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Astana

Posted by Mark Sullivan on May 23, 2023

Posted in: Asia, Kazakhstan. Leave a Comment

On a sleek pedestrian bridge over the Ishim River

Jim models an old Kazakh warrior helmet

At some point our cameras have started doing crazy things, like making images pop out of their surroundings like this. Cool!

Our last stop in Central Asia is Astana, the shiny newish capital of Kazakhstan. If you had trouble coming up with the name of the Kazakh capital, you’d be in good company. To begin with, the capital was moved here from Almaty in 1997. And to make things worse, Astana holds the Guinness Book world record as the capital city with the most name changes in modern times. The town was founded in 1830 as Akmola, and has since been renamed Akmolinsk, Tselinograd, Astana, Nur-Sultan, and then back to Astana.

Astana sits in the vast wide open flat steppes of northern Kazakhstan, so utterly unlike the mountain setting of Almaty. This part of the country is more linked with Russia than the rugged mountains of the south. After independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, the Kazakh parliament soon planned to move the capital here, no doubt in part to stem any breakaway notions on the part of the large Russian population. Since independence, the percentage of ethnic Kazakhs here jumped from just 17% to over 80% as the city grew dramatically. With 1.3 million people, Astana is now second in size only to Almaty.

We decided to fly way up to Astana just to see the spectacle of it all. Fueled by big ambitions and oil money, this planned city features gleaming architecture, grand vistas, lush parks, and elaborate public art. The skyline is dotted with cranes in every direction, raising countless new luxury apartment blocks. It’s fun to see a place with so much growth, ambition, and energy — even if Astana lacked the culinary charms and inherent culture of a more mature metropolis like Almaty. After a couple days here, we were sufficiently wowed yet ready to move on.

That means making one more stop on the way home – Istanbul for a few days to celebrate my very own birthday.

The Baiterek monument sits at the center of the monumental core of the city

The Khan Shatyry entertainment complex occupies a huge tent-like structure by British star architect Sir Norman Foster

Inside Norman Foster’s entertainment complex

Discovering a patch of bunny rabbits in a huge park

Birch trees line a long lovely embankment on the river

Like so much else here, the National Museum of Kazakhstan occupies a stunning piece of architecture. But once we got beyond this dramatic entry foyer, the collection was super chaotic and did a terrible job of providing any context.

This exhibit at the National Museum had something to do with technology. It was a cool looking room to walk through, but there was little indication of what its point was.

Shiny architecture and cranes everywhere

Fun public art

Jim makes the most of a neighborhood lined with lilacs

The monumental core of the city

So much cool architecture

That’s the presidential palace photo-bombing our selfie

More Biking and Samarkand

Posted by Mark Sullivan on May 9, 2023

Posted in: Asia, Uzbekistan. 1 comment

Jim makes a tough day of biking look effortless

Mark climbing a very tough hill

Luba is always positive, no matter how bad the conditions

After the trek in Zaamin National Park, and a night of sleep, the plan was to head out of the park on our bikes. This involved a significant ride downhill, then some ups and downs, then a tough 7 kilometer climb, and finally a 40 kilometer descent from the mountains.

There were a few snags. First, the weather forecast was miserable. The temperature was barely above freezing, and it was actually snowing the night before our ride. The roads were also pretty treacherous. And then there was the matter of that 7 km climb. We all sort of assumed that once morning came, we’d ditch the ride, especially since all of us came to Uzbekistan expecting hot weather everywhere, and nobody had clothes for cold and snow.

But when we got up in the morning the weather had mostly cleared. It was cold — just above freezing — but it was sunny and beautiful. Of the fourteen of us, ten decided we were going to try the ride. It was beautiful riding, though the roads were pretty hellish. Wearing a couple layers, and working pretty hard, the temperature wasn’t bad — except for some pretty cold fingers.

Jim and Rebecca get ready to bike in the cold

Once we began the very tough long climb, it started to get a little colder, and by the time we reached the summit we were wiped out and freezing. This caused a few of us (including me) to decide again the 40 km descent. It was just too cold, and the roads looked just plain scary for riding steeply downhill. So more of us got in the bus, while Jim and six others started downhill. The weather got worse. The roads got worse. There were mean dogs. Becky took a tumble on her bike (but wasn’t hurt). Suffice it to say, by the halfway point of the descent, the remaining riders were climbing into the bus with their teeth chattering. And we all began a 3-hour ride to Samarkand, where we’d get a day off to recover and explore.

Samarkand is the stuff of legends. It is the quintessential Silk Road town. Ancient in origin, it was conquered by Alexander the Great in 329 BC and decimated by Ghengis Khan in 1220. In 1370, Tamerlane made it the capital of his Timurid Empire, stretching from Constantinople across Central Asia into India and China. Today it is leafy, lovely city with an incredible legacy of tile-covered Islamic architecture. It was a joy to explore this beautiful place — and to heal from a rough day of biking. And it deserves lots of pics, as you will see.

The Registan in Samarkand is a stunning group of three medressas — religious schools — the first of which was completed in 1420

Mark, Rebecca, and Jim touring the Registan

A dazzling ceiling inside one of the medresses of the Registan

Timur (known in the West as Tamurlane) watches over his empire

The stunning Gur-e-Amir Mausoleum is Tamurlane’s final resting place

The ceiling of the mausoleum

Mark and Chee take a break outside the mausoleum

In the courtyard outside the mausoleum, a few Central Asian tourists started to try out their English on Jim, and before we knew it he was surrounded by people wanting their pictures taken with him

Shah-i-Zinda is an incredible avenue of mausoleums loaded with tilework from the 14th and 15th centuries

The Registan looks amazing during an evening light show

More of the light show

Biking in Uzbekistan 1

Posted by Mark Sullivan on May 4, 2023

Posted in: Uzbekistan. Leave a Comment

Luba, Rebecca, and Jim are pretty excited about their new Uzbek hats

From Bishkek we flew to Tashkent, the Uzbek capital, to begin our two-week bicycle trip with Grasshopper Adventures. We especially looked forward to meeting up here with Jim’s sister Rebecca and our dear friend Luba. This trip was a 50th birthday present to Rebecca (though COVID postponements mean it didn’t happen until she was a bit older). And we’ve met up with Luba in several countries since first biking together on a Grasshopper journey in Japan in 2017.

But a funny thing happened as we were awaiting their arrival at the hotel where the group was meeting. I heard a shriek and felt a big hug from a woman I assumed was Luba. But no, it took me a second to realize it was Sharon. Yes, Sharon and Tony, our Australian friends from a 2018 Grasshopper tour in India, were here to do the Uzbekistan trip. Three years ago, when we first signed up for this trip, we’d encouraged them to join us but they weren’t able to. But this year they signed up, assuming we’d done it long ago.

With Rebecca, Luba, Tony, and Sharon on board we’re pretty confident this is going to be a great trip!

So great to travel with Tony and Sharon again

We spent the first two days biking in the countryside just east of Tashkent, where the landscape is dry and scrubby, with views further east of the Tien Shan mountains. Named the “Celestial Mountains” in Chinese, this range forms the rugged border between Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and China.

Then we traveled a couple hours toward the Northeast corner of Uzbekistan to a holiday resort area on the shores of the Charvak reservoir. Here we put in two pretty tough days of biking in the Chaktal range of the Tien Shan, with stunning views of both the highest peak in Uzbekistan and the bright blue water of the reservoir.

Mark on the road

The mountains above us

The reservoir always below us

Jim and Luba on pink day

We made a stop at the Sun Institute, also known as a “solar furnace,” where major research is done on sunlight, solar power, and the effect of concentrated heat on materials

The Sun Institute got very interesting when we discovered that Becky (with one of our guides, Ben) could hold a piece of wood in front of this intense mirror and it would immediately start smoking

After a pretty morning on the bikes (Day Four), we returned to Tashkent for a day of sightseeing (and a welcome day off from the bikes) before heading west for more biking adventure. We stopped for a welcome lunch at a lovely restaurant on the way. We had a wonderful table in a cool, beautiful courtyard. There was just one snag. When the main dishes came out — grilled chicken with onions and yogurt — nothing came out for the three vegetarians in our group. This is a culture where grilled meats are supreme, though they usually manage to scrounge something together for the vegetarians.

Meanwhile, Sharon (one of the vegetarians) had been eying the table next to us, where a group of local women were eating together. They had heaps of big red strawberries. And they had delicious-looking thin bread pockets stuffed with cooked greens. We’d had those earlier a couple times, and Sharon eagerly awaited those as the veggie offering. But alas, one of our guides finally announced apologetically that the restaurant simply had nothing to offer the vegetarians. Sharon asked why we couldn’t order the stuffed bread.

It turns out the ladies next door had made those stuffed breads at home and brought them in for their own lunch. Somehow they picked up on our woes and quickly offered Sharon a couple big pieces of their handiwork. When they learned there were a couple more vegetarians, they sent over piles more. Then they sent over a couple heaping bowls of those incredible strawberries for all of us. It was the best possible introduction to Uzbek warmth and hospitality, followed by a fun round of picture taking.