Caspian Crossing

It's below zero outside and blowing a gale. My tent's getting whipped around in all directions like a whacked cricket ball on the end of Glen Maxwell's interminably swinging bat.

I'm near Lake Karakul, in the Pamir region of northeastern Tajikistan, very close to both the Chinese and the Kyrgyz borders.

Early morning. It's stunning.

It's an incredibly beautiful and wildly raw place. There's not a tree in sight. The lake in the distance is huge and the views vast.

My tent is sitting on pebbly sand and was really tough to pitch in the unceasingly strong gusty wind.

Beni Lisa and I are here at an altitude of 4100m. The air's thin, but we're pretty used to it now. We've been at heights of over 3000m for about a week now.

But it's getting colder day by day, and that wind's getting harsher.

Last night Beni came down sick as well. Poor guy. So both Beni and Lisa are really out of it now. They slept for most of the day today, at our exposed lakeside campsite, and we didn't really get moving till late afternoon.

I wrote, read, meditated, slept, strolled around, and ate.

My breakfast consisted of crushed biscuits and flavoured yoghurt. So exotic.

The campsite was super beautiful.

And one of the most beautiful things about it was the silence, especially when the wind occasionally died down. It's precious. Just the sound of the stream running, occasional birds chirping, and nothing.

Silence is incredibly loud sometimes.

It's been a complete gift to be sleeping in a tent out here for over two weeks in a row, except for that one night in a guesthouse in Ishkashim. Despite the bitter cold, I'm pretty warm when I'm rugged up in all my blankets. And I've have had so much time to just rest and enjoy this place.

I strolled up to the "highway" for awhile, sat down, and played chicken. But no one played with me.

Eventually we got moving this afternoon, and drove towards the magnificent Lake Karakul, and the township by the same name.

A huge, beautiful lake. And the town was so interesting too.

People who live here need to be tough. The weather's hostile. You can't grow anything much. The winters are long and bitterly cold, and access roads are often blocked by snow.

There's little in the way of economic activity, except in the summer, when foreign tourists cross the border from Kyrgyzstan, or travel the Pamir Highway all the way from Khorug or Dushanbe, and stay in the little homestays, or buy a few things in the tiny shops that have hardly anything to sell.

But summer's basically over now, and there's only a few tourists now.

These boys helped us fill up our water

We walked around the lake for a bit. It was pure unadulterated magnificence.

Then we wandered around town for a bit.

We eventually headed further up the road, to this wild open spot, on another part of the vast, untouched lake.

Tear-inducing beauty.

I sat for a long time, within this freezing masterpiece of nature's creation, watching the light and the colours change and slowly fade to black.

It's impossible to describe the profound meaning of such moments.

They're pretty much my raison d'être.

Later, Beni and Lisa rested while I cooked dinner.

And now it's 9pm, and my tent's wildly blowing around.

With me in it.

Another Day, Another Border

More solefood. The moon was getting ready to set as I woke this morning.

Beni woke feeling a little better, Lisa felt worse. Now she's short of breath, has a terrible cough, and is feeling dizzy.

We need to get down to lower altitudes.

We drove down to Karakul Lake, and Beni and I had a stroll while Lisa rested. It was magnificent.

It's hard to describe the vastness of the place, the sense of space, the colours, the remoteness, the silence. It truly is mindblowing.

Once we headed off in the van we had to climb a few hundred metres up to yet another pass before we could descend into Kyrgyzstan.

Border security, a little way from the actual Chinese border.

For what it's worth, today I crossed my 20th international border on this trip. I just counted them in my head as we drove up to yet another one. I mean, I haven't been to 20 different countries this time, 13 in fact, and so the border crossing thing is a little, you know, meh, by now.

I mean, it's interesting, but there's no stress involved. As long as you do your homework and know what you need, it's pretty straightforward.

Because Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan aren't on good terms, and because only foreigners can cross the border, there's a few formalities you need to sort out before you get to the border.

On the Tajik side, you need a GBAO permit, to allow you to travel through the Gorno-Badakshan Autonomous Oblast. And you need lots of photocopies of your passport and the GBAO permit. As we passed through the Pamir region we handed out at least 10 copies of each to the military.

Then, from the Kyrgyz side, you need to go through a government-approved agency to get approval to enter the country at the Kyzyl-Art border crossing. They put your name on a list, and if it's not there, well then sorry, but you can't come in.

We heard of a whole group of travellers who got stuck there because they didn't even know they needed this. They needed to go back and contact certain online agencies, and it took a few days for their approvals to come through.

But anyway we had everything we needed.

As usual no pics at the border crossings. Militaries don't like cameras.

And then finally we could descend, to get some real oxygen back into Lisa's lungs.

There's a huge area of no-person's land between the two borders. On the road it stretches for about 30km. The road through it is one of the worst we've seen in the Pamirs - basically a goat track the whole way, and sometimes very steep and muddy, with super gnarly crossings. Very very dodgy.

I sort of get it though.

Who's gonna maintain the section of road in no-one's land, especially when cooperation between the two countries is basically non-existent?

The landscapes changed drastically during the crossing. Grey snow capped mountains suddenly became towering red  hills, and as we slowly descended, the views of the mountains surrounding us in all directions were magnificent.

Some of the peaks in the distance are over 7,000m high. Like Peak Lenin, for example, at 7134m.

We descended over 1200m, and finally got to the small town of Sary-Tash.

The smell of burning coal was everywhere.

The only ATM in town wasn't working. We were all totally out of cash.

We needed to drive another 35 kms to Sary-Moghul, which is named, I guess, after the famous Moghuls, the dudes who conquered India (and this place), and who were the direct descendents of the Mongols.

Finally we got cash, it was a real relief, and we decided to stay in a guesthouse so we could properly shower etc.

There was a café attached, and guess who strolled in as we were sitting there? Tanja and Philip, the sweet Austrians I'd met in Dushanbe! It was so awesome to hang out with them for the night, as we'd had some great times a few weeks back, before we independently left for the Pamirs.

A whole group of us spent the night eating, chatting, and drinking beer, although not a lot of beer, I haven't really felt like it too much.

I'm not a huge beer drinker at all, to be honest, one or two does it for me.

Yeah, today was another day to say goodbye to a country. It was my last day in Tajikistan. It's an amazing country, full of contrast, especially when it comes to the difference between the haves, and the have-nots-but-need-to-shutup-about-it-because-you-might-get-arrested-and-imprisoned-and-tortured-if-you-say-anything.

Or worse.

This has been my route through the magnificent country, 94% of which is mountainous. I travelled from west to east, entering the country from Uzbekistan, heading to the beautiful Iskanderkul Lake, then south to the capital Dushanbe, and then east to the Afghan border with Beni and Lisa.

We followed that border along pretty much the whole of southeastern Tajikistan,  and then headed north through the incredibly high mountain passes to the Kyzyl-Art border crossing into Kyrgyzstan.

Tajikistan is one helluv an amazing country, one of the most rugged and remote I've been to.

Outside the capital it's poor, traditional, rugged and remote.

And our Pamir crossing is one of those experiences I'll never forget.

Sad Goodbyes

The next morning was goodbye time, as usual.

The view from my bedroom.

Lisa and Beni slept in the van, as they only had dorm rooms in the guesthouse.

The hills outside the guesthouse.

I felt so sad to say goodbye to Lisa and Beni. We all felt amazing travelling together, we had some incredible moments, despite Lisa's sickness for much of the time.

She felt so much better at the lower altitude btw, I think she's getting over the crazy illness that's thwarted her for two whole weeks, with only a couple of days reprieve in between.

And so that was that.

Before I knew it I was in a share taxi heading down the mountains back to Osh.

I had the front passenger seat.

Which was lucky (more comfy).

Which was unlucky (can clearly see the death-defying driving manoeuvres and cliff edges).

The views were stunning, as usual.

The going was pretty slow a lot of the time, because the shepherds, cowherds, goatees and horse whisperers were moving their stock down the mountains.

It's that time of the year.

More mountains than you can poke a sheepstick at

It took us at least five minutes to get through this lot. It was really baaaaaaad.

And then eventually we made it to Osh. The traffic coming in was heavy, just like when we rode in last time.

This woman was going around cleansing vehicles with smoke from burning sage.

I walked to my guesthouse from the shared taxi parking lot. I know my way around this town, I've been here a few times now.

Fresh produce!

Teens at another boxing machine.

The local

It was great to have my own room and get back online.

Well, it was and it wasn't.

There's also nothing like sleeping in your tent in an incredible place and being totally out of range for awhile.

I also did something for the first time on this whole trip.

I went to a barber and had a haircut!

Now that I'm back in civilisation I felt like looking a little more civilised.

Then I went and got delicious veg food from Navat again.

Back To Black (Bewdy)

I rose early and took a Yandex to the border. Yandex is the Uzbek Uber. It was super cheap, about USD1.50. The border's pretty close.

The border crossing itself was a breeze - I was in and out of both sides within 10 minutes. Unheard of, but it was early on a Sunday morning, which was a good thing as it wasn't very busy.

I immediately got hustled into getting a shared taxi to Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, but I bargained a pretty good price.

My two companions in the back were an older Uzbek couple, on their way to visit their son and family in South Korea. They were wide chunky people, and I was squashed right up against the door.

I felt like a stick insect sharing a tightly packed wooden box with two watermelons.

They were the most lovely of couples. Well, the man was at least. The woman didn't say boo, but she did smile at me once.

Not long out of the border area we stopped, and the man bought us all breakfast - round bready pastry hoops, but the bread was stuffed with meat.

Of course.

So generous!

And of course I had to eat it, to be polite.

A couple of squishy hours up the road and the taxi driver veered north, and eventually we arrived at watermelon man's brother's house, where I was invited for lunch.

So sweet!

It was a veritable feast, and it was veritably meaty - meaty vegetable potato soup, sweet and savoury breads, meat-stuffed pastries, sweet corn, and fresh ripe pears from the garden.

Plus all the other snacks that I didn't get to because we were in a bit of a hurry.

Part of our feast.

We constantly stopped for food. I didn't realise watermelons ate so much.

We stopped at a fish farm, where they make fish somsa. This is the tank where they farm the fish.

The tandoor's heating up. That thing on the grill is a split fish.

More bread

The man bought little things for his grandkids too. He has fourteen of them (so far), and he's only 2 years older than me.

Watermelon man buying more breads. He's the guy with the white hat, the taqiyah. He's  done the Hajj, meaning he's been to Mecca, which all Muslims should to do once in their lives, if they're able. It's one of the five pillars of Islam.

Whether they make it back or not from the Hajj is another thing. 1300 people died there this year, due to extreme temperatures. And that was only within 3 days in June. Many Muslims have told me that the Saudis really have no regard for Muslim believers who lie outside their strict Wahhabi brand of Islam.

Fresh and delicious

Gas station. We had to move away from the vehicles while they were being refuelled. Doesn't instil a lot of confidence, does it.

This is the tunnel that I rode over the top of when I cycled to Tashkent about a month ago or so. It would've actually been fine to cycle in, because 1. it's ventilated 2. it's well lit, and 3. it's not very long. There was a longer one further up, but it also would've been fine, unlike the Tajik and Kyrgyz death trap tunnels.

The taxi driver dropped me somewhere or other in Tashkent, and I strolled about 4 or 5 clicks to my hostel.

It was nice strolling through the burbs. The weather is considerably less extreme than when I was last here - still warm, but not sweltering.

Parked with military precision

A park up the road from my place

I wish I wasn't vegetarian, I'd eat heaps of xot dogs.

More jiza-ing

So I eventually got to the hostel, and there was sad and dusty Bewdy, still patiently waiting in the stairwell.

Someone must've accidentally bashed into her though, as the rear view mirror was totally snapped off, unfortunately.

Maybe I should get one of those that attach to your helmet. Not sure yet.

But otherwise she was still there, no one had stolen her, even though she was in an open stairwell for a few weeks, with easy access to outside.

Theft is pretty much nonexistent around here.

It was nice to go Chinese and get some great veg food, and jam in the hostel in the eve. It's actually nice to be in a city again.

A Caspian Crossing

Well, there's been a little bit of a blockage in my long and convoluted northwestward journey from Australia.

All land and sea borders into Azerbaijan are closed. The government shut the borders when Covid hit, and has never reopened them. One theory for why they've remained closed is to stop Russian men who want to avoid military conscription from entering the country. Maybe the Azerbaijani government did a deal with Putin.

So the only way to get in to the country is to fly.

I've booked myself a ticket on Azerbaijan Airlines from Tashkent to Baku. That's why I rushed back here after the Pamir journey, so I could get myself and my stuff organised in time.

I've gotta say that I really hate flying with my bike and all my stuff. Without boring you with too many details, I basically spent the whole of today sorting and packing all my stuff.

It was so complicated getting the bike packed to go. I rode halfway across the city on my bike and left it with a bike guy to pack, but when I went to pick it up a few hours later he hadn't even started it, despite committing to a pickup time. Great.

So I did it with him in a complete rush. He didn't even want to put padding inside the bike box - I put a stop to that nonsense. Bike bits can be easily damaged when transported, and the bike can be unrideable at the other end if it's not protected properly.

Anyway, it's all done now and I'm waiting in the airport terminal, wondering how much extra they're gonna slug me for my huge amount of luggage when I check in in a few minutes. They make a lot of cash that way - some airlines don't give you the option to purchase oversized luggage online beforehand, or don't have a sporting equipment allowance, and unfortunately Azerbaijan Airlines is one of those.

I rode through a beautiful park with a lake on the way to find a bike box.

Retro apartment buildings

And their unretro cousins

I snuck a pic inside a retro metro station

In Baku

Well well well.

It's really not at all what I expected.

Baku, the capital of the country of Azerbaijan, is much wealthier than I'd expected.

Well, I didn't really know exactly what to expect, and the country does have a reputation for having a chunk of oil money floating around. And for having some pretty nasty politics.

But I hadn't expected that the wealth would be so widespread here in the city. There's hundreds of restaurants and cafes, thousands of shops, many of them upmarket, and they're all full of shoppers and diners, everyone sparklingly well-dressed and spending money.

Well, not everyone, of course. But many.

Many of buildings are ostentatious, sparkling and new, but the old ones are also grand and beautifully maintained, and would look totally in place in Europe. It actually feels quite like Europe here. Albeit a Europe full of Azerbaijanis.

And here in the old city there's an extensive network of very old homes, palaces, medieval baths and beautiful city walls, many of which have been painstakingly restored to their original condition.

I'm staying in the old city, in an impossible-to-find and a-little-dingy guesthouse, which seems to have followed the Central Asian model I've encountered many times already - ie. there's absolutely no indication it's a guesthouse, no signs, no street numbers, nothing. Ours not to reason why.

There's just a closed nondescript old door and a long staircase up to another closed wooden door. I'm glad I had the phone number - it's the only way the taxi driver would've found it, as not even the guesthouse neighbours had any idea it existed.

But it's cheap, is in a fabulous location, and has allowed me to "splurge" (in an Asian-prices sense anyway) on having my own room for a couple of days, so I can really rest and do my own thing while I re-energise after a few long consecutive days of travel.

Yeah, it's time to recalibrate, and prepare myself for the next leg of my journey.

Put yer helmet on, cos it's time to explore the Caucasus❤️

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