Khiva to Bukhara. The government pay you? Otkuda, otkuda?!!
I left the hostel in Khiva at around 09:30 and no sooner had I left the inner city than the road once again tuned to absolute shit. It’s quite unbelievable how bad it was at times. Luckily I was taking a quieter route back to the highway which meant fewer cars which in turn meant […]
Khiva – Marvellous, majestic and magical
Silk Road cities in Central Asia Khiva is a super small town and so it didn’t take me long at all to find the old historic part of the city. I negotiated my through the mad traffic and the completely dilapidated roads to find myself surrounded by a sea of madrassas, minarets and sun baked […]
Nurkus to Khiva. Hmm, I guess he’s sleeping here with me then leaving his wife inside…
It would have been nice to cycle together with the three guys I had met but alas we all had different plans. Jess and Tim wanted to make it to Dushanbe, 1000 km’s away, before the 20th October when the climate in the mountains would be more favourable whereas both Dave and I wanted to […]
Through Uzbekistan to Nurkus. Mr policeman: Difficult in England to find woman?
No sooner had I stepped out the other side of the border than a horde of black market money changers raced over to me. Their eye’s must have lit up at the sight of a western tourist. “Money, money. You want exchange?” Everyone was thrusting mobile phones into my face with various numbers on them. […]
Beyneu to Uzbekistan and the road of death!
After having stayed in the lovely cosmopolitan city that is Beyneu for two nights and getting, quite literally, eaten alive by the friendly resident mosquitoes, I decided it was time to tackle part two of my desert challenge. Having stocked up on enough water to drown a small kitten and enough food to see me […]
Aktau to Beyneu. Starry eyed nights in the steppe
Okay, just one more day I said to myself. Holed up in my cosy hotel room and knowing precisely what lay ahead of me filled me with just a hint of trepidation and fear. 500 difficult, barren and dusty km’s lay before me and that was only to the Uzbek border. It would be another […]
A town called Aktau – not the kind of place to vacation
Wednesday 1st September I made it to Kazakhstan. That’s something I was never quite sure I’d hear myself saying. What an awesome feeling. I can now finally say I have arrived in Asia proper and under my own steam – somewhat. Arriving in Kazakhstan after crossing the Caspian Sea My first morning in the country, […]
Across the Caspian Sea. Give me my Uzbek visa!
Well I finally find myself aboard my rusting cargo ship crossing the Caspian Sea, and to be perfectly honest, it’s all gone worryingly smoothly – in context that is. I mean it certainly isn’t like crossing the channel on a Stena line ferry. I had heard many horror stories with regards to this journey which […]
Cycle touring through Azerbaijan
The border was fairly straight forward. It was pretty empty to be honest with only soldiers walking around with, well not much else to do. We had to wait for half an hour at the Azeri side for some reason where the soldiers were asking all sorts of questions. Luckily for me, Furkan can understand […]
Tbilisi to Azerbaijan. The land of the Lada
I received my visa! I crossed the border! I arrived in bloody Baku and the end of my journey across land! As you can imagine – I’m a happy fish. It’s been quite a long journey up until this point and there were times in the past couple of weeks when I never thought I’d […]