Braking Archives : August, 2009
New Photo Albums From Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan, although not initially on our place to cycle turned out to be a very interesting place with amazing, friendly people and interesting cities. See the country through our eyes with the latest albums
Random Musings: #9
The team is currently deadlocked over whether to visit Istanbul or Constantinople next. If only there was some middle ground…
Wandering the Streets of Bukhara
Bukhara, like Samarkand had many very old, Indiana Jones style buildings and streets to wander. Here are some of my favorite images from the city.
Black Markets Are Fun
The black market is the best place to get the best rate for USD in Uzbekistan.
Wandering the Streets of Samarkand
Samarkand, an ancient city in Uzbekistan has some amazing buildings that date back over 500 years old. Here are some of my favorite images from the city
Private Registan Tour (1 comment)
We learned that if you pay the right guard near the Registan in Samarkand that he would let you climb the Minaret.
Cycle Tourist Central
After cycling 6000 km across China without meeting any other cyclists on the road (except the Koons brothers who were heading home) we were starting to wonder if we were the only ones out there. It turns out that they were all in Central Asia. As mentioned in a previous post we met the Belgian [...]
Our Uzbek Family
It was no more than 12 hours into Uzbekistan before we were invited into a strangers home to stay the night. I caught some of this on video.
Glad We Didn’t Ride the Uzbek Desert
If there were any doubts about our choice not to ride from Bukhara, Uzbekistan to Aktau, Kazakhstan they have now been quelled after I just read Leon’s blog. Leon rode with us from Osh, Kyrgyzstan to Bukhara Kazakhstan and decided there to continue through the seering heat. Here is his latest entry which is well [...]
A Positive Sign (1 comment)
We passed this on the way into Tbilisi the other day: It’s only a straight line distance, but it means we’re getting there.
A View Through Taka’s Eyes
In todays digital age it has been extremely easy to bring you digital photos from our trip virtually as they happen, but imagine a trip where the memories you bring back are more than files on a small piece of plastic. This is exactly what our friend Taka does. We first met Taka in Bishkek, [...]
Our Biggest Pass in Kyrgyzstan
There is nothing like 2 and a half hours of downhill riding to remind you why cycling is so much fun.
Crossing the Border into Kazakhstan
To cross the border from China to Kazakhstan you must take a bus. Tom covered this in his post Borderline Ridiculous. Here is what is was like.
Back to Kazakhstan
By now you would have read the post about our adventure from Bukhara back to Aktau, Kazakhstan. This is what the first train was like.
48 hours
It was all well and good deciding to skip the Uzbek and Kazakh deserts and the accompanying 45-degree furnace. We still had the problem of getting three cyclists, bikes and bags all the way from Bukara to the port of Aktau in Kazakhstan. In this part of the world at least, the machinations of getting [...]