Day 62 - Friday 2nd June - Toktogul to Arslanbob

The rain of the evening before had cleared, with sunny skies and cool, crisp mountain air. We continued our descent down the winding road, seemingly hemmed in by steep canyons. The shepherds were up earlier driving the animals up the road. And again the road surface was consistent, allowing us to enjoy the drive, and not have to worry about dodging potholes.

Toktogul is a small scattered town on the edge of a large lake. Around the hilled land scape was grassed, while the flatter land near the lake was intensely cropped. The whole lot ringed by snow capped mountains.

As we continued south the basin gave way to a narrow gorge and another lake. This one emerald green, while he cliff sides were a mixture of intense reds and deep browns. Although this was only a two lane road, the driving was exhilarating.

Tash – Komur is the coal mining centre of Kyrgyzstan, which by local standards is a large and rambling place with Soviet style apartment blocks set amongst the hilly landscape.

We had descended into the northern edge of the Ferghana Valley (more a large basin). The road turned east and ran along the Uzbek border. The traffic volumes increased as we drove through small towns. And with this came the police radar checks every 5k. I was the first to get pulled over, shortly followed by Goldie. We were not speeding, so had to get our guide to double back as we were having difficulty understanding the issue. In Kyrgyzstan you must drive with your head lights on whilst on the highway. We have installed LED daylight running lights, to save the power drain and preserve the head light globes. They come on automatically when the ignition is switched on. These are OK. The police had been intimating that we did not have our headlights on. I tried to show that we had the DRLs on. Akay had words with them and we were on the road again.

After lunch, I was pulled over again. American or German (this is what we typically get asked by everyone) the police enquired. When I responded that we were Australian, he smiled and we were allowed to proceed. Not sure whether the response of the police would have been the same if the answer was otherwise.

We were heading for Arslanbob, up a small side road and back into the mountains. The area is home to a large native, walnut forest. Reputedly Alexander the Great stopped here on his rampages east and took the walnuts back to Macedonia.

We arrived early enough to go for a walk in the forest. Firstly to a waterfall then along some horse tracks that the local villagers used. More stunning Kyrgyz scenary.

Our homestay was in a traditional Uzbek house. There are a lot of Uzbeks living in the northern Ferghana region. They are much more traditional and conservative in their Islamic practices than the Kyrgyz. The homestay was cheap, basic but very clean. The running water for a shower was a challenge. We were fed the local staples as we sat on mats around a large low dining table. The Tien Shan loomed over our shoulders.         

Day 61 - Thursday 1st June - Bishkek to Toktogul

The morning was bright and sunny. We were headed south over the 3600m Tor Ashuu Pass. Passage was slow as the two lane road was again pot holed. The locals were less concerned about these and oncoming traffic and overtook at any opportunity. Particular favourites were blind corners and crests. If there was an oncoming car, the over taker blasted their horn and flashed lights to get everyone to pull over.

Just after we started on the road south we passed a petro-chemical plant. I am not sure where the oil to fuel it comes from, but its not Kyrgyzstan. But it did mean that there were a lot of tankers on the road. Heading north to refill and south over the pass with a full load. There were also a number of burnt out wrecks on the roadside, reminding everyone that not all made the journey. These were not the Chinese, wrecked car mounted on a concrete plinth to remind you of the vagaries of speeding, but burned out wrecked trucks that had been pushed off the road and abandoned. There were also granite tomb stones, parked at a safe distance from the roadside, commemorating the departed.

The climb was long and slow. As we ascended we encountered more and more shepherds on horses driving their cattle, sheep or horses up the road (yes, it is the main highway going south, but in Kyrgyzstan, it’s there for everyone) to the high summer pastures. We generally wound our way slowly through each herd, so as to avoid contact and damage to the cars. The local method was generally one hand on the horn and a foot on the accelerator, and lights flashed at us if we were in the way, even though they were driving up the wrong side of the road. It was a colourful procession.

By the time we reached the summit via the numerous switchbacks, the day had turned grey, cold and it was snowing. Only lightly thankfully. The last part of the crossing is through a tunnel as it is well above the snow line. There is some form of red light system to regulate traffic, we were not sure how it worked. After waiting for 20 minutes, the queue of cars headed off on a red light, the trucks remained. Some cars, impatiently drove around the queue and raced in. The tunnel is unlit and unventilated. We soon realised that while the tunnel is barely comfortable for cars passing in opposite directions, cars and trucks uncomfortable and two trucks trying to pass would have been impossible.  

The long and winding road

Once through we had a short descent into the high altitude Suusamyr Basin. Ringed with snow capped mountains, the wide, flat grassland was dotted with yurts and herds of cattle, sheep and horses. Along the roadside, the locals were selling milk (cow and horse) in Fanta bottles, yogurt, cream, honey and these little white balls of delight about the size and appearance of a moth ball (for those who can remember them).

We stopped to watch a herdsman milking his horses. The foals, lying asleep, were tethered to a line pegged at both ends, while the mares stood by patiently to be milked. An old lady (on closer inspection she could have been in her 40s, 50s or 60s) invited us in to her yurt. It was made of felt (made from the wool of their sheep), stretched over a wooden frame and securely tied with rope, some of which was made from the horses manes. The yurt was warmed by a wooden stove andcolourfully decorated with carpets on the floor and walls. We were offered some bread and delightful cream accompanied by horse’s milk. I can only say that I now have a better appreciation of the reaction that some have when they try Vegemite for the first time. The taste of the milk was difficult to describe: bitter and acidic were two of the words that first come to mind. It was unlike anything I had previously tasted. The little moth balls were a concentrated version of this flavour having been made from fermented horses milk. The taste was positively awful, and I don’t say that lightly as one who has devoured crickets and circadas on this trip and managed to keep a straight face with everything the Japanese have thrown my way on business trips. But the locals love it and claim that the horses milk is very good for your health, despite my predictions that anything more than a mouthful would probably kill you.

The scenery was stunning. The sharpness of the contrasting colours, the rugged snow capped mountains and the age old summer migration. And the road conditions improved dramatically so that we could drive at a reasonable and consistent speed, enjoying the rises and dips and long sweeping curves.

After crossing the Ala Bel Ashuu pass at the southern end of the basin, we descended down to our night’s accommodation. A small guest house next to a raging river. Rustic, basic, but clean we were challeneged to get hot water in our room, so the showers were bracing.

There are time when things can get ugly. This evening could have gone that way. Our guide had challenged the team that men only drank vodka, women drank beer or wine. The vodka was the same price as the beer, and came in a very glamerous bottle. I think most of the production cost went into the bottle, not its contents. Some managed to restrain themselves, others less so. After a dinner of traditional Kyrgyz food, the music was turned up. There was a group of locals in the dining room and they were determined to show us how the Kyrgyz dance. After an hour or so of arm and leg thrashing, the effects of the vodka started to amerliorate and we realised we had to drive the next morning, so gracefully departed, much to the disappointment of the locals.

Day 60 - Wednesday May 31st - Bishkek

We had a day off in town. There was a National Park about 30 minutes from town to enjoy some more alpine walking or just explore the city. I had some work to do, so Loris and a few of the others went walking in the mountains for the morning. Others soon found that all the museums, for some unexplained reason were closed.

In the afternoon we wandered the sprawling and busy Osh Market. It appears you could buy anything there, from a new hat to plumbing supplies and your daily staples of meat, vegetables and dried fruit.

The centre of Bishkek is covered in parkland with a number of large, cubic Soviet style buildings and statues of Lenin and Manus (a national hero). The wide, tree lined streets and rose gardens gave the centre of town an air of sophistication and order. But a few blocks away, like the roads, the foot paths have broken up into an uneven jumble of rubble.

After a day or so, you start identifying the smaller things that help to characterise a place. There are no new cars in Kyrgyzstan. I have always wondered what happens to the cast offs from countries that have mandated age limits for cars. Germany seems to donate their old BMW, Audi and Mercedies and Japan their old Lexus and Toyota. Newest about 15 years old. As the astute will have noted, the German cars are left hand drive, while the Japanese are right hand drive. Not a problem here, just so long as they are going.

Trucks also seem to breakdown a lot in this country. They are parked in the most inconvenient roadside spot in a state of repair, with parts, tyres and people spread around them.

And there are mobile phones. I observed earlier that China must have had 2 billion new smart phones and as a consequence everyone had a camera. Not so here, old Nokia’s are common here, and in case you had forgotten, while they did have a camera, they were a challenge to use.

Day 59 - Tuesday 30th May - Karakol to Bishkek

Cooking breakfast

The day broke clear, sunny and cool. We had all slept well despite the shared bunkroom accommodation with a chorus of snorers on the male side. A few of the team left an hour early, deciding that it would be more comfortable to walk out than the down hill ride in the truck. The balance of the team decided the inconvenience was out weighed by the breakfast of rice porridge and fresh local bread which is cooked in oil over the wood fired stove. Spread with home made apricot jam and tea it was a welcome distraction for what lay ahead.

I rode down in the same as I came up the hill in. This time I was looking over the downhill side of the road. The chance to look for squirrels in the trees was the best diversion we could find to avoid looking over the sheer drops. The fresh air and walk would have been much more pleasant than being tossed about.

It was raining when we reached Karakol. Our departure was delayed for an hour as Ginger reinstalled the repaired mounting brackets for the rear shock absorbers. So most of the team ended up down town scavenging for lunch and enjoying morning coffee and cake in Karakol Koffee. It was also a chance to examine the Lenin statue at close hand.

Loaded with fresh bread, cheese and a BBQ chook we set off with everyone looking for shipping container buildings. It seems they are a preferred method of construction. The best was a three story container building which was being faced with pink granite tiles.

We soon encountered Isik Kol. Despite what its name sound like, the water in the lake is warm, around 18c. Its reported as the 2nd largest alpine lake in the world behind Titicaca in South America. The countryside soon turned dry and sandy. The guide books had referred to the shore line as being dotted with clusters of villages of Russian dachas (summer houses). It would seem that economic times had devoured these. Most were empty and many looked to have been long abandoned, not an uncombed sight in Kyrgyzstan.

We had passed a number of factories since crossing the border. All were closed and in abandoned decay. They apparently did not last long after the Soviets cut the country lose in 1990 and it became independent. Presumably they had been propped up under the Soviet regime, but once the need to be self supporting arose, the challenge appeared unsurmountable.

The potholed road improved considerably after we left the town of Balikchi at the western end of Isik Kol, which gave us a chance to drive a bit faster. But we were constantly being teased by very slow speed signs and instructions from Akay (our guide) to obey them. We soon found out why. We figured that the quality of the road was being funded by speeding fines. Every 5k police were stationed with speed cameras for the entire 180k section. Burgundy was the first car to test the police and negotiated his own fine down from many thousand cum (the local currency) to the equivalent of $20.

Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan has a population of nearly 1 million. It sprawls and at 6.00 in the evening we hit peak hour traffic as we crossed the city to our hotel. A new granite edifice, not the hotel we had booked for some reason that was not satisfactorily explained, but there was no secure parking as we had specified. We lined the cars up on the street, in front of the hotel. Given the amount of attention they attract, and you can not lock them, this is not an entirely satisfactory situation. It was overcome when the hotel promised to station a security man on the street overseeing the cars for the entire night. He was standing there unsmiling,  when we went to bed and there when we rose in the morning.

Day 58 - Monday 29th May - Into the Tien Shan

The Russian army truck was waiting for us at the front gate of the hotel at 10am. Our departure had been delayed a short while to allow time for the mechanical crew to remove the rear shock absorbers off Ginger and take the mounts to a local welder to be strengthened. One had broken on the previous day’s rough roads.

Our journey into the Altyn Ayrashan valley was billed as 3 hours of hell. Not one to get unnecessarily concerned about things, I can confess that looking over a couple of the seeming sheer drop-offs that fell for a hundred or so metres only inches from the side of the truck as we ponderously lumbered over football sized boulders, gave concern of the consequences a couple of times, especially on the occasions when the truck struggled to find its gears. But the scenery was breath taking.

Below us the Altyn Arashan raced down the valley. Pencil thin pines cluster on the steep, grassy hillsides. Above us the mountains soared skyward.

But the billing of the trip was wrong. It only took a little over 2 hours. Thankfully. We covered the last 500m to our mountain lodge on foot as a particularly rugged section appeared over the horizon and the valley opened up before us.

Akay, our guide had described the lodge as a Soviet style mountain hut. I think that conveyed that it was rustic. Six shipping containers formed the hut. Bunk beds, shared rooms branching off a central dinning room. The toilets were of the long drop variety, the water came from the icy stream that rushed by the front door, the kitchen was a lean too with a couple of small wood fired stoves on which the owners wife conjured up a series of rustic mountain meals and baked the best bread we had tasted in months, the electricity came from solar panel charged batteries and the milk was so fresh it was tethered to a rail waiting. The hut was warm and dry.

But it was outside the front door that we were more interested in. The valley was dotted with tents and Yurts. The shepherds had driven the horses, cattle and sheep up into the high pastures for the summer grazing. Foals, calves and lambs strutted or in some cases just struggling to their feet to make their first steps in life. Hot springs fed baths by the river and in a couple of yurts.

At around 5500m, Altyn Arashan stood like a giant chisel at the far end of the valley. We walked for the afternoon up a side valley and marvelled at the majesty of it all. We were not alone. We met a few groups of other trekkers who had travelled from Europe to hike the mountains of the Kyrgyzstan Tien Shan.

Day 57 - 28th May - Shonji to Karakol (Kyrgyzstan)

We were up early to do some repairs to the car. We had received a new fuel pump. It was a Chinese knock off of the Facet pump that had failed in Southern China. The specifications were unattainable, as was the branding. But given the problems of the day before we decided to change it over for the one I was using, as supposedlyit had a lower pressure setting which we hoped would relieve the flooding issue.  

Not sure what this guy was carrying, but it looks a little heavy.

The changeover was quick. So we decided we would also change over the radiator fan which was missing one of it’s seven plastic blades, and relace it with the new one Simon had delivered. It should have been a simple operation of removing the 6 bolts that held the radiator in, undo the top and bottom hoses, but like most things MG, there were complications. The fan mount was not identical and the fan sat further forward, so we had to muck about and pack the radiator forward to give clearance between the fan and radiator.

We were off to the Kyrgyzstan border after half a day in KZ, but driving via the Charyn Cayon, described as the little KZ Grand Canyon. None of the cars appreciated the corrugated dirt roads and it appears that the motor in mine was bouncing about a lot as I soon noticed the water temperature climb to 100c. On checking, the new fan had completely disintegrated. Although it scarred the radiator, it had not punctured it. In 40 minutes, the team had the old fan reinstalled without loosing a drop of water.

The Canyon was spectacular. We had talked about a walk through it, but given the 300 odd kilometres we had drive for the day, time was against us.  We also had to recalibrate our time and distance expectations given the quality of the roads. Lunch was spent sitting on our little fold up chairs on a bluff overlooking a turbulent, flooded river racing through a brick red gorge. There was no one else around. It was a welcome break from the crowds, chaos and industrial landscape of China.

One thing you can be certain of is that the further you get from a capital city, the quality of the roads deteriorates, especially as you are headed for a very minor and infrequently used border crossing. The emerald green fields, livestock and the dramatic back drop of the Tien Shan provided a magnificent distraction from the pace and road quality.

We had been aiming at arriving at the border around 3pm. The guards were awoken from their afternoon siesta, and as usual 5 stood by taking photos of car and each other while one stamped the exit from Kazakhstan in Passports. The Kyrgyzstan side was much the same. First through Immigration. Australians are Visa free, so there was no paperwork, and off to Customs. Yes I also drove an MG and it was white. We were through both borders in a record 40 minutes.

Our new guide Akay was waiting for us. It was a bit obscure how long it was going to take to cover the 120k into Karkol. The map had made some obscure comment about the road quality, especially as this was supposed to be a National Highway. It was something along the lines about a joke.

But the countryside kept us constantly distracted. The nomads bring their horses, cattle and sheep up to the high country for the summer to graze on what looks like rich green lawn. Yurts dot the landscape. Old Dodge milk tankers race up and down the dirt road much faster than an MG. I am not sure whether they delivered milk or freshly churned butter back to the dairy.    

Three hours later a weary team arrived at the hotel. A quick shower and at 8.00pm we were off to find an ATM and get some dinner.

Day 56 - Saturday 27th May - Horgas to Shonji (Kazakhstan)

Xingjiang, like Tibet is a very sensitive area for China. We had been used to Facebook, Instagram and Youtube access being blocked for the duration of our stay in China, but for many of our group who were using Wordpress for their Blogs, that also was stopped in Xingjiang.

As we were preparing to drive to the border we were aware that there were an extra number of cameras on us. Plus on every corner (it was only 2klms to the border) there was a cameraman filming. We were told that they were from the local TV station. How they found out about us and marshalled the resources, were questions that were unanswered. At the border gate interviews were requested and given.

Then we were off into the frey. Our agents had their freight people working on the export of the cars for a couple of days, so we were hoping the process would be smooth. We were waved through, drove around all the trucks and asked to line the cars up in order in a special marshalling area. The TV camera were still with us. In the Immigration hall, the staff had their camera out and were more interested in taking photos of us and then the cars and the cars with all of the staff and then all of the staff and us. Bugger all the other people who were patiently waiting in queue for their documents to be processed.

It was then off to Customs for the cars. Cameras still rolling. The customs guys checked our Passports (again) opened the boot of a couple of cars for the cameras and we were off. Through the Chinese border in a record 30 minutes.

It’s a 5klm drive across to the Kazakhstan border. The buildings were old, the paint peeling off and repairs probably had not been done since the Soviet empire imploded. There were no TV cameras, no hired shipping agents, we were on our own. No one on our side spoke Kazak or Russian, and no one on their side spoke much English, yet we managed to muddle through the process of getting the cars into KZ in a couple of hours. There were the obligatory photos of cars and officials. They had very little else to do, so this time no one else was inconvenienced. One guy even managed to persuade Mike to let him drive his car around the parking lot.

There were no guard rails along the road into KZ. Infact there was not much of a road. The difference was stark.

We met up with our guide in Zharkent a small town 30k from the border. Our new CCTV cameraman joined us their also. Lunch was BBQ meat and bread and coffee. The team had been transported into a new world.

Our destination for the night was a hot spring about 70lkms from Shonji. The population of towns was now measured in the thousands, not the millions. Dust and decay hung over all around the place. One of the group suggested that things would be better in the richer Stans. I reminded him that the oil rich Kazakhstan was by far the most wealthy and things could only go down hill from here.

We picked up a new passenger in Shonji. Simon joined the team as Tony’e new navigator. I think he only managed to pack a tooth brush in his bag for himself. The balance of the space was full of spare parts for the team.

The car did not like the pot holed and dirt roads. The engine kept on flooding and stalling. Not sure if it’s the fuel pump or the SU carbies bouncing about or a combination of the two. A number of the others experienced a similar issue to some degree.

We drove across a wide, open grassland. The Tien Shan rose as a dramatic backdrop. Across it and a world away, China. Sheep, cattle, horses and men on horseback with dogs at their side, dotted the landscape.

The hot springs were a welcome relief. I don’t think we had been for a swim since Luang Prabang. The beers were cold, and the meat and noodles were local.      

Day 55 - Friday 26th May - Kuyten to Horgas

Communications tracking vehicle

Kuyten is probably one of the smallest towns we have stayed in with a population of only 250k, 2 power stations and one steel works. So it was with some surprise that we were met first thing in the morning in the hotel car park by a man in a large SUV with even larger aerials on the roof. We are not sure who he represented, but it was some government department and he wanted to see our radio licenses, which of course we did not have. Green was roused from her slumber to come and discuss the issue, while we all evaporated.

Local street sweeper

Much lengthy discussion and the first conclusion was he was going to check that the CB radios complied with Chinese standards. Surprisingly they all did. Next point was they wanted to take them all and send them to the border for us to pick up on exit. That was unsatisfactory. Compromise was reached and the radios were all removed and put in a sealed box for us to carry to the border and Green signed her life away, personally guaranteeing that we would not open the box.

We were aware that the radios were a sensitive issue here and had not seen anyone else using them, so I guess we were lucky that this happened on our last driving day in China, and it was relatively straight forward.

We noticed that the number of trucks had started to thin out as we headed westward to Horgas. And in parts the road went straight through the towns. Disclosing the usual jumble of old shop houses and what, at speed looks like a lot of old junk, but more likely someone’s business, tyres, timber and bits of metal.

Late afternoon across the wide open grassland, mountains appeared in front of us. We then started to climb from our altitude of 500m. The road was straight, at least on the uphill as we climbed through 2200m. On the downhill, the road snaked from one side of the pass to the other and cut under the uphill on a number of occasions. On the way up we passed nomads in Yurts, cattle, sheep and horses in summer camp.

And then we started descending. In typical Chinese fashion we crossed one bridge hundreds of metres above the cars and trucks on the roadway in valley floor. It took me a few moments to realise that was our road. Our road looped through two mountains as we descended 400m and passed under the bridge.

As we drove down the narrow valleys and looked up at cascading steams and steep slopes dotted with sheep and cattle, we wondered how they managed to drive a camel train up this old Silk Road pass.

Only a few years ago Horgas was a town of 20k people. Today it has a population of over 200k and a soon to be destination for a high speed train and a major transport hub under the Chinese Belt and Road strategy.

Our tour agent was not sure whether our hotel would have running water or electricity. Luckily it had both, although the Soviet built hotel had certainly seen better days.       

Day 54 - Thursday 25th May - Turpan to Kuyten

When we departed town the temperature was already scorching heat and the forecast for the next few days was for an escalation. Fortunately we were looking at the forecast for Turpan.

Desert and wind farms greeted us on the way out of town. We were expecting that the continued drive west to Horgas would be flat and get increasingly hot. But after a short while we started to climb from the -50m at Turpan to around 1100m and a distinct change in temperature. Grassland and grazing vistas opened up before us. The snow capped Tien Shan moved from the right hand side of the car to our left as the G30 passed through a saddle.

An amazing amount of construction was underway. Trucks, people and concrete were everywhere.  The G30 seemed to be perfectly good, but they were building a new highway beside it and overhead the pylons for a new highspeed train were being installed.

We passed around Urumchi. The largest city in the region (approaching 4m. The hotbed of Uygur dissent if you follow the ABC. New apartment blocks abounded. These were a large part of the problem according to reports. The issue was that the government had bull dozed the old mud brick hutongs that had been home for the Uyghur for centuries and replaced the narrow winding street with the new high rise apartments. The reports that I had seen implied that the Uygur were being discriminated against with their old traditional housing demolished and their way of life stamped out in favour of the Han. This probably true to some extent. But I am not sure that the Uygur were selectively being discriminated against. As far as we have seem around China, the government has been demolishing the hutongs in every town and replacing them with modern high rise. There is a big stink about it happening in Beijing. One of the may issues I see is that the hutongs have no running water or sewerage. In Beijing each street has their own shared public toilets, as you head west I am not sure whether this is the case. And there was no possibility of providing water an sanitation to the mud brick dwelling, its just much cheaper to bulldoze the lot and provide wide streets and transport access, electricity and modern sanitation. Unfortunately out goes the colour and traditions of generations and the sameness of modern China stamped every where. The reality is don’t try and stand in front of the bull dozers.

Urumchi also has a huge fruit and vegetable market. Produce is traded and distributed from here across the country. And for mile after mile we could see where it was all coming from. The flat  desert plains with the addition of irrigation yield up an abundant amount of produce. We were nearly 4000k from Beijing and there appears very little of the countryside that it not cultivated.

And of course, every now and again we would spot the ubiquitous power station, steel plant or petro-chemical plant. Even smaller towns (pop 500k) seemed to have them.

We had a late lunch and visit to a Changyu Vinyard. Bigger than Disneyland, I think that the designers had managed to addbit of every major French Chateau into the construction. It was portrayed as a working vineyard. It had less than 50 acres of grapes, although there were plenty on surrounding land. After our tour, our team was convinced that the place was a theme park and did not make any wine. This was reinforced by groups of wedding couples with their photographers draped all over the place (more than 8 groups as we were departing).  

Day 53 - Wednesday 24th May - Turpan

Lonely Planet described Turpan as a laid back place where you could sit under the grape vines and have a coffee or cold beer. Marco Polo also wrote favourably of the town. We were looking forward to the cold beers.

We found the grape vines growing on overhead trellises sheltering the streets, but the sheltered streets were devoid of any form of commercial activity.  Unfortunately something seems to have happened since the last edition of LP was published. I think it is the general escalation of security across the whole of Xinjiang that has cleared any major gathering of people. The only place that there was any form of out door dining was around the lake in the centre of town. But that was surrounded by a 10’ high barbed wire fence with people and bag scanning security at both entrances.

Without the offer of the alfresco option and the fact that it was also blisteringly hot, I took to option to catch up on stuff while Loris went to the museum.

At 5.00pm we were organised to drive out to what was described as an irrigation museum. This showed the Karez irrigation system used extensively in this area, Afghanistan and in Iran. In summary water is captured in tunnels dug down the mountainsides and then channelled down into irrigation ditches at the foot and around the fields. As its all underground, it protects the water from excessive evaporation. The tunnels go back for thousands of years. Unfortunately the museum was a Karez theme park, nothing real, but tons of the favourite Chinese construction material, concrete.

It was then off to Jiaohe, the ruins of a garrison town built in the Han Dynasty (about 1700 years ago). Situated on an island that rises about 50’ high out of the middle of the river. Today its surrounded by stark desert, in its time, I assume that it was surrounded by green fields as it was noted as a significant supply base for the silk route.