Bishkek

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May 14, 2012
Hotel: Radison house; Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan; $50/double
Today was already our last day in Kazakhstan; it was time to move onto Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. We wanted to get an early start to Bishkek as we would only be spending one afternoon there. Originally we planned to spend a day in Bishkek, then a day or two going to Issyk-Kul lake. That involved some backtracking though, and we also added an extra day into Tajikistan into the plans. I had been in contact with a guesthouse in Bishkek that had arranged transportation onto Osh with a night in a yurt and horsesback riding. I had stayed overnight in a yurt in Mongolia when I visited a few years ago but none of my friends had and they all wanted an 'authentic' Kyrgyzstan experience. A taxi from Almaty to Bishkek including border crossing takes about 3-4 hours.

We set off from the hotel to the bus station in a taxi around 8:30AM. This was Monday morning so we saw lots more traffic and people out today than we had previously.. in fact there was huge line of traffic all headed into town from the western suburbs. Luckily we were headed in the opposite direction and there wasn't so much traffic heading towards the Sayran bus station. We got there and found the shared taxi ranks. These are cars or minibuses that have their destination written on cards.. touts yell out their destination. Shared taxis only depart when full.. if you are by yourself you may be waiting awhile. Since there were 4 of us, and only 5 seats we decided to buy the extra seat and get going immediately. The driver wanted 10000 KZT ($68) for the whole car to Bishkek... Lonely Planet said 8000 is better but he didn't seem willing to come down. As is usual for shared taxis, even when you pay for the full car it can take awhile to get going as they stop for gas, air in the tires, chat with friends, etc. We actually had to stop at several gas stations as some were out of gas/closed! One quirk here we noticed was many of the cars were secondhand from Japan where they drive on the left... our taxi was a right-hand drive Toyota minivan. That makes it difficult to pass trucks when you can't see around them! I've driven left and right- hand drive cars in many countries, but only once I had driven a right-hand drive car in drive-on-right country (Palau) a few years ago.. it definitely took more concentration!

We were soon out of the suburbs and heading across the treeless steppe which stretches 2000 miles north to the tundra and Arctic Ocean. The road was in great condition, a dual carriageway for some distance then merging into a 2-lane. One stretch was dead straight for over 31 miles. We passed through small farming villiages with tiny магазин (magazin or store). I noticed several necropolis/cemeteries built on the top of hills near towns. The mountains continued along to our left side as we drove west but eventually started tapering out, at this point the road headed south towards the border with Kyrgyzstan. Our driver only spoke Kazakh and was trying to tell us something, finally he called up a friend who spoke English. Still wasn't able to figure out what he was saying other than something about the border. We found out what he meant when we arrived at the border and the gates were closed to through-traffic (it was just turning lunchtime). They were still letting through foot traffic though so we were able to pass through. It turned out to be one of the quickest border crossings.. a quick stamp and a few minutes later we were walking across the bridge to the Kyrgyz side. This border crossing turned out to be just as hassle free. We handed our passports off to an official, a few minutes later he handed back our passports and waved us through the gates.. and we were in Kyrgyzstan! From the border we found a taxi into town for 1500 KZT, since we hadn't changed any money to Kyrgyz soms yet. I had loaded GPS maps onto my phone and was able to guide the taxi to our hotel directly.

I had booked the Radison Guesthouse for $50/nt per double. The guesthouse had good reviews and a few flyertalkers had stayed there on the $500 FRU fares earlier this year. The guesthouse is on a back street but within walking distance to the center of town. Rooms were small but had twin beds, TV, fan, A/C and wifi. The rooms were located motel style around a lovely courtyard with a chaikhana (teahouse) platform. We settled in for a few minutes then headed off down the street to find an ATM and lunch as it was after 1PM. We lucked out with ATM, just a few blocks away we found a bank that dispensed both US$ and Kyrgyz som (47:$1). I also found a change place that exchanged my last remaining 5000 KZT bill.

We went to the Chaikhana Jalal-Abad for lunch, a place listed in the Lonely Planet. It was a gorgeous place, carved wood posts and ceiling, old guys sitting drinking tea. The food was delicious as well, shashlik (kebabs), plov (pilaf) and laghman (sp??) which was a bit like beef stroganoff without the sauce. The best meal we'd had so far! After lunch we wandered through central Bishkek, going by the National Museum (sadly, closed today) and Ala-Too square. There was a huge Lenin statue that had been moved behind the museum. Bishkek was noticeably less affluent than Almaty, but it was a much more walkable city.. the blocks were not spaced so far apart. The weather was great, partly cloudy and not too hot. We finally ended up at Victory Square, celebrating the end of WWII before heading back to our guesthouse.

That evening we went to an Italian place for dinner. There seemed to be a good selection of restaurants along Chuy avenue. Many of the signs on restaurants were in English, so there must be a significant tourist or foreign worker population here. We did see some other Americans along the street but they looked more like contractors than tourists.

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