All of my photos from Tibet are up in the gallery. Tajikistan is up there as well and I think they’re pretty interesting—maybe because you don’t see pictures of Tajikistan every day. My only regret is the Alichur gallery. You see, somehow I deleted an entire 512mb memory card full of images. Some of them…
When I travel for long periods of time (I’m almost at five months now), some places and even countries fade from my memory quickly. When I left Bishkek in September, and then again in early October, it was a peaceful place. But today I got an email from Nargiza, the girl who posed as my…
After thirteen hours today spent between a landcruiser, minibus and bus Sui and I made it to Kathmandu. The past seven days have been an amazing set of highs (the temple art and Everest) and lows (everything about our French travelmate and the beggars). We had dinner tonight that was not Chinese food and I…
In Lhasa I’m surrounded by tourists, tour groups, travel agencies and Western restaurants. With so many backpacker amenities I figured it would be a snap to organize an overland trip to the Nepalese border. My first day here I met a Chinese-American woman in my dorm room named Sui who I immediately clicked with. We…
Tibet isn’t the most obvious destination from Central Asia, but it’s where I wanted to go next. Although there is a road from Kashgar through Western Tibet it’s illegal for foreigners to travel and can be quite dangerous. While I was in Central Asia I tossed the idea of hitchhiking on a truck around but…
Backtracking again, I took the fast train (25 hours) from Kashgar to Urumqi and found it just as nice as the first time. Maybe it was because the national holiday just ended, but I have never seen a Chinese train so empty—none of the hard sleeper compartments had more than two people in them. My…
After sitting around in Osh, Daniel (the Australian thrid of Team America—the name they made up for our three-person travel group in Tajikistan), flew into town and in a whirlwind I was on a bus to Kashgar. Because there was an actual bus we were pretty sure that the border was open. We never got…
Today I finally found where to buy fresh bread near my gueshouse in Osh. The directions I was given were classic: Take a right after walking past the garbage cans and mini market. From there look for the Kyrgyzstan Resturaunt on your right. The sign is in Russian. In-between Kyrgyzstan Resturaunt and Kyrgyzstan Cafe there’s…
and China won’t let me in. Tajikistan started and ended on bad notes (waiting for permits in Dushanbe… almost getting into a fight with the militsia in Murgab and projectile vomiting at 3,800 meters), but everything in-between was completely amazing. I flew on a tiny 17-seater plane with no computers on board. We soared through…
There’s a lot of US Aid goods being recycled in Tajikistan. I’m not sure if they were given to Tajikistan or Afghanistan but it’s nice to see my tax dollars at work in this part of the world.
By my estimate it would be four or five days before I got another chance to take a shower. I was waiting in the small Pamiri town of Khorog, Tajikistan, to find a driver to take my friends and I across the Pamir Mountains by way of the Wakhan Corridor bordering Afghanistan. We were sure…
Crossing over from Uzbekistan to Tajikistan was relatively simple—It was one of the least busy borders I’ve ever seen. A German guy named Vincent whom I met at my hotel was heading to Dushanbe as well and decided to tag along with me a day earlier than planned. I was happy to have the company…
There’s a new Uzbek post up about Nukus and Moynaq backdated here. Where, you ask? I guess you’ll just have to read it to find out. Some little part of me really hopes that someone out there reading this is learning a little about geography. Did someone say souvenirs? here you go, Korea, Mongolia, China…
After a day of driving through the mountains I’ve made it to Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan. I haven’t had time to look around yet and today will be spent searching out a Kyrgyz visa (so I can get back to China), possibly registering with my embassy for my mom’s sake and picking up my…
Getting to Bukhara was more straight forward than my trip to Khiva. The son of my hotel’s owner drew me a map to the bus station and I walked out of the city walls into the new city. Unfortunately, the bus wasn’t leaving for a few more hours so I decided to spend a few…
Could it be? There’s new maps up! Okay, the Mongolian flag sucks and there’s no data for NW China or Kyrgyz but it’s something. If it makes you feel any better, I took a ton of souvenir and sketchbook photos for the relevent sections but haven’t gotten around to writing the code and resizing the…
I really have to remember in the future not to tell hotel owners I’m a graphic designer. Sometimes they actually know what it means and then they always ask to make then a logo/brochure/web page. Today when I got back from drawing at the mosque the owner of my hotel asked to see the drawing.…
I know this is going to shock you all… but there’s new photos up! I finally found a good internet connection in Bukhara and just spent three hours working on the site for you guys instead of siteseeing. I’ve gone on to post about Uzbekistan but am working on some stories about Kyrgyzstan for you…
Getting to Khiva should have been relatively straight forward—a bus to Urgench and then a 45 minute taxi ride to Khiva. I bought a seat on the local bus to Urgench in Nukus, knowing it might take a little more time than a taxi, but with more space. I was almost an hour early and…
Karplakastan is a region in Northwest Uzbekistan which has had a really bad century. The entire region’s climate and economy has been greatly affected by The USSR’s draining of the Aral Sea in the 1960’s. What was once the world’s fourth largest lake has been drained to irrigate the cotton fields throughout Central Asia. Moynaq,…