Hotel Shymkent

On the road again<br><br>Tuesday October 20, 2009<br><br> We're up early. The Brits leave today so we have to drive from Samarkand back to Tashkent and they go directly to the airport. I&#8217;ll spend one night, sort of, in the hotel and leave it at the ridiculous hour of 3 a.m. to go to the airport for my flight to Istanbul.<br><br> Not much to tell ...

Airport Woes 10/9 to 10/10/09<br><br> My flight east went from Bucharest, Romania to Istanbul, Turkey and finally to Tashkent, Uzbekistan for this change of countries. I had a very long layover in Istanbul, 9 hours. My husband had suggested I get a day room at the hotel there. Sounds good to me. However, I didn't really trust Turkish Airlines to keep track of my suitcase and send it one to Uzbekistan ...

<br> When I say the night I mean that I put my head on the pillow and moments later Ziyodullo is banging on the door. <br> "Come, we must go to Tashkent."<br> It is 6a.m. I stagger into my clothes and we leave the hotel, what a waste of money, and go to the lockup and the bike. It dawns on me that Rustam is going to ride it to Tashkent. We have a very brief discussion and he gets the message that this is not going to happen. Back into the car to scour an ...

Summary:<br><br>By now 2 weeks in Uzbekistan&#8230;what a great country, offering the old Silk Road cities with their madrassas and other beautiful building and village life with street sellers, donkey and cart drivers and lots of people working the cotton fields as it is harvesting time! They love meat here, as it seems to be in every dish and the Lepyoshka (Uzbec bread) is sold on every street corner! The bread is made in special clay ovens, where they stick to the ceiling! It ...

... helemaal spannend&#8230;<br><br>Ik voel me helemaal thuis in Oezbekistan. We kennen de weg, we kennen mensen, zijn kind aan huis bij Dedeman, ik doe mn boodschapjes om de hoek en op de markt, het enige wat anders is dan thuis is de taal.. Mn Russisch is nog niet zo vloeiend ;-)<br><br>Bijna jammer dat we morgen weer vertrekken, hoewel ik ook uitkijk naar de natuur en de bergen van Kirgizie. De auto krijgt nu een algehele check, ik duik zo de sauna in en dan zijn we klaar voor de komende kilometers!

Back in Tashkent to find some actual information. Chris is in a bad state, bowels wise, so Damo and I went to find an internet cafe to suss out the story. Naturally, maps aren't allowed on Uzbek internet, but we managed to find out that Yallama is next to Chinoz, which is on the lonely planet map. Its 2 hours south of Tashkent and today is the last day on our Uzbek visa so we get ...

So, after thinking paperwork would keep me from going, I GOT TO GO TO SHYMKENT FOR NAURYZ! Oh, talk about a much needed break...it's probably one of the best vacations that I've ever had. I left my snowy wonderland and headed for the southern desert where I got to wear T-SHIRTS and got a SUNBURN! The weather was perfect, I claimed a bed in an apartment with running hot water and it was just wonderful. I can't gush enough about it. I had almost reached a breaking ...

up for more manty in the morning. then into town for registration at the police station, an obligatory exercise for tourists in kazakhstan who are staying in a place for more than 72 hours. yernar knows some fellow in the cop shop, who eases the beurocratic endeavour. then off to an internet cafe for emailing David on the couchsurfing website, who hopefully can sort me out a place to crash for a few days. then an evening on the turps with yernar. late the ...

the following morning i woke feeling fresh, in a manky kind of dehydrated way to find that somebody had keenly polished off what was left of my water. the uzbekis no doubt. i waited for somebody to wander thru selling water. somebody didn't come. i cosidered both the beer and wait, and the smoke and wait games, but due to the previous evening's fervour, i felt up to neither of those. besides, i had no beer. i waited. i wandered. i passed ...

Here are some photos of our trip south to Shymkent. Thanks to Ivy for taking them. More to follow. LUVAROUNDTHEWORLD Shymkent is the third largest city in Kazakhstan, busy with many people, life, cars, shops and a bonus - a variety of food, races, and you name it. I was there for one of Kazakhstan´s largest holidays Naurez. It is the Kazakh New Year and it is on March 22nd. About 46 volunteers met in Shymkent for a week of activities and warm weather since Shymkent is located in the South ...