Day 88 to Samarkand, Uzbekistan, 388km, 7,614 to date

I’ve been web-disabled for awhile now, after crossing into Uzbekistan we couldn’t buy SIM cards without a local Uzbek passport.  After we arrived in Samarkand and checked into our hotel we got a small yellow sticky in our passports.  I guess this means we are now registered with the authorities and so are “legal”.  This hotel yellow sticky was the ticket to getting a SIM card.  Again about $2-3 for the SIM card and about $5 for 1.2gig.

I am continuing to have digestive problems, which is making me very weak, so again I took a day off and along with 5 others we taxied into Samarkand a day early.  

This was a good move because Samarkand is one of those mystical cities like Atlantis, that most of us don’t know if is a modern place or simply some pile of rocks in the middle of a desert that is thought to be the site of an ancient city.  The name Samarkand leads us to a world of dreams, of strange exotic places, the scent of perfumes, spices, fabulous palaces, bells of caravans, strange music - is this place real or imagined?  I can now tell you that it is a modern city that also has a huge collection of ancient (some restored) major buildings and mosques.  The area is heavily subjected to earthquakes, so the buildings still standing are a testament to the ancient construction methods.  Having said that I was inside the main (unrestored) dome of the Bibi Mosque today - definitely wouldn’t want to be there in an earthquake - it is all masonry (bricks and un-reinforced cement) construction.

(

 The following heavily “borrowed” from Lonely Planet): Samarkand is one of Asia’s oldest settlements probably dating back to 500BC.  It was the capital of the Sogdian empire until taken by Alexander the Great in 329 BC, who stated that everything he had heard about the place was true except it is way more beautiful.  The city was a key intersection on the Silk Road, connecting China, India, Persia.  It grew and was very prosperous through the 6th to 13th centuries.  It was obliterated by Chinggis Khan in 1220.  In 1370 Timur made Samarkand his capital and over the next 35 years created what was considered the cultural and economic epicentre of Central Asia.  This was followed by a slow decline and suffered from a series of earthquakes that left it essentially uninhabited by the 18th century.  The Russians are credited with resuscitating the city to what it is today.

This guy is Timur, not one of your nicest people, reported to have killed/murdered some 17million people - 5% of the world population at the time.  But he was very successful.

His grandson is Mirzo Ulughbek who became ruler, but is better known as probably the best mathematician/astronomer of the day.  I visited the remains of the Observatory he built, the remains being considered one of the great archeological finds of the 20th century.  The visit rekindled a desire in me to return to the study of classic mathematical astronomy - something else added to my growing todo list for when I return.

This complex is the Registan (‘Sandy Place’ in Tajik), composed of three Medressas (schools), Ulugbek, Sher Dor (Lion) and Tilla-Karl (Gold Covered). The first built in 1420 under Ulugbek.

Some pics from inside the Medrasa's: (yes, that is gold leaf)

It is rather hot around here...

What used to be student dorms are now souvenir shops:

One of the sidewalks on a main street in Samarkand:

:

I don’t understand the currency exchange here.  The official bank rate is 2,900 Som to $1US, however on the back market, i.e. the money changers at the gates of the markets, the rate, depending on how good a haggler you are, is up to 6,100 Som to $1US.  I managed 6,000, but I got dragged to his friends dried fruit stand, where I bought some very good walnut stuffed dates that for sure I paid way too much for…  I don’t understand why such a big difference between the bank rate and the street rate.   The inflation rate has been fairly high in Uzbekistan so that would account for some premium on the street market, but over 100%??

One of the riders that has now joined us here, Roger was also on this ride two years ago.  He started with me In shanghai and rode to Dushanbe where he became ill and had to leave the ride.  Roger is the person that found me immediate post my accident.   I never got a chance to talk to him two years ago.  Today I found out that I had crashed essentially in the middle of the street (a block from the hotel), and I was knocked out cold.  In fact Roger at first thought I was dead.  The locals wanted to immediately move me off the street, by Roger was concerned that I may have had neck injuries.  Roger was also panicking because he had no way of contacting anyone.   Carefully bracing my neck, they managed to move me onto the grass beside the street.  It was some 15 to 20 minutes before I came to.

And the location map showing where I am: