Russia

After barely making it out of Tajikistan, we arrived in Moscow at 1 in the morning. We took a train into town and got out right in the center of the city to try to find our hostel. After walking around a bit, we found what we believed to be the location of our hostel. However, there was no sign. We asked around, and were told that it was definitely the right address. The only problem? The building in which the hostel was housed had been completely gutted for renovation.

Plan B. We walked further into the center of town, through beautiful Red Square, to our second choice, Hotel Rossiya, which was described as a massive concrete block that was the official hotel for foreigners during the Soviet era. Again, we found what I believed to be the right location. This time, the building hadn't been gutted. Instead, it had been completely demolished. There was nothing but a blank spot on the ground, right in the middle of Moscow.

Plan C. It was 2:30 in the morning. The trains had stopped running 90 minutes prior. There were no more cabs to be seen. Thankfully, a local man stopped and asked us if we needed help. We had him take us to the local 5-star hotel, a Hyatt with rooms going for $1000 a night. Needless to say, we didn't book a room there. We sprung for something a little more down-market. That would be our last comfortable night for a while, so it was totally worth it. The next day, we hung out in Red Square again and then hopped an overnight train to St. Pete's. It's an 8-hour train and costs $30 each for a bunk in steerage.

St. Petersburg is beautiful, very European, and very young. There seemed to be a ton of university students walking around, as well as a number of cadets from the local naval academy, set up by Peter the Great. There are beautiful canals and rivers and consequently vistas all over the place. Right in the middle of town, off the Nevsky Prospekt (one of the world's grandest avenues), lies the Winter Palace, which houses the Hermitage, one of the great museums of the world.

We decided to devote a significant part of the day to the Hermitage, which houses impressive collections of art representing all the major European periods. After three hours, our stomachs growling and our tired doggies barking, we finally gave up, right as we were in the middle of the gorgeous French art of the 19th century. However, it was as good a time as any. We were worn down after carrying our 25/35 pound packs (respectively) all over Russia. It was an effort, but we eventually managed to complete a loop around the city that took us to a beautiful vista of the Peter and Paul fortress.

We were relieved to finally get back on the train after a long day on our feet. The overnight car was less comfortable this time--the berths are only about 2 feet wide and 5' 10" long, so I was forced to lie on my side with half my body hanging off the edge, but thankfully I didn't fall out of my bunk during the night.

Tajikistan, Part II

After spending a beautiful day at Iskanderkul, Middy, Jessica, and I hopped in our driver's old Mercedes and headed towards Dushanbe via "the pass," as opposed to the new tunnel. The significance of this distinction is that the pass affords amazing views of the mountains, while the tunnel is faster, but apparently scary, as there are sections that are flooded with water. I was happy the tunnel was closed that day. The views from the pass were amazing.

After a long day of driving, we reached the capital of this little country. Dushanbe is a tiny town, with little to report.





We had a nice dip in the dirty little lake to the north of town, somewhat eery as it was otherwise empty despite numerous abandoned day-beds and swimming/bathing facilities. In addition to just chilling out at Middy and Andrew's house, we made several visits to the local market, where we picked up provisions for our upcoming hiking trip.

It was a blast watching Middy rock his Tajik and swagger around the vast marketplace chatting up his friends and haggling over a handful of apricots here and almonds there.



We left burdened with about six 20 lb. shopping bags, enough to feed us all for a couple weeks. The real key to our getting out of Dushanbe and into the mountains, however, was processing our paperwork. We had to register with the authorities as aliens, and we needed permits to enter the Pamir region, where we intended to go hiking. Once we had registered and obtained our permits, we were free to go.

We loaded up a car with Middy and Andrew's boats and headed off at about 5am.



It was another long day of driving. We bumped and bounced over terrible roads for 14 hours, and were happy to see the Pamir Lodge looming ahead of us when we arrived in Khorog. Having sat in the front for the entire ride, watching the earth fall away from me to the right as our driver skidded around hairpin turns up and down mountainsides for hours, I was happy to be alive. As focused as he was, our driver failed to inspire much confidence in me in light of the several carcasses of rusted-out vehicles I saw lying in the raging river hundreds of feet below us.

The Pamir Lodge was a gem in the mountains. A successful Pakistani doctor built himself a beautiful home (in the middle of NOWHERE) in the Pamirs, and decided to add on a little lodge with five small rooms and a prayer room for the caretakers.



The best part? Each room was only $5 a night, and included morning and evening tea and sweets. At this point in our trip, any comfortable, indoor bed is a big deal.



After a great night at the Pamir Lodge, we headed off into the mountains. It was another long day in the car, but the difference was, this ride was steeply uphill. The elevation climb was noticeable. Our ears were popping and heads started to feel funny. Along the way, we had a fun moment when we stopped for another passenger and a couple of the Tajiks in the car got out to race against the schoolkids in the street. A little later, we stopped again for tea along the way.

Apparently this is an integral part of the typical shared cab ride.

Finally, after a few hours in the van when we were in the middle of a long dusty valley with no side roads, Middy tapped the driver on the shoulder and said, presumably, in Tajik, that we were there. A small sign on the side of the road said something about a UN water project, and a dirt road ran off to the left. We parted ways with the other passengers and headed off.



As was typical in this tiny country, Middy realized that he had taught one of the passenger's daughters in a language program. Of course, the man told Middy that meant he had to come visit the man as a guest.

We headed off up the dirt road. 3 hours later, we were out of the valley and approaching an alpine lake as the sun set. We set up camp in the foundation of an old building to provide a little shelter from the cold wind.




Middy cooked up the most delicious instant noodles I've ever had, and we snuggled up for the night. The next morning we were roused by a herd of cows eating the grass right around our little palace.



That day we spent trekking farther into the mountains, not gaining much elevation, but progressing well into the mountains, in search of a couple hot springs and some archaeological ruins marked on our map.


After a little wandering around, we managed to spot a yurt sitting out in the middle of nowhere, about a mile off. Andrew and I walked over to it while Jessica and Middy relaxed. 20 minutes later, we were chatting with a cute little Kyrgyz woman and her two adorable sons, one of whom was wearing a snoopy sweatshirt, which was so perfectly out of place in the mountains. The nice woman directed to the nearest hot spring and we were off.

The hot spring was more like a luke warm spring in a cinderblock hut, but still welcome considering the absolutely freezing stream we had to ford to get there. The sulfuric smell gave it character, and the dead frogs floating around in the water made it a little more exciting. After bathing for as long as we could stand it, we went to find the Caravan Sari, or ancient roadside inn along the Silk Road. The Caravan Sari, a mud-covered stone hut, was still relatively intact.


It was easy to imagine travellers sitting down on day-beds and enjoying tea just like we still do today.

Alongside the Caravan Sari, we found an ancient burial ground.



Each tomb was a shallow trench covered by flat stones and surrounded by a low mud-covered stone wall. Jessica took the opportunity to poke her head in with a flashlight and see what she could find, Indiana Jones-style. Middy, Andrew, and I had altitude headaches and decided we would try to conserve energy as much as possible.

The next night we spent sleeping next to a huge alpine lake.


The wind was strong enough to make it pretty cool in the afternoon, but it died down that evening, and Middy and Andrew's expert tarp engineering kept us cozier than we would have been otherwise, although with subzero temperatures, it was still pretty cold in our borrowed sleeping bags.

A couple days later, we were on our way back to Dushanbe, but the adventure was just beginning.



We spent another night at the Pamir Lodge and woke up early to get in line at the local airport (they don't take reservations). We got out passports in to hold our places in line first thing when they opened. Unfortunately, 15 people with bigger bribes or better connections got in front of us and we missed the first flight. They told us we would definitely make it on the second flight though, so we breathed easy and turned down a ride in a nice UN-owned Toyota Landcruiser. However, after waiting around the airport for a few hours, we found out that "they couldn't find a pilot" to bring the plane back, so we were back to square one.

After haggling with a few drivers in the local marketplace, Middy got us in an SUV heading back to Dushanbe just in time for our flight to Moscow. Of course, "just in time" doesn't exist in Tajikistan, so needless to say we didn't actually make it back in time for our flight.





Granted, we were driving overnight, but the driver certainly took his liberties. He stopped several times to pray, and several times to nap, and before you knew it, we were several hours late. Thankfully, Middy's friend Marydean met us at home and shepherded us onto the next plane for only $8 in change fees.

Update - More to Come!

Jessica and I left India happy that she had apparently been cured of a bad stomach bug by the hotel doctor, who also cares for the local king of Jaipur (who owns the hotel). We had a late-night/very early morning arrival into Uzbekistan, where we were surprised not to be searched in any way. Our pre-arranged ride did not show, so we accepted a ride from a friendly local, who then got us a special rate at a nice hotel, which we took full advantage of for the 8 hours we were there.

Tashkent was relatively uneventful. The most exciting thing for me was trying to get money to buy drinking water. After visiting two broken atm's, I found a friendly local who put me in a cab to the bank, where I experienced some good Soviet-style bureaucracy. It was over an hour by the time I got back to the hotel with some bottles of water.

After exploring Tashkent a bit on foot and on their cute trolley system, we boarded a train to Samarkand, famous city on the Silk Road. The incredibly uncomfortable seats were outweighed by the friendly locals who sat practically on my lap, one after another, trying to practice their meager English. One of them was going through the usual list of "what's your name? Where are you from? What do you do?" when we came to an interesting bit of information. I told him I was a lawyer. He nodded and then pointed to himself and made the international symbol for machine-gun with his hands, and making the rat-a-tat noise with his mouth, sprayed some pretend bullets around the train car. It was about this time that Jessica noticed the pistol tucked in his sock.

We also met a nice cardiologist on the train, and left our battered copy of The Economist with him to practice his English skills. He was one of the only Uzbeks we ran into who did not have a massive row of gold teeth--a grill, in the parlance of young people. All in all, the people were extremely nice and friendly, in stark contrast to the Uzbek regime currently in power, which boils ethnic minorities alive.

After a short car ride to the border, the adventure really began. We had no trouble with the Uzbek border on the way out, but as we walked across the no-man's land towards the Tajik border, we sensed something was amiss. The rifle-toting man at the gate started making signs with his hands for us to scram. We walked up to him nonetheless and tried to present our passports. I was hoping we could at least talk to a higher-up, when Jessica said "Wait--here comes someone!" I looked up to see a tall, scruffy man in a red hat and monochrome two-piece pajama-suit sauntering up to us. I looked back to the guard for a second, thinking that this guy didn't look very official, when I realized it was our friend Middy, who was greeting us at the border!

I had been expecting to see Middy, as promised, sitting under a tree in a pajama-suit with a good book and a melon (more on melons later). Seeing him walking around greasing the wheels within the Tajik border post was even better. However, even Middy, with his gift of gab and well-cultivated diplomatic skills, could not get us through the border that day, no matter how many games of backgammon he lost to the undercover KGB officers watching the border post.

Apparently, the President was in town for a local festival, so everything was shut down in the immediate vicinity. That meant that no one, especially a couple of shady-looking American tourists, was getting through this border post. In the end, we spent a night (about 22 hours total) sleeping in a field adjacent to the patch of asphalt separating Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. From the time we reached the border at noon until about 8 that evening, we were both pretty worried about being stuck out in the open with no sleeping gear and minimal food/water. We rationed carefully. We even scavenged some dried-out corn from the adjacent field and started munching on that. However, in the end, Middy took extremely good care of us, providing us with enough grapes and bread and water, and obtaining blankets and more food from the guards and other locals for us to spend the night relatively comfortably.

Tajikistan has the friendliest people I have ever encountered. A strong part of their culture is to be exceedingly welcome to "guests," which means giving ANY foreigner the royal treatment--the best food, the best rooms in a house, the best blankets to sleep under in a field in no-man's land, as the case may be. Needless to say, we were well taken care of, and actually too warm under all our blankets in the cool Tajik night. We eventually managed to walk right through the border post with negligible hassle the next morning.

We took a car to the local town of Penjikent and rested, and then headed into the mountains for a night at a beautiful alpine lake called Iskanderkul, a favorite getaway of Alexander the Great.

Agra – Ranthambhore

On our way out of Agra, our guide Deepak took us to what is called “The Abandoned City” because it was built, occupied, and deserted within fifteen years by Akbar “The Great,” the emperor who cemented Mughal (Muslim) rule in India. Akbar was famous not just for redundancy (“Akbar” is Arabic for “is great”). He also accepted all religions, abolishing the tax on non-Muslims and taking one wife from each of the major religions.

This is a cool room where Akbar sat and talked to leaders from all religions, who were charged with telling Akbar the best thing about their respective religions, and to prove it, a tall order to be sure.

This is Akbar’s huge bed. His wives and concubines kept him busy.

This is a cool performance space (literally) where Akbar hung out and listened to music, which was supposedly improved by being played over water, which also cooled the air and scented it with rose petals.

This was the separate palace for Akbar’s Hindu wife, who received special treatment because she bore him a son.

This section of our India trip was upgraded to an all-inclusive resort, and Jai (Jay) waits on us hand and foot, starting by filling the pool upon our arrival and bringing us beers and tomato-and-cheese sandwiches with the crusts cut off. We took full advantage of the pool.

Agra

We began the day with a visit to the Taj Mahal, monument to the enduring passion between Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan and his favorite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. It really is magnificent in person, particularly because the intricate details of the craftsmenship – stone inlays, etc. – are evident when you get up close.






Next we went to Agra Fort, where Emperor Shah Jahan was imprisoned under house arrest by his son Aurangzeb, just across the river from the Taj, which Shah Jahan could see from his window.

After Agra Fort, we finally prevailed upon our Guide Deepak to take us to a real Indian market street in the heart of the city, where the car could not pass. It took us all day for Jessica to convince him that we really wanted to see the real deal. He tried everything to dissuade us, including telling us that a Western-style mall was an Indian market. We refused to go into the mall and told him we wanted to go to the place where it is “so crowded and busy,” as he had described it in an attempt to turn us off, which backfired. Apparently most tourists are either (1) overwhelmed by the hustle and bustle, or (2) judgmental about how Indians, including Deepak, live.

After wearing out our tour guide, we took a nap and then went out to see a “6D” movie about India, which involved 3D glasses, a moving chair, scents, and lots of sudden blasts of mist in the face. It was surprisingly good and informative, if a bit short at 25 minutes, and damp. Afterwards, we went over to Deepak’s “Indian Market” (mall) for some Indian eats among some of the better-heeled locals. We were quite the spectacle, as usual, though less so than in the middle of the city.

New Delhi, Old Delhi

We started our day with a visit to the place where Ghandi was cremated: Raj Ghat. It is a beautiful and serene monument to a great man.




The Lotus Temple is a gorgeous Bahá'í House of Worship, which welcomes all religions for prayer, but not photography, although I was able to snap a partial shot of the ceiling—the inside was the best part, I had to try!




Qutub Minar, a stone tower signifying Muslim domination over the region, was built in 1206, with subsequent additions by later Emperors.




We drove by the Red Fort, built in 1639 when Shah Jahan shifted his capital from Agra to Delhi.



We swung by the President’s House and the houses of parliament and major Indian government ministries.



Just across the way (actually a mile away) lies India Gate, which the Brits built to thank the Indians for sacrificing 80,000 of their boys in the first World War.



We enjoyed seeing – and being – a spectacle at a Sikh temple.





Beyond the monuments and such that we visited, it is worth noting that Delhi itself is quite an experience. Driving is incredible, as lanes are ignored and drivers constantly honk to warn of their presence, pedestrians and farm animals are all about, and everyone just lives in the streets. There are no sidewalks to speak of, and if they were, they would quickly be turned into an additional lane. Where there is any space beside the road, people have set up tent-like structures in which they live and work, selling everything from bananas to jewelry to barbershop services, complete with barber’s chairs and mirrors, right in the road.

Indian Safari

Our day began with a knock at the door from Jai, our new favorite person. After our coffee and biscuits at 5:30 AM, we headed off for a safari in our Suzuki jeep. We had a 40-minute drive through town to the Tiger Park, where we were met by our guide.

After passing a Hindu temple, we headed off into the bush, over some very rough terrain. We saw antelope, Indian gazelle, spotted deer, a peacock, a (HUGE) buzzard, some other funny-looking bird, some monkeys, Indian tarantulas (crabs), frogs, and lots of butterflies and insects.

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…But we had just as much fun taking pictures of all the animals and people in town.