Kazakhstan, here we are. A lot and not much all at the Same time has Happened in the last three weeks. We made it out of Mongolia, which seems like a lifetime ago, hung out in China for A week, had a very interesting bus ride, and Arrived in the "Stans". In some ways its been a whirlwind, in others it has been an agonizingly SLOW crawl. I have come back to a conclusion I made years ago, I strongly dislike large cities! However I like what they have to offer, at times anyway, but most of the time they just stress me out and make me anxious. Too many people, too many things happening all the time, noise and constant movement, and always the smell. I will get to all that later.
Anyway, getting out of Mongolia. We left Khovd with promises of pavement and good scenery. Actually leaving Khovd was more difficult than we thought it would have been or should have been. We kept running into travelers. First there was Dorbina, a women from the Bay area working as a teacher in China and volunteering with WWF in Mongolia supporting sustainable tourism. She helped us out with some road beta via A biologist friend. Then came A couple from Hungary, well he was, she was from Mongolia, studying shamanism's as a thesis topic. Their road beta was more helpful them having been out there the day before. Then Dragan showed back up in need of bike maintenance help. I heard he made it to UB, I had my doubts, but I am sure he was smiling the whole time! For that matter I heard Volcan Made it too, I really like that guy, he's good people. Last but not least was a couple of French guys who had cycled our route in the opposite direction. We picked their brains, exchanged maps and stories, then finally 4 hours later than we wanted Were we off. As promised the road was paved and we made great time. I was however suffering from a bout of excruciating back pain that slowed me down considerably and would reoccur from time to time over the coming weeks. Those that know me know I have a history of random pain, joints, back, neck, whatever. Grin and bear it but this was bad and forced me to my back immediately once we hit Camp. Thankfully Kyle took charge on dinner and I luckily had A pharmaceutical answer for the pain (prescription of course). It was a rough night. Onward and back into the mountains the next day!
We cruised for about an hour and then we were rather abruptly dumped on the side of the road. We said hasty goodbyes to our new friends and confidants and set off to new adventures!
Anyway, getting out of Mongolia. We left Khovd with promises of pavement and good scenery. Actually leaving Khovd was more difficult than we thought it would have been or should have been. We kept running into travelers. First there was Dorbina, a women from the Bay area working as a teacher in China and volunteering with WWF in Mongolia supporting sustainable tourism. She helped us out with some road beta via A biologist friend. Then came A couple from Hungary, well he was, she was from Mongolia, studying shamanism's as a thesis topic. Their road beta was more helpful them having been out there the day before. Then Dragan showed back up in need of bike maintenance help. I heard he made it to UB, I had my doubts, but I am sure he was smiling the whole time! For that matter I heard Volcan Made it too, I really like that guy, he's good people. Last but not least was a couple of French guys who had cycled our route in the opposite direction. We picked their brains, exchanged maps and stories, then finally 4 hours later than we wanted Were we off. As promised the road was paved and we made great time. I was however suffering from a bout of excruciating back pain that slowed me down considerably and would reoccur from time to time over the coming weeks. Those that know me know I have a history of random pain, joints, back, neck, whatever. Grin and bear it but this was bad and forced me to my back immediately once we hit Camp. Thankfully Kyle took charge on dinner and I luckily had A pharmaceutical answer for the pain (prescription of course). It was a rough night. Onward and back into the mountains the next day!
The View. Not bad!
The Mongolian Steppe.
The road we were travelling was either paved or in a state of being paved. Apparently a joint Chinese / Korean and Mongolian project to link the Chinese border we were aiming for with the Russian border near Olgii. This is presumably for coal, something Mongolia has an abundance of. However you feel about coal, I personally do not really like it as a fuel, the pavement was a welcome change after the 1000k of dirt track. Where it was not paved it was graded and hard pack awaiting the tarmac. It made for quick progress and that second day we logged 120k. We would have stopped sooner, and lord knows my back wanted it, but a group of very inebriated Mongolians and their bemused, and seemingly sober, brother next to the only water source we had seen in hours and would see until the next day persuaded us to tank up and keep moving. The brother, who based on the look on his face, knew exactly what was up and appeared to get a good laugh out of it, wasn't bothered by our desire to leave. So with dusk looming we struck out for the pass (dava). Camp was nice, flat, and dark making dinner a headlamp affair and bed late. A leisurely morning was in order and welcome.
The next day we were awoken by camels. Lots of them.
Camels! Despite their cantankerous reputation
these guys were just chillin while we took our time
with breakfast.
Aside from the camels it Turns out we were not actually at the pass. We had A bit of a climb ahead of us but nothing too bad and then the promise of descending roughly 80k! To the dava we went! Passing workers and some yaks it was a pleasant climb. Then the real fun began. The decent was great, 25-35k an hour average and great canyon scenery coupled with a river next to us the whole way. Glorious. On the way down we were graced with some history as well! Turns out this valley has supported people for thousands of years. Grave mounds and standing stones abounded. Many of the stones were elaborately carved. Some pictures from the last post but there were many more. It was fascinating! Who had lived here all those years ago? It wasn't hard to figure why they had lived here, the river and the surrounding environs make for amazing summer pasture.
Standing stone near a very large grave mound.
Large collection of carved stones, these had been fenced.
The river. This was the primary feature of the long valley.
Close up of one of the stones. The sun at the top was a
regular motif.
On down the hill! A glorious ride past settlements, gers, ancient history, and stunning scenery led to camp next to the river. The next several days were occupied with intermittent pavement, another French cyclist, desert heart (we were on the north western edge of the Mongolian Gobi) and some half hearted bargaining for a shitty hotel room. Then it was the border.
The Bulgan border into China is a small thing that does not see a whole lot of traffic. We peddled up and were the general amusement of the day. There had been three cyclist coming the other way within the previous week so I am not sure why everyone was surprised to see us but they were. Surprisingly though we were also treated very well. We had heard horror stories about the Chinese border. We did have to un-pack everything and even show the guards the pictures on our cameras but it was all for show it seems. Most of the guards were just kids and they were more interested in practicing their English with us then anything else. They even fed us free steamed buns when the border closed for lunch and we were forced to wait. All in all not bad. We were even pushed to the front of the line and given special treatment to get us through faster! Once we cleared the border we cruised into the closest town and got a hotel.
We had crossed the border with about 400 RMB or about $75. We were hoping for an ATM in the border town but none was to be found so we had to face the prospect of making that last until Urumqi, the capital of the prefecture, about 500k away. We bought what food we could, got some dinner at a local Uighur restaurant (the Uighurs are an ethnic minority in China that are actually a majority in western China. They are mostly Muslim and closer in kin to the Kazakhs and Mongols than the Han Chinese . They are great and amazingly friendly people!) and crashed. After breakfast we were off the next morning. It was a 150k day through the Northwestern Chinese desert, which looks remarkably like Nevada, and it was hot but easy riding. One thing that did separate this area from other places, like Nevada, was the weird occurrence of random apartments and settlements that obviously support the large coal and nuclear power installations that dot this landscape. There is a healthy offering of solar and wind as well but mostly coal. It is a strange place. Any settlement you come up upon is primarily Kazakh and Uighur with a smattering of Han, and it is pretty dry. After that first day, and all of Mongolia, we decided that we were going to hitch to Urumqi the next day. 50 more k and we were at the main road and a small town. The cops, amused, asked us to pose for selfies with them, then we set about hitching. It was a slow process, a few trucks pulled over and declined, a few suvs did the same, one guy pulled over gave us water and a quarter of a water melon smiled and pulled off, and we finally flagged down a bus. It as a nice bus with AC and a movie! After we got on they wanted us to pay, we of course did not have the money so we managed to somehow communicate we needed an ATM at the station in Urumqi and off we went!
Typical Uighur / Kazakh residential.
View of the desert from the bus, 100+ degrees
glad to not be riding this.
The melon!
Inside the bus, amazing they picked us up!
When we got to Urumqi there was the expected cluster fuck to get the money for the bus but I managed to get it while Kyle kept the bus driver occupied and off we went. First stop was an expat bar for a pizza and a real beer! The food change from mutton to spicy noodles was welcome but some cheese sounded amazing! While at the bar we connected with Igor, remember we met him in Hotgal, and he connected us with a friend living in town. BOOM! Cal showed up and we had a place to stay! A free place to stay facilitated a full week of city living. Too much for me but the rest was needed. Cal was gracious enough to give us full access to his apartment while he had to work during the day. It was amazing to have a place to crash and relax after a hard seven weeks on the bike. Cal lives in the Uighur district, which is a great place to be, and offers a unique view of the city. Urumqi has a rough population of about 3 million, more than the entire country of Mongolia, which was kind of a mind fuck. The first night we were fed beers and kabobs by Ali, a local kabob guy (great dude but he can drink!). Hungover from that the second night we drank with Cal's English teaching colleagues, and hung over from that we met a crew of guys from Cameroon who fed us beers, and dinner, until we could take no more! The Cameroonian guys deserve a special shout out. These guys were awesome! We met them in the same expat bar we went to when we first arrived, Fubar, after they flagged Kyle down when he was ordering another round. They proceeded to adopt us into their group, buy us at least 5 beers each, buy us dinner, and just generally be awesome! They also made me really want to go to Cameroon!!!! They were all in school studying international business of some variety and spoke enough Mandarin to get by. They were an amazing group of guys!
Terrible picture but great people!
Also in there we met a kid heading to the states, Kent State in Ohio to be exact, to study chemistry. We were walking down the street looking for a place to eat when this Uighur kid runs up to us and says "hey guys you want to eat?" So not sure if we were going to get scammed or what we said "yeah!" and followed this guy. Turns out he wanted to buy us dinner and practice his English. He had only been studying for four months and his English was amazing! He has a history in veterinary medicine and will be heading out to study chemistry in the states. His name was Adil and he was awesome! After some great dinner conversation and food we exchanged contacts and parted ways but it was one more example of the amazing people you meet on the road.
Adil and us.
While in western China we decided to do the tourist thing and head to Turpan. Turpan is the site of an ancient silk road trading city and has been occupied for much longer then that. It also happens to be the second lowest depression on earth at something like 500 feet below sea level. Unlike bad water in death valley though it is surrounded be huge mountains so there is an abundance of ground water making it a massive oasis with huge grape vineyards and fruit orchards. It is said the best grapes in central Asia come from there. It is also home to some amazing history. Ancient cities, Buddhist caves, Islamic holy sites, ancient animist pictographs and petroglyphs, it is a pretty awesome place and also a modern bustling city. We got there via the bullet train. At 190k per hour it was an easy hour long journey. Buying the tickets was ridiculous, thank god for the English speaking ticket attendant, but the train was great. If only the US could get off its ass and build high speed rail. While in Turpan we visited a large city ruin built out of mud brick and by excavating the surrounding earth and a larger 17th century Mosque. It was hot but not so bad as to keep us away. At the end of the day we were rewarded with a spectacular desert thunder storm. That storm made me miss the sierra and the summer storms over the Whites. The sting of homesickness was not lost on me but it was a spectacular display none the less.
A Mosque in Turpan.
Corridors of the ancient city.
A Buddhist temple in the ruins.
17th century Mosque and the tallest minaret in
China.
Replica Buddhist cave paintings in the Turpan
museum.
Bow and arrow, reminiscent of those in Mongolia in
the Turpan museum.
Museum.
Dinosaurs!!!!! Also prevalent in the area, the geology
lends itself to fossils.
After our Turpan adventure we took the train back and prepared to leave Urumqi. It was a good stay but I was more than ready to get back on the bike and out of the city. Back to the beginning here and the smell. I wanted the fresh open air, the city air was starting to make me claustrophobic. Too many people. The writhing mass of humanity had left enough of its stench in this place and I wanted no more of it. That being said the city does have its own kind of raw beauty.
A butcher doing his thing.
The bazaar
Night time in the city.
The lights.
It was time to get out. Buying the bus tickets was easy, the journey not so much. After arriving at the bus station we negotiated the loading of the bikes, it ended up costing us some money, oh well. After that we were off to Kazakhstan. We managed to negotiate and early drop off so we could get to some rather scenic areas of Kyrgyzstan and avoid big city Almaty, Kazakhstan, and hoped for the best. It was a rather hellish ride in a sleeper bus. What this meant is that there were bunks, too small for even 5'6" me, and it was crammed as full as it could get. The 12 hours it took us to get from Urumqi to the border was filled with fitful sleep and frequent stops. Luckily everyone on the bus was great and even though there was a significant language barrier they adopted us as one of them and we were all in it together. There was also a guy traveling from Singapore who spoke English on there. This turned out to be a great thing as he translated for money changing, and other touchy things. Anyway it was a long ride to the border but we finally made it. The Chinese side was easy, supposedly due to a bribe the driver gave someone, the Kazakh side was a cluster. We waited with the bikes, were jostled around, and finally got though. Luckily the guards seemed too busy to care about us Americans with bikes and basically said "get out of here now before I change my mind" and we got out of there without a search. From there is was a matter of repacking and getting out of there. We were getting off the bus soon so it was a compromise situation.
The last hour on the bus from the border.
Unceremoniously dumped on the side of the road.
Now in Kazakhstan we have 5 days to get across the Kyrgyz border before getting fined. Kazakh police are rather known for corruption so hopefully we can get there. It is only 200k so I am not too worried. Then we are in the mountains again! The first few days of the stans have been good. The people are friendly, the scenery is pretty good, and the roads are alright. The final leg of this journey has begun and it seems like I have been gone for years rather than 2.5 months. To top it all off when we got to town tonight a women seemed to take pitty on us and just fed us fresh water melon until we could eat no more. A culture that can appreciate a traveller is a good one, these are good people.
It's late and I don't have much of a mind for existential thinking right now but the thoughts of whats next have been entering my mind. I will be back broke, in debt, and unemployed in less than 2 months. What am I going to do? I have no idea. Never grow up seems like a good plan right now. So it's adventure for adventure's sake I guess! On ward to new pastures!
