About Me
Saturday 25 May 2013
Bishkek, Kyrgystan
It was great to be on the bikes again and we had a pleasant ride to Bishkek. The mountains were in the distance with sweeping plains along the roadside. We felt like we were in the wind west with horseman herding goats, sheep and horses to day pastures. Meals were easily found in cafes along the way. We met a couple of young French men who were firemen at home and carried an enormous amount of equipment which they used to teach first aid in schools along the way. The weather was still mild, but we did have rain one night. We are camping again so the good weather is a bonus. We travelled along the main highway and there was a lot of traffic but the drivers gave us room. There was a pass to climb over before we reached the border, about 8 kilometers of climbing with a gradient between 5% and 12%, we have not yet found riding form so we huffed and puffed a bit but the ride on the other side was a long gradual descent and we had about 20 kilometers of no effort at all. The border crossing was smooth and we eventually reached Bishkek and our couch surfing hosts, a group of five young men who are travelers themselves who have rented an apartment for a while to rest. These young men have been great hosts and the highlight of Bishkek has been staying with them. There have been other travelers coming and going, the apartment is full, one night there were fifteen of us. It has been like the United Nations with travelers from England, Denmark, Switzerland, Belgium, France, USA ,Israel, Germany, Ireland and Holland. Bishkek is not a pretty city, lots of broken footpaths and parks that do not get mowed, the shops are not exciting but there are lots of beautiful trees lining the streets. The people are friendly and helpful if we need directions. One day we were approached on the street by a university lecturer and asked to address a class of about fifteen students at Manas university who were learning English which we enjoyed and hope the students benefited from. While we are in Bishkek we will be getting the last of our visas, after Azerbaijan it will be visa free, hooray. Some of the young men in the apartment have had incidents with the police, who look for reasons the arrest people then demand bribes, it is the same in Kazakhstan. but we do not go out at night and have not had any concerns. Vodka drinking is a national pastime and can be bought cheaply, about $1,50 a bottle, anywhere including every corner store. We have managed to steer clear of vodka downing
Tuesday 7 May 2013
Still in Almaty
Still in Almaty,
We have stayed in Almaty longer
than we intended to because our luggage which we sent from Beijing did not
arrive in the expected 10 days. It took
3 weeks for the first box to arrive and when we enquired where the other two
were the girl at the post office just shrugged her shoulders. As time marched
on we were contemplating leaving without our luggage as we had limited time on
our visas.
When we first arrived in Almaty
we met an Australian, David, and his Russian wife, Fatima, who both work at the
university, while we in the supermarket and they gave us their details and
offered to be of assistance if we needed any while we were in the city. We got
in touch with them and Fatima went to the post office with us. What a difference it makes when you can speak
the language. The post office staff
traced our boxes to still being in customs, the reason they were not sent with
the first box is that they are damaged and they advised us to go the pick them
up ourselves as the next day was that start of a week of public holidays,
similar to our Anzac day, 29 million Russians died during the second world war
when Kazakhstan part of Russia. Customs were a long way out of town and Fatima
came with us and the boxes were eventually located. One box weighed 200 grams less than when it
left Beijing but we were not bothered about that we just wanted to pick up the
boxes. When we unpacked everything the
only thing we can find missing was Mike’s beard trimmer and we can live without
that.
While we were waiting we passed
the days by doing a lot of walking around the city, very confused by the
Russian spelling of the street names. We
visited the museum, climbed to a lookout where we could see over the city and
we walked along the river where the wealthy Russians live. Tas, our host look us to Almaty Lake. First we caught a public bus part way up the
mountain and then we had a long climb ahead of us but fortunately a private bus,
a very old one, taking staff who work at an observatory high in the mountain
stopped and gave us a ride all the way to the lake. The lake was frozen and very beautiful
surrounded by snowcapped mountains. We
were approached by two gun toting army men who asked to see our passports and told
us we would have to leave. Apparently
the Kygyzstan border is just over the mountains and perhaps something was going
on, we just left. Luckily they did not see us when we first arrived and we had a
picnic and a look around, unfortunately we did not get to walk around the
lake. On our way down the same bus which
gave us a ride up the mountain was returning taking workers down the mountain
and the driver stopped and gave us a ride again.
It has been frustrating for us
to wait for our luggage but we are packed now and ready to head off over the
mountains to Bishkek in Kygyzstan.
The food in Cetral Asiais very
plain. Plov is eaten a lot, rice with some vegetables and horse meat. We tried
the national dish, besbarmak, consisting of flat noodles, onion and horse meat
which we found bland and the idea of horse meat a bit off putting. Shashlyk are
popular and vary in quality and price. We went for dinner with David and Fatima
who knew a good place and they were delicious, especially the ones with
mushrooms. We discovered monty which we liked, a soup with onions and cabbage and meat. No Mc Donalds but there is KFC and Burger
King and lots of takeaway hamburgers and kebabs.
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