Across northern Türkiye
Note: It’s now considered more polite to use Türkiye to refer to the country formerly known as Turkey. This is understandable because who would want to share a name with a big awkward bird? Occasionally, […]
Asia
In the deserts of Iran
We flew from Pakistan into the northeastern city of Mashhad in Iran. The two countries have a land border in Balochistan, but it’s dodgy. You need a special permit and an armed guard. We’re not […]
Postcard from Pakistan
We were the only people crossing the Attari-Wagah border when we walked across from India to Pakistan. The immigration halls on both sides were completely empty, apart from the staff who were overjoyed to see […]
Poha for breakfast
Somehow, more than two years have sneaked by since my last blog post from Ukraine, just before all hell broke loose there. It was still Covid times when we got back to Bulgaria and we’d […]
Oil, fire and pomegranates
We were rudely awoken from our cabin on the Caspian Sea ferry and unceremoniously dumped in Azerbaijan at 4am. I was still asleep on arrival and would have really liked to just curl up in […]
From the Aral to the Caspian Sea
I hadn’t heard of Karakalpakstan (Qaraqalpaqstan) until I found myself here. It’s actually the ‘Autonomous’ Republic of Karakalpakstan but since having that name it’s been part of the USSR and now part of Uzbekistan. ‘Autonomous’ […]
The wonders of Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva
There is no straightforward overland route from Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan to Tashkent in Uzbekistan. You have to go the long way ‘round – either all the way back down to Osh in the south and […]
The Circumnavigation of Issyk-Kul
Kyrgyzstan is just a little bit scruffy. Not in a sad, rundown, slummy, dirty kind of way but in an offhand, cool and slightly messy, ‘don’t care what the neighbours think’ kind of way. It’s […]
Camping in Kyrgyzstan
Kyrgyzstan is all about the spectacular scenery. The Tian Shan (Heavenly) mountains cover most of the country. Pretty much the whole country is above 1500m and almost half is between 3000m and 7500m. In between […]
In Xinjiang
Even though it was only a few hours from Gansu on the fast train, Turpan feels like we’ve been transported to the Middle East. The Islamic influence is obvious – in the bread and food, […]
Adventurous Hermit 