The Golden Road

So I safely arrived in Tashkent Tuesday morning and jumped straight into a shared taxi (4 people and driver) to Samarkand 3.5 hours away. Perhaps not quite so Romantic as poetry would have us believe, but many things along the way reminded me I was in Uzbekistan, including:

- Its 40 degrees Celsius outside
- I paid about 5 times the going rate for my ticket
- We had to stop at police checkpoints every 30 minutes
- Loud, turkish pop music the entire way
- Cows being grazed on the median of a 3 lane motorway
- When the woman next to me smiles, I see she that all her front teeth are gold.

Things that are different from before include the fact that everybody has a mobile phone. When the driver couldn't understand where I wanted to go, he called his english-speaking sister in Tashkent who spoke to me then looked up directions on the internet for her brother. Brilliant.

Driving in, Samarkand reminded me a lot of Rome or bits of Istanbul, with ancient monuments springing improbably and at unexpected moments out of an otherwise thoroughly modern city. You turn your head and all of a sudden, there is a towering blue dome or brink minaret behind roads and cars and shops.

I managed to get one of the best rooms in Samarkand. It is in a little family-run B&B in the old town. The courtyard is full of flowers and fruit trees and my room has a private balcony that looks over the Gur-i-Amir Mousoleum where Tamerlane is buried.

Tamerlane. who claimed to be the grandson of Geghis Khan is the founder of the Timurid dynasty and had his capital at Shakhrisabz just south of Samarkand. He and his descendants are responsible for most of the momuments in Samarkand. The big ones are the Registan (a sqaure
made by three large medrassahs) and the Bibi Khanum Mosque (built by Tamerlane's wife Bibi Khanum). These are impressive, but more by virtue of being absolutely huge then because of any elegant architecture or intricate tile work like you see in Iran. I went round visiting them all again today and its interesting to see how they have changed over the last 6 years. A lot of reconstruction has been done. In some cases this is good (more information, more areas open) but some sites now have a somewhat disney-ish feel to them caused by the overuse of gold leaf and brand new brickwork.

This afternoon I went to see a carpet factory where they are using only natural dyes (from walnuts, madder, pomegrates etc) and silk. The owner, Abdullah, showed me around and it was clear he took a huge amount of pride in the good working conditions there. All the employes work 8 hours a day, 5 days a week and get a month paid holiday a year. All are over 18 and have finished high school. It seemed like he was constantly trying to make improvements to the factory, his philosophy being that the happiness of his workers can be seen in the quality of the carpets (which are stunning). Abdullah has training as a doctor, speaks 7 languages and spends 3 months a year volunteering as a medic in Afghanistan. It was great to meet someone who clearly gets so much joy from making his world a better place.

Tomorrow morning I am leaving for Tajikistan and 3 days trekking in the Fann mountains. I had the greatest good luck to go to the same agency at the same time as two french people who wanted to to exactly the same thing. This way we are combining forces to make it less expensive (though it is still pretty pricey). The French seem very keen and super fit, so I hope I will be able to keep up with them. We are planning on arriving in Dushanbe on the 30th, so will post again after then.

The Perils and Pitfalls of Utilizing the Local Knowledge Resource Base

It can often seem like a great idea to ask directions from locals. They do live here after all, so presumably know much more than you do, and are usually really keen to help out a bewildered traveller. But keep in mind that people can often be more eager than able to help, and combined with severe translation difficulties, the advice can sometimes be worse than useless.


As case in point I present: The Cautionary Tale of Fran's Latvian Bus Journey


- Step one was boarding the number 22 bus in downtown Riga to return to hotel.

- Worried that I would not be able to spot my stop in the rather faceless suburb and thinking it would be a relatively simple request, I ask the conductor to point out my stop.

- Great confusion and the combined English skills of four seperate passengers results in the information that I am going in the wrong direction.

- I know that this is not true.

- Am advised to get out immediately and cross the street to get the bus going in the opposite direction.

- As I can tell from my map that my stop is approaching, I thank my (wrong) advisors and prepare to descend.

- Immediate change in consensus on bus and am now advised to wait.

- I gesture frantically at them that I know that actually this is my stop. But I am unconcinving, having tacitly acknowledged by asking directions that I know nothing.

- Try again to descend at the next stop and walk back, but well-meaning passengers urge me to stay. To leave now, against their advice feels like it might discharging yourself from hospital AMA, it would be to disrecpect their weighty authority as locals.

- 3 stops later, after consulting my map, there is agreement that I have missed my stop.

- General merriment ensues at the expense of the lost tourist.

- I am now advised to wait on the bus until it finishes its route and comes back again in the opposite direction. This involves 10 more minutes on the bus, 10 minutes waiting at the terminus, and having to buy another ticket (!)

- The conductor kindly pats my arm and assures me she will tell me when to get off.

- Now realizing that she is pretty old and apprently a little bit batty, I place no faith in this.

- Spotting my stop 10 minutes later, I manage to slip unobserved from the bus while my 'helper' is deep in conversation with a passenger.

So, in conclusion, a good map and a modicum of common sense can sometimes be more valuable than local advice. Lesson well learnt.

Have now made it to Uzbekistan - more on that to follow.

SURPRISE! Fran's in Latvia!

I bet that many of you were expecting my post today to be the first from 'on the ground' in Central Asia. Sadly, until last night I was expecting the same thing - but, defying all expectations I am writing today from Latvia. SURPRISE!

Owing to an unfortunate misreading of my (highly ambiguous) Air Baltic itinerary, it turns out that what I had thought was a 1 hour layover in Riga, is in fact a 25 hour layover. Ooops. I rushed off my half-hour late plane from Gatwick, rushed through passport control, grabbed my bag off the conveyor belt and ran upstairs to check in, convinced I would miss my flight, only to be told by rather bemused staff that the flight wasn't till tomorrow.

At this point it was 10:30pm in Riga, I had nowhere to stay and no idea where the airport was in relation to the rest of the city. Fortunately the lady at information booked me into a hotel and helped me get a taxi. So, apart from a substantial amount of dollars doing a magic vanishing act in the process of conversion to Latvian currency, and the rather austere, faceless ex-Soviet hotel I stayed in, everything worked out ok.

I took the bus in this morning to Old-Town Riga, where I am writing this. Now off to explore for a few hours before catching my 11pm flight (fingers crossed...) to Tashkent.

Wait, Where is That?

Since a frequent reaction to a description of my summer travel plans is an assertion that those countries are made up, I thought I would provide a map of the trip. As you can see Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan are real countries that I intend to travel through.

The next stage of the conversation is usually a blank stare followed by the question 'Why?' In addition to the obvious ('Why Not?'), I provide a list of anticipated highlights below:

- Silk road city of Samarkand
- Lakes and steep peaks in the Fann Mountains
- Flying through the western Pamirs to Khorog
- Ruined forts, buddhist stupas and Zoroastrian fire temples in the Wakhan Valley
- Shepherd camps in the high pastures near Murghab
- The Pamir Highway (the only road) through the Pamirs
- Tien Shan mountains in Kyrgyzstan

Future posts will reveal the fate of these well-laid plans in the face of the gritty realities of Central Asia, so stay tuned for more...

The Hunt for the Central Asian Visa

Central Asian visas are elusive beings that must be pursued with patience, skill, and grim determinaton. Their natural habitat is a thicket of dense paperwork (typed, in triplicate) and it is rare that they will emerge to take residence in the lonely pages of your passport. For those looking to undertake the quest, I offer the following experience, valid for American passport holders applying to DC embassies as of spring 2008.

Uzbekistan
- No letter of invitation needed (apparently a new development)
- Application forms need to be typed
- The form has a space for 'inviting organization address and telephone number' but my experience was that was nobody checked with the organization I entered there (so you don't need visa support if travelling independently)
- Impossible to get tourist visas for longer than 30 days. I got a double entry visa valid for longer, but with a total 30 day stay and apparently even that was bending the rules.
- 10 working days, $131

Kyrgyzstan
- No LOI needed for 30 day tourist visa that can be (relatively) easily extended in country for another 30 days
- 10 working days, $80 or double for 3 working days

Tajikistan
- No LOI, but they do ask for a cover letter from a travel agency. I explained I was travelling independently and typed up a letter with a proposed itinerary which worked fine.
- Impossible to get tourist visas for longer than 30 days
- They need a photocopy of the picture page in the passport, not mentioned on the website.
- 4 working days, $80
- Can issue GBAO permits for the Pamirs for an additional $50

All of this is much easier than when I went through the same process 6 years ago, when I needed guides, detailed itineraries or confirmation of hotel bookings for most countries. Below are some links that might be useful for anyone planning a trip.

General Info:
http://www.traveltajikistan.com/
http://www.pamirs.org/ Fantastic photo tours and details of the Pamirs
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/forum.jspa?forumID=13 LP Thorn Tree Central Asia Forum - lots of useful advice from people on the ground

Tour Operators:
http://www.hamsafartravel.com/ Hamsafar Travel has replaced Great Game Travel in Tajikistan
http://www.stantours.com/ Professional, timely visa support with no obligation to purchase tours