persisted ... and as it turned out, after taking some advice, is that the most likely scenario is that the oil we'd been supplied which came in that nice bright yellow authentic Shell™ container, was in fact a cheap Chinese fake.

I guess that when I eventually come to it in Kyrgyzstan, will write up the subsequent symptoms with great detail, as an overlong and very dull anecdote. But the long and short of the effect; is that when cold, the oil was like treacle and was so thick it prevented the engine from revving freely. Then when hot, went to 'water'! I know this, because when we finally got to change it one country later and on our way towards the Chinese border, that's exactly how it came out ... like water. To explain further; good oil still maintains some viscosity, even when past it's sell-by-date and jet black, after being hammered inside the engine for thousands of miles. But this stuff we changed after less than 2000 miles and it ... am trying to think of an appropriate simile here, but can only think of; pissed-out into the sump tray. And as further evidence, in rubbing it with your fingers it had no substance to it at all. I shudder to think how much wear went on in our engines while we had that crap in there, and hope that any prospective buyers don't read my BLOG, as they'll no doubt either hot-foot it to anybody else selling a Dakar at the time. Either that or knock the price down by some outrageous amount, 'cos I'd sure do the same if I was buying a used bike and knew it had been run for a couple of thousand Km's with something akin to old chip-oil for lubrication. Come to think of it, old chip-oil would have probably done a better bloody job!

I recall having to drag myself inwardly kicking and screaming from Trevor's place, as it had been a glorious time wallowing in the lap of luxury. It was so tempting to stay for another day, and another ... perhaps just one more teeny weeny day? But the road called and more importantly what could be one of the real highlights for us dyed-in-the-wool, and now after Anzob ... Experienced Enduro riders, The Pamirs. Or to be more politically accurate, the GBAO or Gorno Badakshan Autonomous Region. Try saying that after half a bottle of Tajik' vodka!
And another piccy that belongs in the previous post. This is the dodgy bit of road just after the trial by wet-tar. 'Our' orchard looked similar to the one you can see. It was an island of tranquility in the midst of highway building madness ...

Tajikistan Pt.3

Me with a big smile on my face ... as did all of us that day!

Anzob

I'm not so adventurous as I used to be these days, and so was with a mix of excitement and not a few nerves that we took the turning that let away from the scary tunnel, and would gradually take us up into the mountains and the Anzob Pass. The early stretches we simply followed the river as normal with occasions of broken road and the usual pot-holes. Villages came and went with mostly friendly and always curious locals, either peering or waving as we went by. We'd spread out somewhat over a kilometre or so, with us all taking it in turns to forge ahead in the lead. I'd say it was those bits I remember the clearest as I blazed the trail up the mountain.

On the way to Anzob ...

The road twisted and turned and wound it's way serpentining slowly up across rock and gravel, with often spectacular views and precipitous drops down into the canyon hundreds of metres below. It went up ... and along, then up again. A small river crossing, a barely cleared rock-fall. The road went along, then up once more. It seemed we were climbing up into the clouds. And then all at once looked down and indeed there were some clouds. We'd gone that high .... though it wasn't so clear that we could see the distant land after cresting the top of the pass itself. A mild disappointment, but nevertheless I felt a sense of personal achievement and was happy about the experience so far.

My bike with gorge and the Anzob track in the background

A short way on after mounting over the crest of the Pass I pulled up alongside Darek, to look at whatever view that could be seen through the haze and to reflect on the days riding. We had plenty of time but the cautious bit of my brain was relieved we were finally going down from here on in. In thinking back on the last couple of hours ascent when I took lead position, it became clear that all the training in the world wouldn't have been much use on some stretches. I'd started out trying to think ahead and choose a good riding 'line'. But as the day wore on tiredness and the increasingly difficult patches, along with the relentlessness of the conditions meant there was no 'right line'. Sometimes it was a case of let the front wheel go where it may, and do the best to hit whatever you found yourself riding over with enough speed to get you over it, but not enough to bottom out the suspension. Of course there were times when the bike took a hard 'hit' through the frame and from it came a few wobbles, though these were handled with less and less drama. The learning curve was fast, so that in time there was a kind of 'flow' about the whole thing and the most important aspect over some sections was to just keep going.

Bjorn with a big smile on his face too ...

Having said that, there were numerous photo-stops, that had everybody wearing a smile as they pulled their cameras out. But of course you can only take so many shots of mountains and mountain roads, so after a few stops myself was keen to press on. As I write now recall a certain tension in dealing with the unknown of my first high mountain pass on a that poorly conditioned road. But my main memory is of the achievement I felt at the top, and not a little disappointment when we were coming back down over the other side ...

I love this shot, as it shows a little of the surface we were riding on. It got worse in places. At times much worse!

Tajikistan Pt.2 First night ...

First night in Tajikistan

By the time we managed to get away from the border post it was already close to dusk, so then in hitting the first village it was full-on dark and were having to rely on our headlights to avoid unseen obstacles along the way. Night rides as explained before were not recommended in central Asia, and happily our Polish buddies agreed and that we would get some provisions and find a campsite pronto'.

One thing that we had noticed was a marked deterioration of the road's surface. While not always brilliant in the further reaches of Uzbekistan, near to the big towns it wasn't too bad on average. But after a short time on the Tajik roads found the pothole count had increased considerably. We'd been warned from others who'd been through here before (there's heaps of info' on the Horizon's Unlimited website) the roads are 'bad' in this country, so the regular pot-hole dodging came as no particular surprise.

It was during that first shopping trip into a dingy 20 Watt lightbulb lit local shop that we were to discover the value of our new found buddies. Not only could they converse, but they seemed to have some kind of idea of which sausage to pick. There was precious little on the shelves, so stocking up on food wouldn't have been too much of a problem if we were on our own. But when it came to picking out something from the line of half dozen torpedo shapes lurking in the chill cabinet, I for one would not have had a clue. The truth of the matter is that I would have likely dismissed them as inedible tubes of meat-based protein that might or might not have been intended for human consumption. They reminded me of a product I'd seen sold in the UK as pet-food, so would have likely walked out of there sausage-less without the benefit of Justina and Maciej's counsel.

Once we'd made our purchases, the next important thing was to find somewhere to camp. A couple of brief forays and stop-off's to ask for some directions and we ended up by the side of a river. In order to get to the spot we had a short spell of off-roading, but of course the darkness made it much more unpredictable and Bjorn came a 'cropper' at a muddy stream crossing. From that he was left in some pain and once again the girls from the Polish contingent were to provide welcome succour as well as more direct and practical help. As a trainee Vet Justina could transfer some knowledge to people, and concluded that Bjorn would not need to be 'put-down'. Some bandage to give support to his ankle and some pain-killers seemed to help him. He was left with a limp, though seemed happier all round. But the girls together did us all really proud after the medical treatment was dispensed, by rustling up a really tasty supper from bread, sausage, mayo' and spice paste. Mind you the beer helped as did the bottle of vodka that appeared to provide some refreshment, after a bunch of locals turned up to find out who and why we were there.

A young Tajik' girl from the nearby village, who'd come to see these strange foreigners ...

I was initially a bit dubious about our choice of camping spot that first night, as a quick survey with a torch when we first arrived during darkness showed up one place where a load of glass had been broken. Along with a couple of other items of rubbish, indicated it might've been used a dumping ground from the nearby village. But when the morning came there was little further evidence of village detrious and the distant hills and nearby river hinted at some of the good stuff that Tajikistan had to offer. It was a beautiful morning and we had the prospect of beginning our exploration of this somewhat undeveloped country.


Packing up next morning ...

After some routine maintenance by Darek on his aging Africa twin we headed off towards our first high Pass. With horror stories about a new tunnel that had been drilled through the mountains to connect the roads coming from Uzbekistan into Dushanbe, we weren't about to go that way. Besides which the prospect of a high pass held some excitement as a test with some real enduro conditions. In a brief curtsy to our reasons for avoiding that forbidding tunnel, is that evidently after the tunnel had been carved out the Civil Engineers were delighted to discover an underground river was on their chosen trajectory through the kilometres of solid rock. The net result was that anyone going through there had the joyful experience of traversing that hole into hell thro' an aquatic building site. Evidently part of the way into the tunnel you'd find yourself riding in some 300 mm of running water, which added to darkness, high concentrations of exhaust fumes, plus unknown road/river-bed surface condition, I for one didn't relish experiencing.

So Anzob pass it was to be ... And here's a good time to insert a link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E8jjECKiRw For those of you that haven't seen it before, it shows highlights of our journey across and towards Dushanbe.

But before that we were to find that travel in the Central Asian country of Tajikistan cannot be measured in times comparable to anywhere in Europe, unless you want to try and ride the length & breadth of the Highlands of Scotland avoiding all sealed roads. Looking at the map it showed a couple of hundred Km's as a bold red line. In other words a main-road ... An easy and a short day's drive in almost any Euro country. But The Stans had shown that we needed to be cautious and open our minds to the vagaries of bad roads, break-downs and fuel supply. Once we got moving we found that things happened slowly in Tajikistan and that we'd not managed to get very far along this highway due to the lumps and bumps that constituted a road surface. Watching the distance reduce as we counted down the Kilometres towards Dushanbe seemed futile that first day, and decided it would be more realistic if could get as far as the turn off for the ascent to Anzob. Towards the end of the first full days riding we were approaching the ill-famed road-works, which were part of the process in creating a new highway. Once completed it would connect the capital Dushanbe all the way from the North West corner of the country.

The road works were being actuated by Chinese labourers, and they had brought their safety standards along with them. Again, the jungle drums of the travel community had sent word ahead, so we had some warning. In some ways though it still made no difference, as it was difficult to comprehend their downright dangerous procedures, that resulted in at least one fatal accident where a car went off the road into the adjacent gorge as a direct result of their road making methods.

Darkness and dangerous conditions were becoming too frequent for my liking, and on this occasion were to prove to be pretty frightening too. In following the valley we'd wound our way alongside a muddy and fast moving river. Sometimes it was wide and slow and at other times was squeezed into a narrow niche through the mountains and tumbled through when it was restricted so, with a roar that could be heard over the sound of the engine. We'd been following this river over the course of the day and a couple of map-checks showed we were not making very good time. Encountering the road-works were often stoppages that brought us to a halt while they cleared debris or sometimes for other reasons less obvious. In some cases we could squeeze past the blockage and ignored the barriers that we stopping the cars. Whether piles of rock or earth moving machinery if we could get past it, we'd do so in order to get a few more kilometres along our way. Suddenly we hit good road. In fact very good road. In fact it was near perfect newly laid black-top of billiard table smooth tarmac. This of course meant traffic was able to get up some decent speed and it was a positive joy to be able to ride in top gear once again. Of course it was never going to last ... and it didn't. Going around one bend, suddenly things changed. It was subtle and at first didn't know what it was. The only thing it reminded me of was riding on super-smooth tarmac in the wet, or during the winter when you hit patches of frost on the roads in mid-winter. But here it was not only dry, but the weather had been hot and dry so it wasn't any of those things. But the steering was definitely light and alarmingly so. A touch on the brakes told me that it wouldn't be a good idea to pull up sharply. In rounding a bend saw someone directly in front of me waving their arms. It was Bjorn and to one side Mateusz both of whom were warning me of something. The something were a couple of bikes laying in a heap in the road and were directly in my way. There was no chance of stopping, so a quick glance in my mirror showed it was clear to go around them, which was executed gingerly with both feet down in an attempt to gain some extra stability. Once safely past judiciously tried the brakes again, but the 'unsettled' feeling fed back from the road underneath me meant I had to mostly use engine-braking to slow down. Edging my way over to the side discovered things felt more sure and so managed to pull up and got off. In stepping back towards the middle of the road found it was actually quite difficult to stand up. It felt like I was walking on ice. No wonder the guys had come off, the road surface was bloody lethal. It was wet tar! And had been newly sprayed onto the recently laid tarmac as a 'finish' to the road surface. Well it nearly finished us off and along with the other cars had serious trouble trying to avoid an accident. Some didn't as several cars as well as the two bikes had lost control. One car had gone into a nearby pylon and another had gone off into a ditch on the right away from the gorge. This was where the car went off the road killing it's occupants recently, and we'd just had a graphic example of how this could have so easily happened once more.

The people in charge of this project should be ... and here I measure my comments to say simply, that they should be held accountable. In Europe such a serious lapse in safety standards would have seen someone jailed for incompetence. Here, nobody seemed to notice and life carried on as normal. The scenario of vehicles skating dangerously across wet tar is likely to be going on every single day that the finishing touches go into that newly built road. Accidents will be happening every day along with the likelihood of more people dying during this piece of civil construction. It's happening still and is likely to continue until the road gets to Dushanbe. Or maybe someone 'important' will get caught in the daily mayhem, in which case maybe ... just maybe, somebody will do something to stop it.

The guys had picked one bike up by the time I got back to them and I was then able to help get the second upright, but not without some difficulty in staying on two feet ourselves. Another car slewed off into the nearside ditch as we watched. It was a Mercedes that had selfishly blasted past earlier in one of the road-works chicanes, showering everyone in gravel and choking dust. We'd managed to overtake him again a short time afterwards when he'd got boxed in with other traffic. It was a slow speed impact and nobody was hurt so was glad the Merc' owner had this misfortune, as he's been going way too fast in another attempt at bulldozing past everyone again.

After we'd dusted ourselves off, and in Darek's case wiped as much of the thick black sticky tar from his jeans and hands, it was time to find somewhere to sleep for the night. The torrent of a river continued to rush past as we progressed slowly along this section of the road in the rather vain hope of finding somewhere suitable. And once again ... darkness was on us, but I needn't have feared as our intrepid Polish buddy's did us proud again. There was one failed attempt at trying to talk some locals into letting us camp in their village on the other side of a rickety bridge. Rickety enough to appear rather daunting in the gloom. I'd watched Maciej pick his way carefully across and didn't fancy it too much if we were given the thumbs up for us all to follow. I wasn't too bothered when they said there simply wasn't enough space in the village for all of us, but when I was getting concerned we'd need to carry on some way further in the dark again, their conversation with the village elder indicated we could stay at a small place a few minutes back along the way we came. Now, after coming from that direction it all looked like stark near vertical gorge, with little in the way of roadside pull-overs. If there was anywhere even vaguely suitable I expected to be kept awake all night by the thunder of lorries rolling past a few metres from our tents. In short, I was not too optimistic at that point. It was Mateusz and his girlfriend that paved the way and after a foray to investigate the described place, they didn't come back. The agreement being, if they didn't return then it was a suitable spot and we should all follow on in their tyre tracks. Rather pessimistically my thinking was that they may not have come back as they'd encountered a problem and were unable to do so. With us following we may have all ended up in the same fix ... Maybe I should have had more confidence as Maciej and Justina went up the small track, then came back down to report that it “was really nice ... It is a beautiful place”. I remained sceptical and even after arrival wasn't too convinced, as it was dark and couldn't see much under the trees. I was shattered ... 'all-in' after the day's trials and didn't even join in with the evenings wind-down chat over bread, sausage and beer. I simply grabbed a couple of mouthfuls of food, 'skulled' the one beer and crawled gratefully into my sleeping bag. Oblivion soon followed ...

Next morning dawned and it became clear that Maciej was absolutely 'bang on the nail'. It was not only beautiful, but a short walk along to the edge of this apricot orchard to overlook the gorge, showed that it was indeed a truly gorgeous spot. We could see another small orchard on the opposite side of the river reached by yet another rickety bridge, and there too could see a few locals who were wandering along the pathway to assumedly begin their days labour in and around that area. I could just about make out the road below, winding it's way alongside the river. Somehow even though only 20 or so metres down, didn't find the passing traffic particularly intrusive. The overhang seemed to muffle the sound of a lorry as it drove by and so guessed it was bounced back and into another part of the gorge.

And here you can see Bjorn doing his Photobiker 'thing' ...

It got better too. As the others rose from their nights slumber Mateusz wandered further along and up into the orchard, then came back to report he'd found a small stream. This stream came directly from the mountains above and was pretty much guaranteed to be 100% pure water. In bathing here it seemed to wash not only the road grime away, but some of the tension from the past 24 hours too. It was cool and refreshing and I did that thing of drinking from the same water source I'd washed in only minutes earlier. But of course it was fresh run by the time I came to drink and fill my water bottles. I've gotta say there's something quite special about drinking water straight from the stream, as it's a very basic health consideration and not done lightly. Some say that water doesn't really taste of anything, but here the water tasted good. Very good ...

Our campsite in the orchard ...

With the sun up and warming the air and the prospect of a hot day to come, didn't even bother to dry myself. Simply putting my clothes back onto my wet body felt good and it felt right. The wet clothing would soon dry and besides which I reasoned, would keep me feeling cooler while packing the bike ...

In returning to our camp came across a group of ladies who were sat sorting what looked like dried apricots. They weren't too industrious in their labours and seemed more interested in me. I passed the time of day and they seemed friendly enough, though was surprised when I was offered tea. There was no fire evident, but there by the side of one of the older ladies was an oversized pot filled with a hot brew. Well, what could I say? Life is so much brighter with an early morning cuppa, and it had the effect of putting the icing on the cake for me during that first hour of the day. None of the ladies could speak any English and my Tajik' is non-exist ant, but it didn't matter in the slightest. In those 10 minutes or so I was sat with them I felt quite at ease and laughed along with their amicable banter. It seemed they were having a giggle at me and guessed it was because I looked so strange to them. There was no malice in their laughter at all and got the distinct impression these simple people who scratched out a meagre existence alongside the one and only main road through that part of the world, were in fact very happy people indeed.

With some reluctance I said my goodbyes and thanks for the much appreciated cuppa, and went back to my travel buddies to pack and get ready for the days riding. Anzob called. We were going to cross our first real High-Pass this coming day ...

Tajikistan Pt 1

Pick the odd one out!

1. Wash your eyes with an eye-wash glass full of fine sand.

2. Visit Central Asia in high summer

3. Drink 14 pints of rough cider, then set the alarm for 2 hours after you fall asleep. The moment when you start coming around, put a scratched vinyl record by the Bay City Rollers onto a low-fi sound system, and listen to it cranked up full volume.

4. Vigorously scrape your thighs with a rough grade steel-brush, then apply a good handful of salt and rub it in well. NB. For a more intense experience follow it up with a sprinkling of spirit vinegar and dry with wire-wool.

5. Watch an evenings worth of Coronation Street, East-Enders and Neighbours on the TV.

The answer of course is (5) because it's simply dull as dishwater, and not excruciatingly painful as are the others 4 choices ...

Welcome to No-Man's land ...

A quick stamp into the country, and we'd be on our way to Dushanbe within the hour ... Riding the short distance to the Tajik' border post, we hand our passports over with a flourish and get a nice friendly “Welcome to Tajikistan” from the border guard. After dealing with that surly bastard on the other side, this felt much better. I'm getting a warm feeling about this country before they've even let us in. The map in my tank bag is staring at me, so I do a quick assessment to guesstimate how far we were likely to get before dark. Two minutes later, the border guard comes back and says something in Tajik', then it's repeated in Russian. We still don't understand, but then he says one word in English that we do know “problem”. Confident that everything's in good-order our end say to him, “There's no problem at all. Here ... look at the visa. it says 'Tourist visa' here and 'GBAO permit' here”. He takes it back momentarily, before showing it back to us again, but this time saying “Date no good”. To myself as well as to Bjorn, I start to mumble “What's he on about then?”. Holding it back under his nose to show him the date and say “Look here ... it says 4th of the 8th month, till 2nd of the 9th month, which means we can come into your country as tourists”. He shakes his head and looks at his watch. Now why the hell does he think that time has anything to do with it? And slowly and gradually the penny starts to drop. I look at the date on my watch, then back at the date on the visa. And yup it's only the 2nd of August. The visa doesn't come into force for another 2 days on the 4th. Ever had that sinking feeling? Yup, I looked at Bjorn who was disbelieving himself, then looked back at the Uzbek' border. Nope, we'd been stamped out, so there is no going back there. Besides which wouldn't give much chance of getting sympathy from bully boy, who I'd reckon would sell his Granny for a few Cym. The only way is forward ... Our nice border guard is sympathetic enough to call up his boss for advice or assistance, but all we get is a suggestion to try money. A bribe? What sort of money are we talking here? We start out with an odd five bucks I've got sat in my wallet, which I can tell is treated as a joke and this my first and rather pathetic attempt at 'buying-in' to the well documented central Asian tradition of corruption, quickly petres-out at $20. Even this sum, is still feeble enough to be laughed at too. I sure don't have anything like a couple of hundred bucks spare, which might be given some credence. With resignation kicking-in I leave it with Bjorn to carry on trying to 'talk his way in', and go back along the road a hundred metres or so, to look at our campsite for the next two days.

If you'd have come through the Uzbekistan/Tajikistan border crossing on the 3rd August, this is the sight that would've greeted you ... Note the wind bending the trees. As the day wore on it became a searingly hot-wind. Great for drying your clothes if all you have is two minutes, good for desiccating coconuts etc. etc.

We quickly worked out that 'water' could become a problem. We'd only got a couple of litres and after talking to the guys in the Tajik' side found they had little more than two poorly serviced wooden huts, so they didn't have anything to spare. So it was time to bite the bullet and wander back into the Uzbek' side, to try and blag some drinking water from them. I couldn't believe it when I asked him ... Our bullying border guard thought it was okay for us to take our drinking water from the irrigation ditch adjacent to our campsite. After explaining our predicament he laughed out loud. And the thought passed through my mind that it was, 'good to see the brute's got some sense of humour'. He then pointed back to the caramel coloured liquid running alongside the road that was being used to water the nearby fields. I adjusted my initial thoughts to 'yeah, some bloody warped sense of humour'. But then had to dig deep into my own humour to continue with this in the hope of making some progress. The one and only female border post guard came up and pleaded on our behalf and begrudgingly he pointed to a trailer tank, which if anywhere near full would have thousands of litres in it. Ha! Gotcha ... Give me an inch ... or in this case a few litres. I'd fully intended to raid whatever water I wanted once I'd found the source. And there it was tucked out of the way in a corner of the compound and unlocked.

This is the Uzbek' border post where we came from, and had to try and 'blag' our drinking water ...

The 'water-run' was to turn into some kind of entertainment each time I made it. Whichever guard was on point-duty at the final barrier, he never quite knew what to do each time I walked through and past into their compound. They knew full well of our predicament and that we weren't going to try and get back through. We just wanted some water. And if from that they tried to stop us, were going to have dehydrated western tourists to deal with ... The best of the sport though, was in photographing the Uzbek' border post from the other side. The point-duty guard noticed me taking pictures and motioned me to come closer. Of course I knew that it was just so he could tell me to stop what I was doing, so motioned to him in return to come over to me. Which of course knew he wasn't allowed to do, and so happily brought my camera back up to take another shot. Even from a distance I could see he was furious ... I wonder if he wanted to shoot me?
And this is where were headed to. Tajikistan. It might look flat here, but don't be fooled!

A couple of hours into our enforced refugee status a mini-bus pulled up. A German speaking lady came up with a bag full of supplies. We were amazed to find that we were something of a talking point and our predicament had prompted sympathy within this Deutch touro' group to have a whip-round on our behalf. An assortment of goodies appeared and Bjorn's eyes lit up at the sight of chocolate! I hate to argue nor relished the sight of seeing a grown man cry if I won the toss of a coin, so let him wolf the lot!

Well, we'd well and truly stuffed-up this time. Here we were stuck in between borders, with a prospect of living in no-man's land for a couple of days. At the time I viewed it, our camping spot didn't look so bad. But that didn't account for the fact that the following day was going to get very hot. Very, very hot indeed with little if any shade to provide relief. The first day started out reasonable enough, but as soon as the sun move around from behind a small stand of protective poplars, our campsite was bathed in clear unrelenting sunlight. It got worse too, in that a fierce wind came up that didn't seem to have any refreshing coolness to it. It was a hot-wind and if anything increased the drying effect, so even when sat in the shade it felt as if every bit of moisture was being sucked out of you. A most unpleasant sensation. I'd been 'slack' too in that I'd put my t-shirt on way too late and so had picked up some sun. My stomach was bright red come the afternoon time, but by this time was so uncomfortable in the extreme heat, a touch of sun-burn wasn't high on the personal discomfort list.

Strangely enough our first night there wasn't too bad. The one main reason being, that the guard on the Tajik side was a genuine dyed-in-the-wool nice guy. In realising we were in for a difficult couple of days, came along to ask if we needed anything once we'd pitched tent and started making tea. I laughingly told him that “a bottle of vodka would be good”. But instead of taking it as the joke as it was intended, he said he'd see what he could do. He then went to say that he was a practising Muslim and that he wasn't allowed to drink alcohol, but that he thought it would okay to get some on our behalf. I was amazed at his benevolence. Half an hour later good to his promise he came back with a bag full of tomatoes and some rather cute little cucumbers. He was also clutching what looked like fairly lethal, but happily a proprietary brand of vodka too. Along with some spices and pasta, I was able to rustle up a passable feed with these few items. It was a bit 'tomatoey', as they went into both sauce and salad, but what the hell ... a couple of shots from our bottle of gratis vodka, made it taste like a gourmet meal.

Not much I know, but we liked to call it home ...

There was some light relief that first evening, when I was sat rummaging through the dark recesses of my brain practicing my own unique version of meditational therapy, when a sight pulled me back into some kind alertness. I thought that I was looking at a 60's Mini struggling it's way through the sheep-dip type vehicle-wheel sterilising pit, coming from the Uzbek side. It's low slung frame meant it had to take things slowly, mainly because it was weighed down further by one of those old-style British red phone-boxes. If it had been the end of the 2nd day you could have accused me of going a bit Trop'o' from the heat further cooking my age-addled brain. But this was first evening and had yet to have my brain fried. Nudging Bjorn he too did a double-take and in picking his chin up off the deck asked of me, “Is that a '60's Mini with a red phone-box on the top?”
A Very British Adventure. Participants of the Mongol Rally

It turned out to be a contingent of the Mongolian Rally ... From what I could gather it was a bit of a Gumball styley vehicle-race of sorts, from the UK to Ulan Baatar. These guys had come up with something called 'A Very British Adventure' and through Ben Avery's (get it) website, were angling for funds for their charity. Of course it was also a good chance to compare travel notes, as well as listen to the rather Pythonesque approach of these four likable loonies from Blighty. The two guys had evidently made a pact to wear their DJ's all the way, but the girls were at this stage doing their best to persuade them to put the pledge to one side. It was something to do with the smell apparently ... Englishmen smell? What? Confounded nonsense of course!

It was while we preparing for our 2nd night that we got the call that we could go through. And suddenly instead of settling down for another uncomfortable night in no-man's land, we were scrabbling about in the failing light to get ourselves packed and ready to go on into Tajikistan. It came about after we'd been chatting to some Polish bikers who were on their way through from Uzbekistan. After we'd said our goodbyes to these guys and while they were still being processed on the Tajik side, Bjorn wandered along to both wave them off and ask the border post guards if we could do our paperwork upfront so we could ride straight through first thing in the morning. From that he came sprinting back, to say they were going to let us all through together ... Now! But with the proviso, that if anyone stopped us and asked we should hang back, and let these guys show their papers first. As Polish, most of 'em had passable Russian, and so could blag-it on our behalf.

We were 'in'! And not only that, but we had our own Russian speaking escort. There were three bikes, two of which were ridden by Brothers Macjek and Mateus each of whom had brought their respective girlfriends along with them. Then there was Darek the 'Mr Cool' of their group, on his aging Honda Africa-Twin . Our newly formed gang made their way into this, another new country. It was to become a roller-coaster ride in Tajikistan ... literally!

Uzbekistan Pt 10

A Bully on the border.

The road to the Uzbek'/Tajikistan border saw us making fairly good time I recall. I also remember filling our tanks using up the remaining Uzbek' Cym, so felt pleased at the efficient use of the last of the local currency before leaving the country. There was a nice guy at the small shop that served as both local bar and gas-station who insisted on buying me a beer. He spoke a little French and his mate a few words of English, and therefore became a surreal experience because the usual choice of tongues for this region in which to converse were Tajik, Uzbek or Kyrgyz, with the only unifying language being Russian. But the the border was only minutes away and would likely be hanging about for some time when we got there. So some little time spent there speaking Franglais with these Uzbek's was a bit of a novelty. Besides which, the beer might even help me sleep through some of the expected waiting time at the border.

As predicted we soon come to a barrier and STOP sign that signaled the edge of Uzbekistan. Gathering up our paperwork for both the bikes and ourselves wandered into the border post building to start the exiting process. It was here that I found myself observing some rather disturbing behaviour by one of the guys in charge. He was a stocky sort with thick hairy forearms, and after seeing him order some people to be strip-searched on the flimsiest of excuses, made a note to treat this guy with kid-gloves. Patiently waiting in line with my one single piece of luggage brought in off the bike, was hoping they'd not insist on us carrying my whole 'kit & caboodle' inside to be searched. With it being hot and getting hotter, I sure wasn't about to haul it all in unless specifically asked to do so. The panniers and tank bag were left on the bike. So far as I was concerned it'd be heaps easier if they took a look inside those luggage items in-situ.

Our passports were taken for perusal, then after some debate taken elsewhere to another office. Lord knows why, but whatever came of it I was intent on sitting patiently till they'd finished looking at them, exit stamped our visas, returned our passports and let us go. But before getting that far Bjorn suddenly said to me “What's he doing?” with some annoyance then disappeared outside. Evidently he'd noticed the brutish guy had wandered outside and with curiosity getting the better of him, was seen poking around with the GPS unit on Bjorn's Dakar. In the interests of keeping an eye on the situation (or you could say I was being a nosey bastard!), wandered outside myself, just in time to see Bjorn barge his way in between the bike and the Customs guy. He then removed the GPS unit from it's cradle on the handlebars and put it into the tank-bag he'd brought along as his 'luggage'. Obviously this had the effect of putting the border-official's nose out of joint, as his reaction was to immediately order Bjorn to take all of his luggage into the customs hall to be searched. Outwardly I was calm but inside I winced, as this was the definitely the wrong bloke to upset.

Any chance of getting quick clearance had now gone, so put my backside on the tiled floor of the customs office and squatted with back to the wall, getting as comfy as possible in readiness for a 'long-wait'. During this time, practised my 'calmly bored expression', and did little more than answer a couple of questions over the course of half an hour or more. One question was ... “Australian?” (it's written plainly on the front of the bloody passport, ya Jackass!) to which I gave a 'yes', and the second was “Tajikistan?” and gave the same mono-syllabic reply, while thinking: Now, that's the 2^nd completely inane bloody question you've asked me! As if I'd come all the way to the border of Tajikistan, when I really wanted to go into Turkmenistan or Kazakhstan. This of course is rather long-winded, because the words that actually formed in my brain were ... 'this guy's a real twat!'

In retrospect Bjorn got away lightly, as the disturbing behaviour I mentioned earlier was repeated on some other unsuspecting emigrants. We watched as more people came into the building and stood in line for a few moments. It appeared to be a complete family with grandparents and parents right through to kids and grandkids. There might've been an uncle or aunt or two to swell the numbers as well. In waiting for their turn to be processed the father reached across a short barrier, to get one of the customs forms on the desk where the guard was sat. The guard immediately scolded him for this misdemeanour. I thought at the time that this guards reaction was disproportionately harsh and wondered why he should do this. Maybe he saw these people as coming from the 'wrong side of the track'. But whatever the reason, they appeared to be open for general abuse from this guard. After that short exchange, I thought things would calm down. But no ... after the bollockin', the Father seemed to be trying to explain himself. Which prompted the guard to launch a further tirade. Then 'Bully-boy' came back in and took over! With him facing me I could see he was relishing the fact that he was going to 'take control'. Barking orders at the family, things suddenly erupted into a full scale argument. But it didn't last, because whatever was being said, could see that a couple of female family members were soon pleading. A short while later it became obvious what was happening. They'd been ordered to go into a room to be strip-searched. Now, if you were to have seen these people, they were about as far as you can get from international smugglers as it gets. It seemed pretty clear to me, that it was never expected to find any contraband on any of those people, the strip-search was just being used to demean these individuals, and was a form of punishment. The thought passed through my mind ... what if I get the same treatment? Would I comply? Or would I do my best to ram the rough end of a metaphorical pineapple up this brutes arse! Talking of pineapples and arses ... maybe he was like that prison warder guy in the film The Midnight Express. It was enough to give you the shivers ...

Luckily it never came to this, and a big show of unlimited patience seemed to do the trick. After the men from the unfortunate family came back out buckling up trousers and straightening themselves, they appeared to have retained most of their humour if not dignity. It seemed to have the affect of placating the border officials though. Things started to move for us after that and could get going at last. One small hiccup was that in being told to go, had yet to get given my bike registration document back. So the fake anger tactic was called into play once again, and gambled that my age and nationality would command some respect. Up until that moment I'd been both calm and polite with them, but as soon as this bully tried to be dismissive towards me I 'barked' “Moto Passport!” at him, and looked him square in the eyes. It did the trick and he started made some noises to try and placate me. I stayed rooted to the spot and retained my grim expression until he eventually walked back over to the other office and came back with my paperwork. With passport stamped, rego' document back in my sweaty little hands, that was it. We were off to Tajikistan.

Uzbekistan Pt 9

One of the towers of Bhukara ...

Bjorn acting as entertainment for the locals in one of the villages in Uzbekistan. You'd think he was turning cart-wheels with all the interest being shown, but he was only changing an air-filter!

Back to Samarqand again ...

In gaining the much treasured Chinese visa, there was no need to wait a whole 7 days to pick up my Kyrgyz' visa. And have got to say here, that I really can't be arsed to go into another over-long anecdote about persuading the guys at the Kyrgyzstan embassy to take my passport off of 7-day visa processing pile, and put it on to a smaller pile that's labelled 'same day', just so I could the heck out of there. But I will tell ya this much ... and that is once I finally gained ingress to the Kyrgyz embassy had to do some fast-talking, as the Consul initially told me that 'it can't be done'. But I managed to encourage him otherwise, as it was evidently a lot more work and hassle for him to return my money and passport without visa (my idea was to apply for it in Dushanbe). And so it was, that he finally accepted my nice crisp new $50 dollar note to upgrade the application. Over went the fifty dollar bill and back came nothing! “Come back at 4 O'clock” he told me, so trustingly went along my way intending to be back there on the dot at the prescribed time. It was fairly clear, that the absence of a receipt meant this one was 'off the books'. But hey ... so long as my visa got processed, I didn't care if my fifty bucks was going to stand the embassy crew for their first round of drinks on a Friday night. In walking back out, looked at my watch to see how long I had to wait till the 4 O'clock pick-up time. It was 4 O'clock! Anyway, heading back across towards the small crowd who were waiting in the shadows cast by the trees on the other side of the avenue, and found my new fellow traveller buddies Alvaro & Salva'. These guys had been away from their home country for years, with plans to keep travelling for many more years to come. My Spanish buddies were both overland cyclists and were waiting to pick up their visas too. In touching base with these guys I didn't notice the fearful heat and time passed quickly. Suddenly the call for people to pick up their passports and visas went out.

Having done my 'time' here in Tashkent was getting out of there. It was too bloody expensive for one, and with little or nothing else to encourage me or other tourists to tarry, it was back to Samarqand.

The picture above was taken in Bhukara and is nothing to do with Samarqand, but as it's Uzbekistan decided to put it in an as it's similar architectural style throughout the region ...

I've got little to say about the journey back from Tashkent, except to say it was a mirror image of the ride there. Another dodgy night-ride during the last hour that had me gritting my teeth, but little else to remark upon here apart from that. And the same applies for the one-night stopover back in the Samarqand, and that my mad dash back had drained most of my 'good stuff', leaving me feeling as if I could stay for at least one more night to recover. Once again, my inbuilt warning system failed to send enough feedback, to prompt me to dig my heels in and do just that. Bjorn's urgency it turns out was somewhat misplaced, and was to prove that two more nights chillin' in the cool shade of the guest-house with cold beer, would have been way, way better than what was to come ...

Uzbekistan Pt. 8

We're now going to Tashkent ...

We're done with Samarqand for the time being, so pack up our stuff and head towards Tashkent in the North eastern corner of the country. This was the capital of Uzbekistan, and we needed to try for some more visas.

Visas! I'm frankly getting sick of this, as at times it seems as if the whole point to going travelling is to sit about outside embassies trying to get yet another bleedin' visa, just so we can get into the next country. Sometimes I'd like to get every bloody bureaucrat and politician who's involved with setting visa policy, and if they're not actively doing all they can to make it as cheap and hassle free as they can ever manage, they should be sent to Coventry. But then of course they'd need a visa to get into the UK wouldn't they, which everyone in most of the countries I've visited to date tell me, is nearly impossible to get!

So checking the map we head off Tashkent'wards. And on this ride we get a graphic example of the madness of carving up the ex-soviet countries in this part of the world.

In following the main road a dual-carriageway in mostly good repair, find that we are making good speed. At one point we pass a minor turn-off to the right that has a fair amount of heavy traffic on it. We then enjoyed a few minutes of riding on a near empty road, which gives a lift to the spirits. Good and empty roads are always something to celebrate ... But a Kilometre or two on and I notice that there are rather more weeds growing in spots not normally seen on well used roadways, as if this road is a little used back-water. Suddenly there's a check-point and we're at the Kazakhstan border! What? We don't want to go to Kazakhstan! Something was wrong, we clearly didn't deviate from the main highway and all the clues were there, to show we'd not made any wrong turns. We hadn't ... what had happened is that some faceless and nameless individuals in the not too distant past had simply drawn a line on the map of Central Asia right through the road we were on. So we now needed a visa to go to Kazakhstan, if we want to continue along this road to go to Tashkent. It turns out that the side road with the disproportionately heavy traffic we passed earlier, was the main road that would enable us to continue on to the capital yet keep us in Uzbekistan. A U-turn, with a dog-legged ride along a less than perfect road with heavy traffic. Dare I say it? We're hot and tired, and this piece of mindless map-drawing adds to the frustration. Which ... helps to enhance the heat ... and our tiredness ... I think that's all I've got to say about that ride. Except that we're still smack-bang on the old Silk-Route and didn't pass one single camel-train.

Tashkent diary ... 30/7/08

I feel better, much better ... on the home run to the hotel, bought two beers as combined reward and evening softener, after a bloody hard day. I don't mind the thought of relying on a cold beer for a helping hand back to pull me back from the madness of dealing with consular bureaucracy. I've supped one straight off and feel gently mellow already. If Bjorn comes back soon he can have the other one. Hmmm, then again ... Where's that bottle-opener?

Let me explain ... Another round of embassies, with an attempted 'blag' to try and obtain a Chinese Tourist visa, that see us trying the 'fake airplane ticket and hotel booking ploy' ... A strained start to the day, with Bjorn demonstrating piano chord tension. The previous evening he was very bitchy, trying his best to push responsibility for most of the current day to day difficulties in my direction. His impatience is now becoming an ongoing issue with me. The cracks are beginning to show, and find myself having burgeoning thoughts, that perhaps it'd be better if we go our separate ways as soon as possible.

A visit to the Uzbek' Airlines offices to book a flight to Beijing and back, which is immediately followed by a visit to the Internet cafe to book a weeks accommodation in a hostel in the middle of China's capital. 40 minutes later we walk out with a printed copy of this booking, that clearly shows the 4 Euro deposit as paid. This is done just to make sure we consolidate the lie about flying in and out of China. As far as we are aware a visa is a simple and straightforward piece of paper stuck into a passport, that allows entry into the country by any route and any means. So that's our aim ... To obtain a Chinese visa by any means. We tried 'fair' in Tehran and it failed, so we here in Tashkent now to give the 'foul' means a go, to see if that'll work for us.

Let the embassy dash begin!

A mad taxi-ride to make sure we get to the embassy before the 11.am closing time, but find it's open till 12 anyway. We wait ... then are given the nod to go in. Fill in the forms, hand over the dosh ($100 for a one-dayer). Done! We'll either get it, or not. We're now in the laps of the god's, and the vagaries of the Chinese bureaucracy. After putting in the application, we start the walk back. but then I decide I'd go to the Kyrgyz' embassy, to try and see how far I can get with that visa application ...

¾ of an hour and a couple of changes on the Metro later, a rather confused 'me' gets off at the station closest to where I'm supposed to be going. A 15- minute 'mooch' around, and I find the embassy. Bingo! Except that it doesn't open for an hour and a half at 2.30pm Time to find somewhere to eat, drink and sweat ... Which I do ... profusely. The meal of Pilov's not bad though. For 1900 cym (sic. don't remember the exchange, but it would have only been a US dollar or two), have what I think to be a good feed. Nice pot of çay, send a birthday SMS moby message to my youngest daughter Laura in France, and an hours gone by. Wandering back to embassy in good time, a fair queue has already formed. Not too many in front of me though ... Ava'chat with a guy I reckon to be of Japanese origin, who tells me he's Canadian! Nice bloke, but then he tells me he's a Christian Missionary, which puts my inbuilt anti-preaching early warning alarms onto 'alert' status. No evidence of preaching, nor any hints that I could be 'saved' if I embrace Jesus, comes out of the conversation that I can detect, and we just end up talking about Canada, future winter Olympics and other harmless stuff. So maybe it's just me being a tad paranoid I guess. Then the nice security guard nod's at me from across the road. I'm in ...

After getting the application form and the 'low-down' on the procedure from the sole visa department official, was told I now needed to go to a local bank to pay the money into the embassies account. It's not too long a walk, but takes me back around the small streets, to an underpass across one of the busy main-streets. And as its very hot walk, choose the shady path whenever there is any. Arriving into the appointed office I'm immediately directed to a window to pay in the money. One small hitch though, is that the computers are 'down', with no view when they're gonna be back online in order to complete the transaction. 'You have gotta be kidding me!' Rings around my over-heated and over-stimulated brain. They assure me, there's nothing they can do till the computers are back. 3.55 pm the system's back up, giving me little more than 5 minutes to get back to the Kyrgyz embassy. I run ... in +40⁰C heat. I sweat, but keep going ... check the time. 2 minutes to go. Check the time ... 1 minute to go ... round the corner, see the security guard. He looks at the time, I look at the door ... which is closed. “Closed?” I venture. “Cloosed!” he confirms, and gets a good sound “Bugger it!” in response from me ... then he grins. He's taking the piss, 'cos he knows full well I've pulled out all the stops to get back in time. He's obviously seen this before, and is enjoying himself. He indicates I can go in, and do so with considerable relief. There is sweat dripping from my face and my T-shirt is stuck clammily to my body.

It's cool inside and approaching the little hole that acts as a service-hatch await some attention. There sits the young Krygyz' chap behind the desk, and who I can see is intent on doing something he's already started, which means he ignores me momentarily. I'm not too concerned as this gives me the chance to complete the till then, uncompleted application form. 4.10pm, it's in, he accepts it and in handing in the bank receipt I get another receipt in return, along with some more paperwork to show as ID in case I'm asked for my passport by the Uzbek' authorities. Phew ...

Gotta get back to the Chinese embassy now. Time check. 50 minutes ... “should be enough time” I think. 10 minutes later am back on the Metro, and head back to the station where I had to change lines on the way there. Okay for time so far. I ask for directions. Big mistake ... as this well-meaning man wastes another 5 valuable minutes. He 'rabbits' away about the names and number of stations, but the conversation doesn't seem to be heading towards any conclusion. So it's only after he's confirmed to himself his spoken English 'works' and that he's able to make himself understood by me, I realise in return that he doesn't know what the bloody hell he's talking about. He finally asks another lady, but this adds yet more minutes with little progress. She does however seem pretty confident after looking at my city street map, which shows the Metro stops at street-level. She even goes to the trouble of showing me where to get off, and points with confidence to a station four stops along. Though it doesn't seem quite right to me. And indeed proves to be so ... When I get off and surface back up onto the road first thing was a directional check. Noting the position of the sun and along with confirmation by my trusty compass, make a start at walking. I'm certain I'm going in the right direction even though I don't recognise anything. 10 minutes later the realisation hits me, that I'm bloody miles away. Bugger it! It's now well gone time, but the only chance for arriving before it's too late, is to do something I should've done in the first place. Get a taxi. Another time-check ... 5.10pm. Late, but not so bad. Taxi driver is not too sure, and wanders ... He checks my map ... he deviates, then deviates again, and then finally he asks a policeman. “My Christ”, I think, “They obviously don't do a local version of 'The Knowledge' for Tashkent taxi drivers”. We're close ... Then we're there, arrived ... And it's ... just gone 5.30pm. Dammit! Empty ... devoid of people. Not a good sign. I expected to see Bjorn, but there's absolutely nobody there. Except for one lone security police guard. Who confirms ... “Cloosed. Coome beck tomoorow ... mehbee?”

Concluding this little anecdote, I took a warm and rather long walk back to our nice expensive accommodation. My mind had settled into a neutral sort of a place after the 'good' of getting one application in, and not so good of failing to get back to the Chinese embassy in time. When I arrived back hot and tired, I half expected a tirade from Bjorn about not being at the embassy by our agreed time. But I was initially surprised that he didn't even mention my poor time-keeping, and was happily chatting away to a fellow traveller about something unrelated. He seemed to be well into his first cold beer, and so I guessed the alcohol was mellowing his oft encountered 'edgy' side. I'd already decided to take care of my bodily needs and get myself into a better mind-frame, and so cracked one of my own coldies that I'd bought from a nearby grocers shop. A few sips later and Bjorn let slip the reason for his buoyant mood. He'd evidently managed to pick up both of our passports, and the two of us now had the 'so hard to come by' Chinese visas. After all the hassle we'd had in Tehran, this was a revelation. We'd told a bare-faced lie about flying into China, but we'd complied with their procedure. Which clearly proved that cheating does pay!

Moving on here, would like to say a few words about our accommodation in Tashkent. It seems that the only reason for any visitors to Uzbekistan going to Tashkent and who are not on business, is to obtain visas for onward travel to other countries. So there are not really any 'travelly' places to stay (not that we'd managed to find, at any rate). And now we come to cost ... We did try hard for a discount bearing in mind the spasmodic water supply, but still had to pay $20/night each, though will add this was with breakfast. After all it was a 'Hotel'. For this sum we had A/C, which with heat often reaching oppressive levels, was a good thing. But it was still way over-priced, as the once new and shiny facade of that place had long since gone. This was a tatty 'has-been' of a hotel, that had pretensions of being better than it actually was. After stepping in through the gate, you entered a courtyard that was also the site of the 'swimming pool'. And please do take note of my use of the single ' ' marks, to highlight the fact there was something different about this potential bathing area. The reason for mentioning it, was that initially I didn't realise it was a swimming pool. No, honestly! The milky turquoise blue colour indicated to me, that it was a pool of water with some other as yet unidentified purpose. Apart perhaps from dangling one's feet into that viscous looking coloured liquid, could not imagine anyone wanting to take a dip. It looked to me as if it were a place of incubation for yet to be discovered water-borne diseases and its sole saving grace being, that there weren't any nasty bits of luminous green vegetation or brown sludge floating on the top.

Which is more than be said for our hosts. A very brief bit of goss' that makes reference to a not at all disguised sleight on their possible characters, was that we overheard what sounded very much to my ears like an abusive argument during one of our night's there. It came in the form of several brief and aggressive sounding outbursts, things going flying and the odd scream or two from a woman (though to my unqualified ears didn't detect fear in any of the screams, that might have prompted action on my part). I think I'm fairly safe that the proprietor won't ever get to read this, and from that go on to accuse me of doing horrid things to his standing in the community through defamation. So will tell you here, that there was some evidence that he was a violent drunkard. The main reason for me making mention of it here, is that I'd never met a Violent-Drunk before. I've little doubt there are plenty around, but usually not too many people hold up their hands or wear badges as members of this dubious minority. He wasn't like this all of the time though, as I had a number of fairly coherent conversations with him during the course of my short stay there, that were mostly prompted from the lack of water to our bathroom. When talking with him I did note a rather heavy smell of something volatile on his breath too early in the day, but so long as he didn't do anything to upset me (such as giving me a hard time about parking my bike) wasn't about to make any negative judgements about him. So I didn't really have any personal gripe with this particular hotelier.

However in saying that will admit to one fairly serious failure on my part while staying at this Inn of ill repute, which cost me a whole twenty bucks. And that is when I came to pay my dues when leaving. This failure was for timekeeping, in thinking we'd stayed one night longer than we actually had. So because of that I ended up paying for 4 nights and not just the 3 which was the correct number of nights. On a tight budget, any oversight that cost me $20 was close to stupidity. Handing over my carefully counted out 80 dollars, I kind of begrudged giving over what to me was a large sum and that 'bit' a noticeable hole into my wallet. This money was pocketed just a little too quickly by one of the women there who I took to be 'the wife', with what appeared to be some surprise. That should have rung an alarm bell with me, as I'd guess that normally it would immediately be written down into their ledger as 'paid', seeing as they took such pains to enter all passport details into it on arrival. I really would have believed too, that all money transactions would be recorded that related to peoples coming, and in my case going. In other words, I think they realised there was a mistake and chose not to mention it. Mean Bastards! Or should I say 'Mean Bitch'. Come to think of it, maybe that guy had some cause to get riled if he was getting it 'in the ear' from his Haridan of a wife. Who knows? Maybe she would wait for him to get drunk and then 'press his buttons' knowing what the result was going to be! There are some very odd people about ya know ...