Tajikistan - August 2022

In August of 2022 I made a trip to Tajikistan and the Pamir Mountains.  I had always been intrigued by the Pamirs and had wanted to follow the Silk Road Route from Osh in Kyrgyzstan to Dushanbe in Tajikistan but alas these days the Tajiks and the Kyrgyz do not get along and the border between them is closed.  Making a round trip through the Pamirs inside Tajikistan was therefore a good compromise.

The trip was arranged by a company called Kalpak Travel based in Switzerland.  I had arranged a solo trip for myself but for the first 4 days I was joined by another group including the Tour Company owner (Luca), a Welshman (Dewi), an English lady (Caroline), a Kazakh (Aysenty) and a couple of Tajik guides (Alouaddin and Oriz).

I flew from Manchester to Dushanbe on Turkish Airlines via Istanbul.  This was my first visit to the new airport in Istanbul and what an impressive airport it is.  Turkish Airlines flies to more countries in the world than any other airline and the departure board is an impressive list of the exotic and the obscure.

Turkish Airlines Departure Destinations

I got an unexplained upgrade to business class for the Istanbul to Dushanbe leg which was most welcome.  I have been spoiled by all the business class flights I have been taking.  I arrived in Dushanbe, the capital city, at 3:00 am, a little early in the morning.  The airport was a bit of a crush and alas I couldn’t find the person who was supposed to pick me up.  I knew I was supposed to stay at the Atlas Hotel and there was someone from the hotel outside the airport so I went with him back to the hotel.  I later found that somehow I had missed the pickup person and he ended up waiting for a couple of hours for me not knowing I was safely at the hotel.

The Tajik National Museum

Next morning I met up with the other folks in the hotel and we set off for a tour of Dushanbe.  The first stop was the National Museum of Tajikistan.  A monumental building filled with all sorts of historical artifacts from prehistoric times to the present.  There were many wonderful things but none of them really stuck in my mind afterwards.  The only thing I remember was a room full of presents given to the President of Tajikistan by visiting dignitaries.  Lots of glitzy things but what stuck out was the gun given by Vladimir Putin, and a small silver bowl given by Condoleeza Rice.

The 2nd Largest Flagpole

We left the museum and walked through the park area past the large flagpole - once the tallest in the world until it was upstaged by one in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.  In the park there is a statue to the poet Rudaki who was born in Tajikistan though he spent much of his life in Uzbekistan.  They are quite proud of him in Tajikistan though.  There is Rudaki Park and Rudaki Street and of course the fine statue.

Rudaki Statue

Ismaili Monument

Moving through the park we came to another statue - this one is of Ismoili Somoni who was the 10th century emir who is now considered the father of the Tajik nation.  Everything in this central area is very modern and built to impress - definitely post-independence (1991) and most likely 2010 and later.

Inside the "Tea Room", Navruz Palace

Inside the Navruz Palace

A quick lunch in a Turkish restaurant and then we were off to the Navruz Palace.  They sometimes refer to this palatial building as the biggest Tea House in the world but to be honest it is not really a tea house.  It is an extremely over the top ornate building with a series of large meeting and banquet rooms, each room is decorated to the hilt and all lit with a giant crystal chandelier in the middle.  You can rent parts of the building for weddings and meetings and some government receptions are held there.  They are quite proud of the building but really it is quite absurd.

The Green Bazaar

Spice Vendor in the Bazaar

The next stop was a more down to earth building - the Green Bazaar.  This is the relatively new bazaar filled with market stalls selling a variety of foods.  What was remarkable to me was that so many stalls were selling the same thing - nuts and dried fruits.  I just don’t know how so many stalls can sell the same thing and be profitable.  Surely they only need one or two nut stalls?  There must have been a dozen of them.

A simpler Tea House

At the end of the day we stopped at a more realistic tea room.  A nice old building in the traditional style where we had a cup of tea.

Old man on the steps by the railway station

We went back to the hotel for a couple of hours before dinner so I decided to walk around town.  I walked down to the railway station where there was supposed to be examples of Soviet era stained glass windows.  I found the station but not the stained glass.  The station was quite small since there is not much of a rail network in Tajikistan.  You can however take a train to Moscow a couple of times a week if you fancy a 4 day train journey. 

Baking Bread

The street market behind the station was however quite interesting. Lots of melons for sale, it must be water melon season. The bread baker was quite sociable and didn't mind me taking photos.

In the evening we all went to a very fancy looking restaurant called Bukhara.  I can’t remember what we ate so it couldn’t have been that memorable in the food line.

The next morning, Sunday, we all assembled in the hotel lobby for the start of our road trip.  We had three Land Cruisers outside, three drivers, three guides, one tour company owner, and four paying guests.

Dushanbe is quite hot at this time of year and it was quite uncomfortably hot.  It was good to get out into the mountains and some cooler temperatures.

The Mountains outside Dushanbe

Just past the town of Nurok we came to an overlook of a large reservoir, the Norah Reservoir.  Unfortunately the atmosphere was quite hazy and dusty so the views were not that impressive.  At the overlook there were numerous stalls, again all selling the same two products - dried nuts or an awful looking soup made up of various pieces of offal - stomach, tongues and other unknown bits of the animal.  We didn’t indulge.

Soup for sale - no thanks

A little further down the road we stopped at the Hulbuk Fortress.  The fortress is a 9-12th century structure that has been significantly rebuilt.  The original construction was primarily mud brick which does not weather well.  It was restored by the Soviets and the restored outer walls look a little too perfect.  The interior buildings are so eroded and weathered that they are now just mounds of earth.  At least the restoration gives you an idea of how impressive the structure was in this once major city.

Hulbuk Fortress

Hulbuk Fortress

We drove on over a couple of passes to the town of Kulob where we stopped for lunch.  We then dropped down to the Panj River and the Afghanistan border.  The Panj is a significant fast flowing river coming out of the Pamir and Hindu Kush Mountains.  It is not an easy river to cross so it makes a relatively impermeable border with Afghanistan.

Me, Dewi, Caroline, Alouaddin, Oriz, Aysenty, Luca

We stopped by a road sign for Afghanistan for a photo opportunity.  The road dropped down from the highway to a bridge over to Afghanistan.  The bridge, these days, is closed.

The Panj River

The Afghan side of the Panj River

We drove along the road along the northern bank of the Panj keeping an eye out on Afghanistan for anything of interest. Everyone was intrigued to be so close to Afghanistan, just 50-100 meters across the river. While we might have expected to see poverty and decay, I was surprised that the villages in Afghanistan seemed reasonably tidy and not much different to the Tajik villages.

Afghan Village

Afghan Villagers

We stopped at the town of Qualai Khumb for the night.  Our hotel, the Karon Palace, was actually quite luxurious for such a small town. In the late afternoon I took a walk around the town.  It wasn’t a big town but I did find a lot of friendly children and adults to photograph.

The next day we continued our drive up the Panj valley.  Our road paralleled a similar road on the Afghanistan side.  There were villages on the Afghanistan side that were flying the white flags of the Taliban.

Castle Karon

We took a diversion up the hillside from the main road to Castle Karon.  This was another castle constructed of mud that overlooks the Panj river valley and Afghanistan below. It has unfortunately suffered serious deterioration from the weather.  The site is sometimes referred to as Tajikistan’s Machu Picchu.  Machu Picchu it isn’t and it is hard to see how it can be compared to that epic site.  There had been some rather tasteless restoration in places and it is really quite uninspiring.

We continued our drive up the Panj valley.  The Afghan villages looked quite prosperous.  There appeared to be a lot more cultivation of land in their villages compared to the Tajik villages.

The Panj River

The Panj river is an impressive river - it is a roiling torrent carrying a lot of silt down stream.  

We stopped for lunch at a roadside cafe and ate the usual fare - soup, plov and bread. 

The road was quite rough.  It was built in the 1940’s by the Soviets and it probably hadn’t been resurfaced since.  We were constantly driving on the shoulder and dodging potholes.  It was slow going and very tiring.

Tajikistan, the Panj, Afghanistan

That night we stayed in Kharog, a more significant town.  Our accommodation was the Hotel LAL.  In the evening we had dinner by the riverside - soup, plov and bread again.

In Khorog

The Ismaili Center Khorog

The next morning we visited the Ismaili Center in Khorog.  It is a beautiful modern building built at great expense using local materials.  It was financed by the Aga Khan who is the spiritual leader of the Ismailis (an offshoot of the Shia moslem sect).  The prayer hall and meeting rooms were simply splendid examples of fine design and workmanship.

Presidential House in Khorog

We drove up to the top of the hill to what is the 2nd highest botanical gardens in the world (once again Tajikistan is beaten to the first place, this time by Nepal).  In the grounds of the gardens is a fine house, one of many around the country that are used for the President.  It was a pleasant enough park but nothing spectacular.

Aysentiy, our Kazakh companion, who also runs a coffee business in Almaty, treated us to a very fine hand ground, pour over cup of coffee.  Sadly no milk.

Bridge to Afghanstan - Closed

We then continued further up the Panj River valley stopping for lunch in Ishkashim where there was another closed bridge over to Afghanistan.

After Ishkashim we drove up a steep trail to the top of the hill where there is an ancient fortress, the Qah Qaha Fortress.  This was another fortress made primarily of mud construction and as usual it has suffered from exposure to the elements.  At one time it must have been a fine structure commanding a great view (and control) over the valley below.

After Ishkashim the river widens and the Panj flows more slowly through the broad valley.

Yamchun Fortress

We wound up to the top of the hill again to another fortress.  This one the Yamchun Fortress was made from stone so it has survived better.  Again it has a commanding view over the valleys below.

Bibi Fatima Hot Springs

From Yamchun we went even further up the hill to the Bibi Fatima Hot Spring.  Most of us took the opportunity to soak in the hot spring which was just the perfect temperature.

We drove down the hill again and continued up the valley.  Our route now was through the Wakhan Corridor, the thin strip of land mainly in Afghanistan running up the Panj valley to the conjunction of the Pamir, Hindu Kush and Karakoram ranges.

At the Homestay in Yamg

That evening we stayed in a local home in Yamg.  Homestays for tourists have become quite popular and we saw lots of them advertised along the way.  Our host family had built a small guesthouse that could accommodate everyone on our trip.  There was even a shower and toilets.  That night we had another fine meal of soup and plov.

Mubarak-i-Wakhani Museum

Next morning we visited a small museum in the village of Yamg, the museum of Mubarak-i-Wakhani.  The museum is housed in a traditional home and it contains traditional costumes and artifacts including some musical instruments.  In the grounds there is a solar calendar that utilizes a stone with a hole that lines up with a stone on the adjacent hill top at sunset on the equinox.

Buying Gas outside Yamg

At this point I left my fellow group members and headed off on my own little trip into the Pamirs (with driver and guide of course).  The others were on a longer trip and were taking a different route.  We filled up with petrol in the village (from someone selling gas out of a tank inside a shed) and then headed off to the north-east.

Camels on the Afghan Side

We saw a group of camels on the Afghan side.  They were Bactrian camels and they looked rather majestic - beautiful animals.

A lonesome Yak

Not so majestic were the Yaks. But they do provide milk and meat and hides to the locals and they can withstand the cold.

For a while we were still along the Afghan border and the Wakhan Corridor, then we turned north on the Pamir River away from Afghanistan.

At a Military Checkpoint

There were many military checkpoints along the way and many soldiers walking along the road patrolling the border. At the checkpoint where we turned up into the Pamirs the soldier somehow had a bird which he wanted to give me. I didn't really want a bird so he let it go. I gave them a couple of bottles of beer and that seemed to make everyone very happy.

The weather wasn’t great and the mountains and eventually ourselves were in the clouds as we headed up into the high Pamirs.  The old Pamir Highway here is all dirt - no asphalt.  We made it over a pass at over 14,000 ft and then dropped down to lower altitudes out of the clouds.

Yurt near Alichur

We traversed the old Pamir Highway before joining the “new” road. The new road was built by the Soviets in WWII but the condition nowadays is pretty bad.  We bounced down the road for a while before stopping in the village of Alichur for lunch.  It was more of a truck stop than a restaurant but we got some reasonable soup.

Moving on we drove on towards the Kyrgyzstan border.  

Shakhty Cave Paintings

We took a side trip on a barely marked trail to the Shakhty Caves.  These are some small caves halfway up a hillside where there are some paleolithic cave paintings (8000 - 5000BC).  They were not really that impressive but they certainly looked old.

My guide, Bobo, was in his other life an archaeologist.  He had worked in this area and discovered other caves with paintings on them.  Admittedly his discoveries were even less impressive than the Shakhty Caves - just a few colored lines really.

Welcome to Murgob

We again joined the highway and drove onto the town of Murgob where we stayed for the night in the Pamir Hotel - not too luxurious but quite adequate.

The Mosque in Murgob

It was cloudy and quite cold and bleak in Murgob so I bundled up for a walk around town.  It was quite a desolate spot particularly on this cold evening but still there were lots of kids around happy to be photographed.  Most of the homes in the town do not have a water supply so there were several water pumps around the town.  Modern manual pumps where the residents could fill up water containers and take them back to their homes.

Lenin

There is a statue of Lenin in front of one of the government buildings - a white Lenin.  I talked to one lady, a good English speaker, a teacher, who said they loved Lenin in Mugrob.

Pumping Water in Murgob

Mugrob was the farthest west that we were traveling so the next morning we turned back towards Kharog. This time we didn’t go back down the old Pamir Highway, just the new (1940’s) road. 

Harriet and Ed on their way to Kyrgyzstan

On our way we stopped and talked to Harriet and Ed, two bicyclists who had ridden from the UK.  That was quite an epic trip, surely a trip of a lifetime.

Lake Yashikul

In Alichur we also bumped into the other group we had been traveling with.  We stopped and chatted on the side of the road for a while.  We continued on our way and turned off the highway to the village of Bulunkul.  Beyond the village we drove up to Lake Yashilkul.  A beautiful glacial lake.  

Well and Yurt in Bulunkul

Our hosts in Bulunkul

In Bulunkul we had lunch at a home stay.  The host cooked the food in a yurt out back.  The Yurt was really comfortable and beautifully warm.

Fresh Bread in Bulunkul

Back on the Pamir Highway we drove on towards Kharog.  The weather turned bad and we had rain.  We arrived in a wet Kharog and again stayed at the LAL Hotel.

On the road to Bartang

The next day was the day of our trek up the Jizeu valley.  We were up early and as we left town we stopped at the market to buy some snacks for the hike.  We headed west down the Panj valley to the junction with the Bartang River where we turned north up the Bartang valley.  It was a beautiful sunny day, so different to the clouds and rain of the previous day. 

The wrong bridge

We were to head up the Jizeu Valley and stay at a home somewhere up the valley.  We stopped at the first bridge across the river, a rather rickety wire and wooden footbridge over the torrent of the Bartang River.  We said goodbye to our driver with the understanding he would pick us up the next day - he was going to stay in one of the villages nearby.  We crossed the river and walked up the trail until we found an old man who had a small holding in the valley.  He informed my guide that we were on the wrong trail.  There are two bridges and we had stopped at the first when we needed the second.  Only a 4 km detour but it wasn’t something we had planned.  Bobo, the guide was quite upset with himself but it all worked out just fine.

Jizeu Valley

We walked back to the bridge and then up the road the second bridge.  On the right trail now, we walked up the valley to the Jizeu villages.  The trail was a nice single track though there were places where it was a little tricky when it crossed a scree slope.

Children on the way to Jizeu

We dined at the side of the trail on cheese, sausage and bread then continued our way to the first Jizeu village.  Since I wanted to go on to some lakes higher up, we decided to proceed to the next village.  These villages are quite primitive and quite remote.  There were probably only a dozen families in the valley.

Our Home for the night, Jizeu

When we reached the upper village we approached one smallholding and asked about accommodation.  Though we had no booking (how could you there’s no communication) he offered us a room - about $20 per person including dinner and breakfast.  That seem so little to me but it was probably a very large sum to the family. 

Lake Tsaxinkul

We rested for a while and then moved further up the valley to Lake Tsaxinkul.  Not a very large lake but quite nice.

Our Hosts Children

Grandmother tending her sheep

Back at our homestay we rested and were entertained by the young children.  Three generations were living in the home.  Two grandparents, two parents and two children.  A bull, a cow, two sheep, some chickens, apple trees, apricot trees, and a few small plots of land cultivated with potatoes and wheat.  There were solar panels on the roof and a satellite dish but there was no cell communications or phone lines.  They are truly living off the grid.  There was no plumbing and only a pit toilet.  Everyone appeared happy however. - including me.

The food for dinner was quite acceptable and we dined on a covered platform at the back of the house.  As the sun fell behind the mountains it got quite cold so we adjourned to bed fairly early in the evening.  I had a most comfortable night covered by heavy blankets provided by our host.

The next morning we had a plan to intercept our driver before he headed past the second bridge to the first bridge where he left us off yesterday.  If we could get to the road before 9:00 we could catch him before he drove by.  So we had a quick breakfast and off we went.  It was another nice day and I wanted to enjoy the hike so I let Bobo go on ahead so that I could take in the landscape.  It was a beautiful hike down the valley in the early morning.

The Vizeu Valley

At the bridge there was no driver and no Bobo.  A little worrying since that was not in our plan but shortly I saw the car coming up the road.  Bobo had in fact run down the road to find the car and bring him back.  Since the driver had slept further downstream and not upstream as we thought our plan would never have worked as the car would never have passed the second bridge.

We drove down the Bartang until it joined the Panj and then turned west down the Panj all the way to Qualai Khumb.  We had done the road before on our way out 4 days earlier.  This section was an extremely rough road and the going was slow.

It was around 3:00 when we got to Qualai Khumb after a very tiring drive.  We had lunch by the river and then I checked in at the Koron Palace Hotel, the same one we had stayed at before.

Over the hill to Dushanbe

The next day it was a drive back from Qualai Khumb all the way to Dushanbe.  We took the route to the north over the mountains rather than the more westerly route that we took on the way out.  The mountain road to the north was a shorter distance but a rougher road.  The mountains were however quite beautiful and once again the weather was cooperating with blue skies.

Hay making

There appeared to be more cultivated land in these mountains.  Many more cows, sheep and goats.  Bee hives were everywhere.  The whole environment looked just a little more prosperous.

We stopped for a photo opportunity and Bobo found a piece of pottery in the hillside.  Being the archaeologist he dug around and found more.  Soon we were all scrambling over the side of the road and finding interesting bits of clay pottery.  There was no village in the vicinity and Bobo felt it was some sort of ancient burial site.  He is going to make a report and try to come back and investigate further.

On the road to Dushanbe

We eventually joined the surfaced road that went from Dushanbe to the Kyrgyzstan border.  Again it was an old road with WWII Soviet Asphalt.  It is almost harder to drive on the potholed asphalt rather than the dirt road.   Dirt roads can be graded and smoothed out from time to time, asphalt potholes cannot be graded, they need more significant repair.

We drove past a large construction site for a new dam. It looked immense and apparently is the largest project in current Tajikistan.  All financed by the Tajiks themselves.  

Bobo, the guide, Sayed the driver

We stopped for lunch (good plov) by the side of the road and then continued on into Dushanbe.  

The new mosque in Dushanbe

It was now quite hot at the lower altitude and Dushanbe is not an attractive city.  I wanted to visit the new mosque that had recently been built but was not yet open.  It is a huge mosque and quite an impressive structure.

Unknown Monument Dushanbe

I then went to check into my hotel for the evening.  I said goodbye to my driver, Sayed, and arranged to meet Bobo, my guide, later on for an evening meal.  We went to a very modern and glitzy Turkish restaurant for a rather mediocre meal.  The streets of Dushanbe were lit up as if it were Christmas.  People were walking around and it did feel quite nice in the cooler evening air.

Dushanbe in the evening

Back at the hotel I packed my bag and got ready for an early morning (3:00am) departure for the airport.   The plane left on time for Istanbul where I landed around 8:00 in the morning.  

There are more photos of Tajikistan here and more photos of the people of Tajikistan here.