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Day 101 Thursday 28th April 2016 – Khiva to Nukus Leaving about 9.00am today so up at a reasonable time, thank goodness because our room’s window opens onto the balcony where breakfast is served and the tour group got out there just before the start of breakfast and rearranged tables and started singing and laughing - lucky we were awake.
Our taxi driver to Nukus was really nice and gave us a bit of a rundown on the countryside as we went through. The only odd thing was when he filled up with gas we had to wait outside a brick wall with other passengers, only the drivers could enter, not sure why, it is the first time this has happened. About 80%!o(MISSING)f the cars here run on gas so just about every taxi we have got has filled up with the stuff but this is the first time we had to get out before they entered the station. We arrived at Nukus about 12.00pm and booked into the modern Jipek Joli hotel with the taxi driver helping us in with our bags which is a good start to the town.
Aral Sea
Us on the shorelineThis town is modern and from what we could see has no character which is what we expected as the main reason to stay here is a jumping board to the Aral Sea. There is one other attraction the Savitsky Museum started by Russian painter Igor Savitsky who came to this region for an archeological expedition in 1950. He collected artefacts and art and petitioned the authorities for a museum while flying under the radar of the Soviet Union authorities. The museum is well presented and like all art “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, we saw some amazing sculptures using the base of trees and their roots and ink illustrations but a lot of the oil paintings were not to our taste.
There is not much else around the area and in the few blocks we walked, did not even see a corner shop to buy water or snacks, so we ate at the hotel which turned out to be pretty good after the meals in the last town.
Day 102 Friday 29th April 2016 – Nukus to Aral Sea Up early once again and we were the first ones down for breakfast. Bit of a shambles with the poor guy running the place had obviously not set up and then went into panic as more and more guests came down. Lucky we got in first so we had time afterwards to get ready for the day ahead. At 8 we went down to the foyer and checked out leaving our main packs behind and only taking our day packs. Our guide Uzak and driver Zafar were waiting for us and we were soon heading out of town in there large Toyota 4WD. First stop today was the ancient city of Mizdakhan, which existed between the 4
th BC to the 14
th AD when Timur destroyed it. Today the hill the town sat on is one of the largest cemeteries in Central Asia, and our guide gave us a good walk through showing us the many ruined and restored Mausoleums. Most have great stories attached like one that had a “Romeo and Juliet” tale as they found the remains of two teenagers in it. Another ruined building was apparently a Medressa and the story went that all who put back 7
Aral Sea
Our tents at Sunrise of the displaced bricks will have their wish come true, but rather than rebuilding the ruins people have chosen to stack 7 bricks and stones on top of each other and the site is littered with stone piles. One of the tombs is sacred and a guardian had to get a payment to enter. People are still being buried here and we passed a couple of graves from last month. A lot of the old graves appeared to be dug up and it actually looked like perhaps the corpses had dug themselves out vampire style, but we wondered if the place has grave robbers looking for gold teeth which just about every Uzbeki has.
After our fascinating visit to the graveyard we headed off again along one of the roughest asphalt roads we have ever had the displeasure to travel along, but thankfully this road turned into a rough dirt road which was less bone jarring just as we ascended the Ustyurt Plateau. This plateau isn’t very high but stretches right across Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan and was always the Western shoreline for the Aral Sea.
For lunch we stopped at a spot next
Mizdakhan Cemetery
Piled rocks outside Medressa to the Sudochie Lake, which was a fresh water lake that dried up in 1965 but the Uzbekistan Government has now been able to refill. The spot for lunch was actually amongst the ruins of a town that was once occupied by Polish Exiles that the Soviet Government had banished from their homeland back in the 1950’s. They moved on when the lake disappeared, and it was sad to see the small run down cemetery knowing the people died here so far from their homeland.
After nice picnic lunch we were off again racing along the top of the Ustyurt Plateau along one of the hundreds of wheel rutted routes that zig zag in every direction. Along the way we passed many gas and drilling rigs that dot this entire landscape. To our great surprise the plateau is blanketed in vegetation especially wild flowers, but we were told that come the middle of summer the whole place goes brown.
Around 4pm we finally stopped for a view over what is left of the once great Aral Sea, before descending down to the Aral Sea basin. The Aral Sea used to be the 4
th largest
Mizdakhan Cemetery
Interior domed roof inland sea in the world with a surface area of 68,000km2 (approximately the same size of Sri Lanka or Tasmania) and had two major rivers flowing into it, the Sya Darya in the east and the Amu Darya in the south. Both rivers flow through multiple countries and from the early 1960’s the Soviets decided to divert most of the water from the rivers for agriculture and principally for cotton farming. The Soviets didn’t think much of the Sea with one of their senior scientist at the time calling it a mistake of nature and they were well aware of what was going to happen so it came as no surprise when the sea started to shrink. As of today the sea is only 10 percent of what it used to be and will disappear completely within 5 to 15 years. Most people who know of the Environmental disaster think that the Sea was drained but the Aral sea is a salt water lake and it has shrunk directly as a result of evaporation and not having rivers to replenish it. As the sea shrank the salt content increased killing all the fish and at present the salt content of
the sea is 4 times the salinity of normal seawater. Kazakhstan in the north has built a dam to recover a small portion of the sea which is almost completely salt free while Uzbekistan has created a few small fresh water lakes like Sudochie in an effort to create a haven for some wildlife and restart a small fishing industry. As the water went the seabed was exposed and this led to dust storms that carried salt across the landscape destroying more crops and creating a huge spike in health problems for the people living around it. The weather patterns have also changed with less rain happening leading to a further need for more water from the existing rivers. Yes, this is a manmade environmental disaster on an epic scale.
Over the years there has been a lot of international outcry over the situation but very little has been done to stop it. The Uzbekistan Government has come under a lot of criticism over the years with cotton production increasing rather than decreasing and in general water management practices in Central Asia being very poor, with claims that anywhere between 30 to 75 percent of water being
wasted in poor constructed and managed water canals. Like everywhere in the world, water is a serious issue and here it takes on a whole new meaning with most of the Central Asian countries not being exactly cooperative with each other. Ultimately the decision to kill the sea started back in the 1960’s and no one since has had the ability or desire to stop its death.
Our driver was able to drive us across what was once the Aral Seabed till within 200 metres of the shoreline where we had to then walk the rest of the way due to the soft ground. Wasn’t sure if we could get to the water or not but we did and was at least able to touch it. We could have swam in it if we wanted to but would need to wade through potentially thigh deep mud and then have no way to clean off afterwards. Didn’t particularly want to spend the night in our tent covered in mud but we took a vote on it and it was unanimous – no swimming for us.
Our campsite was located on a lower level of the
Ustyurt Plateau where we were able to watch the sunset while our driver and guide set up our tent and cooked us dinner. Had expected this to be a crowded camp site but were the only ones here and discovered that at most you would find only 6 others. From our high vantage point we could not see or hear another living thing (other than birds and rabbits) for miles; it was as if we had the Sea to ourselves. The dinner like lunch was exceptional considering where we were and cooking it on a small open fire. The only downside to the meals was the swarms of flies followed by the mosquitos, and silly us we had forgotten the Aerogard. Just as it went dark we retreated to our tent for a restless night’s sleep in our small tent.
Day 103 Saturday 30th April 2016 – Aral Sea to Nukus Up at 5.20 to witness the sunrise over the Aral Sea-what a sight. Had read about the vanishing Aral Sea way back in the 1980’s, never thought I would ever see it and so I was glad to get
Sudochie Lake
Polish graves on the lake shore this opportunity but was also really sad as in a few years it will be no more. We had watched as the sun lifted over the last sliver of water from a mound just a short distance from our camp and afterwards walked back to discover breakfast was ready; boiled eggs, sausages, bread, and tea- sensational. While the guys packed up afterwards we had a while to have a last long look at the Aral before we hit the dirt road back. We initially drove back along the Ustyurt Plateau stopping for lots of photograph opportunities before descending down to the dry Aral Seabed. A lot of the seabed in this area is covered in scrubland some of it planted by the Government in an effort to stop soil erosion and the damaging wind storms. The area is also covered with heaps of oil and gas rigs and you sort of wonder if the loss of the Aral Sea is more of a bonanza than a tragedy for the country. It is sort of surreal travelling across a dusty landscape thinking that this was once a home for fish. After driving for three hours we hit the town of Moynaq,
which was once an island town with a population of 30,000 people most of who manned the fishing fleet and the fish cannery. One sixth of the soviet fish came from the Aral Sea so this was a large operation but all that remains of it today is a small number of rusting boat relics left as a tourist drawcard. Spent some time clambering over the old hulks before visiting a small museum where we watched a documentary. It was incredible seeing old soviet footage of the trawlers battling huge waves out on the Aral Sea and the large volume of fish they caught.
From here we were driven to a local home for a home cooked meal which as expected was pretty special. The people of Moynaq have been hit the hardest with the loss of the sea and the population has decreased down to 10,000, with high unemployment. The Dust storms delivered huge health problems to the people as well as the sea scooped up large amounts of fertilizer and chemicals and once the sea dried theses were blown back across the land. The Soviets also ran a chemical warfare plant on one of the
Ustyurt Plateau
What are you looking at? many islands in the Aral Sea and this too contributed to major health issues. So it was good that the tour included a lunch with the locals as it sort of helps spread the money around a bit and they seemed very happy to have us.
Just as we left Moynaq it started to rain and it continued to rain for the next 4 hours as we drove back to Nukus. We had been so lucky with the weather as if it had rained yesterday we couldn’t have camped by the sea. Got back to our hotel and said goodbye to Uzak and Zafar who were both fantastic. Uzak had perfect English and was able to give us valuable history and insight into not only the Aral Sea but about Uzbekistan, while Zafar was a great driver who never sped and had to deal with some of the worst roads we have ever seen. We both felt absolutely buggered but sat up till 8 having a few beers discussing what an incredible couple of days we have had.
Day 104 Sunday 1st May 2016 – Nukus to Tashkent Aral Sea
Receding shoreline Yet another early start, but today a tour group beat us to breakfast and we had to endure over the top loud conversations while we ate. Checked out at 9 and got a taxi to the train station for 5000 som ($1 AUS). The whole train station is being rebuilt and there is no signs anywhere but just lots of people standing around, but eventually we worked out where to go and got through the brief security checks without any problems. As usual we are always paranoid about missing a connection and got there an hour early and had to stand on the exposed platform in the cold wind, but thankfully no rain.
Train turned up at 10 and we found our cabin which is just a dual berth one so we had the very small room to ourselves. Discovered to our dismay that our cabin doesn’t have a power point so our plans of blogging all the way to Tashkent was foiled. Soon had all sorts of people wanting to drop in including a guy begging for money, another who repeatedly wanted to discuss Sydney football, despite only knowing a handful of words and an
Aral Sea
Sunset over the sea endless stream of others who wanted to sell us large smoked fish. Clara from the kitchen came by as well to let us know she can sell us Plov; sorry not today Clara, she is a real character you can hear her a carriage away. Most of the people that dropped in were fairly harmless but it soon lost its charm and so we shut the door, but it didn’t stop the “stare bears” who would open it and look at us like a zoo exhibit and then move on. Discovered that the door lock wouldn’t work but thankfully I did some running repairs and got it fixed so I guess I can now say “I fix trains”. The train was very slow with lots of long stops and mostly the landscape was flat and featureless and had us wondering –why didn’t we fly? About 6.00pm Clara popped in to ask if we needed food and we were now thinking that dinner might be dried fish, so we were very glad to see her. We settled on lagman which turned out to be quite tasty or was it that we were hungry? Just as she was leaving the football fan
Aral Sea
The vanishing sea was trying to enter our cabin and god love her she backed into him pushing him out and slammed the door closed so he did not come in. We were given clean sheets for the night which was good as the carriage was not very clean, so about 10.00pm as we were getting comfortable after making our beds up the door rattled which being on a moving train was not usual and we took no notice. Next thing the lock was moving and the guard opened the door barging in moving our bags on the floor, under the seat they had stored a large mail sack and he needed to get it out for the next stop, so I would say there is not much privacy.
Day 105 Monday 2nd May 2016 – Nukus to Tashkent During the night we were not disturbed again so got some sleep and woke up about 5.30am to prepare for the arrival at Tashkent. The first thing was a toilet stop, Scott went first and then me unfortunately the lock does not work well so here I am squatting side saddle over the toilet facing the
Aral Sea
Shoreline door when a man barged through the door nearly landing in my lap much to my horror. In Central Asia no one knocks or slowly opens the door, we have had cleaners in the hotels burst through the door without a knock and I even had a fight with a door in Nukus when the cleaner started to open the door (no knock) and I was standing in my underwear. I just got to the door before it opened and held the lock as she tried to force it with me screaming “Noooo”, Scott who was in the shower came running out to see want was happening, I eventually won after they persisted for a few minutes and they left leaving the master keys in the door. I have no idea what they are thinking but obviously they do not believe in locked doors or knocking.
After that excitement we were glad to get off the train to the usual taxi scrum that included a policeman stepping in to move them on so we could get out the gate. After the first few ridiculous quotes of 60,000 som we said “10,000 no more” which is double the
Aral Sea
The sea once lapped against those cliffs local rate and then said we will take the metro, a driver at the back of the pack called out he would take us. So after a very short drive we were at our hotel standing in the foyer but being only 7.30am we had to wait till 12.00pm for check in. Settled in the lounge area and checked emails and got coffee but we must have been making the place look untidy because at 9.00am they said the room was ready.
Lunch was a great plov down the road and an easy afternoon and a late dinner and a beer.
Day 106 Tuesday 3rd May 2016 – Tashkent Today is mainly catching up on forward planning and emailing but did go out to Abulkasim Medressa in Navoi Park. The Medressa has been converted into a workshop and training area for wood carving and painters, it was interesting watching the carvers doing their thing. We left without buying anything as most pieces were just too big and heavy to carry.
Stopped for a cold drink and to discuss the plans for Kazakhstan and the border crossing
Aral Sea
Sun kissing the Sea tomorrow. We know that we can get a 15 day visa at the border as of July 2015 but this info does not always make it to the land crossings, luckily we have a multi entry visa for Uzbekistan so we can always go back. Hopefully it will be smooth sailing and we will be sitting in a hotel in the city of Turkistan tomorrow afternoon.
After a couple of beers and writing lists of what we had to get done on the internet tonight we hit the metro to get home. The metro in Tashkent is just an absolute gem, the stations are glorious Soviet architecture and the trains run 5 minutes apart and are not crowded at all. The worst problem is the security checks and because we are tourists and the security is bored we get a lot longer scrutiny. Because of our accents people always have trouble understanding us and it is a battle for them to work out we are from Australia until you say “kangaroo” and all of a sudden everyone is imitating a kangaroo and laughing.
Got back to our room mid-afternoon and spent a frantic couple
of hours sorting out planning issues on the internet – in the old days those hours would have been spent catching up on sleep or drinking; god I hate the internet. Eventually ended up going old school and hitting a bar across the road and getting a feed that was huge because we basically over ordered expecting small portions. Probably drank a bit too much tonight considering we are not only moving on tomorrow but also crossing a border but we have a few other pressures in our lives at the moment and needed a night of discussing options. Tomorrow we are leaving Uzbekistan, a country we have mixed feelings over, but we both absolutely love Tashkent. Cannot exactly explain why we love this city but it has a great vibe and there is fantastic food to be had, and if you want to try plov, this is the town to have it in. Kazakhstan awaits us.
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taracloud
Tara Cloud
Kangaroos and the stare bears!
Fabulous adventures at the poor, dying Aral Sea and the wonderful cemeteries of the dead cities! Shocking the before and after maps--what a huge environmental disaster! When you said the lake was saltwater and drying up, I imagined it might leave great salt flats like Uyuni. Too bad it's dirt and chemicals--what a hard life for those left! Best wishes for smooth sailing across into Kazakhstan!