Pedaling from the Black Forest to the Yellow Sea

daily distance: 82km
total distance: 10,152km
riding time: 8-9h 

The majority of the day was uphill and a bad one at that. The much shorter part was downhill. But first off, tonight’s living quarters.

The area is amazing and extremely beautiful. And it was cold. That coldfront seemed to be hovering over the area for quite a while. But soon after this picture things warmed up and by the time I got to the pass it was warm again.

This is a picture which shows the top of the pass. Take a closer look at the right top on the range in the back. You can sort of make it out. 

The way up was nice and smooth until the turnoff to what will be a tunnel …

Until then, Chinese construction crews are busy working on it and not much is done to maintain the road over the pass. Nevertheless, a great many “Ni Hao” was thrown my way on the way up.

Here is the road …

and after a long struggle, I finally made it to the top. A small cry of happiness …

The downhill was similarly atrocious. The road had pretty much been destroyed by all the traffic. It was hard to navigate a way through the remaining rubble, with rocks protruding everywhere. Slight problem: it was getting late. By the time I was at the top of the pass, it was late afternoon. It had taken much longer than I had anticipated. Riding was impossible on parts of the uphill, it was simply too bumpy.

That meant that I wanted to get down into Ayni as quickly as I could. After 15km the road was again a silky black line and I thought that it would be a no-brainer. Little did I know that a Chinese road worker would eventually kick my bike, followed by a slight disagreement. You can hit me, but don’t hit my bike. The Tajiks around us clearly understood that I was in trouble in terms of time, but that meant nothing to him. I tried to reason that with all the Chinese construction workers going up and down the road there was no problem. But his feelings were hurt. He showed me his tatoos, his sunglasses were mirrored and his cigarette he held between his teeth. He reminded me of a dragon (sans the sunglasses I guess) and litterally spewed fire. What I didn’t know was that construction workers are allowed to throw stones at the cars and so kicking a bike is nothing to him. Eventually with the sun gone and it getting gloomy, I could head down the mountain and arrived in Ayni - the town where the German Agro Action is located in this area - just before it became seriously dark. The interesting thing again was that the 30 or Tajik drivers were all on my side. They tried to reason with him long after I had given up. There was no way this would work out I thought. Too many people involved wouldn’t help either and so I waited things out.

I was welcomed by the German Agro Action staff and together we had dinner before I crawled into bed. Tomorrow I’ll be off to Veshab for which the donations that this charity ride is intended for will go. Please consider donating!

daily distance: 107km
total distance: 10,070km
riding time: 8h

Out of Khujand and into the unknown. After a yummy milk and cheese curd breakfast prepared by Nodir’s wife I set out and started working on the hills that lay ahead.

Too bad I didn’t gain that much altitude quickly. But slowly things were getting more and more desolate as I was leaving the Western end of the Fergana Valley. It looked the same as when I entered after coming over Kamchik Pass in Uzbekistan. Long, long stretches of desolate dusty land with a few villages here and there. Very few though.

I went through the only - unremarkable - town of any proportion and passed a number of smaller villages. Just prior to Istarafshan, I picked up some yummy melons from this stand and had a go at it.

A lot more climbing until the end of the day followed through more and more alpine surroundings. All day long, I was either skirting snow-capped peaks or was heading towards them. Great scenery overall.

I ended the riding before sunset and found a good little shed to spend the night. It did get cold though towards the end of the day and I am getting a bit apprehensive about the temperatures in the Pamir region which is considerably higher. But for the time being it’s all good.

daily distance: 87km
total distance: 9963km
riding time: 4-5h

The wind was still there. And coming from the West. What happened? This is the wind I would have needed throughout Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Now of course that I am turning West for a bit, it is coming from where I could have used it.

Riding in the rain … What you ask? Yes, this is the first rain for several months for me. Tajikistan greeted me with rain. Funny stuff. The last rain must have been somewhere in Turkey.

One of the German Agro Action staff was expecting me in Khujand and so I made my way there. Little did I know a) what would happen there and b) that I would spend the night there. Despite the heavy wind I got to Khujand before midday and was greeted by a camera crew. Not just one, but two in the end. One was local, the other from national TV.

It was fun … Nodir greeted me and introduced me and after a lot of camera posing and running and biking around and some interviews we found our way to some food after which I thought I would continue for some more mileage. But Nodir seemed concerned and in the end I decided to stay in Khujand, figuring that almost 90km wasn’t too bad. The road will still be there tomorrow.

I owe a big one to Nodir for inviting me to his house. His wife had chided him for allowing me to set out over the phone at which point I had decided to stay. It was a good decision and made for interesting conversations. One little factoid for Tajikistan is that the maximum number of people you can have at a wedding party is 150. The biggest celebrations had well over 1000 people, growing in size over time to show how whatever people were. Showing off a bit is part of it for sure. So, the government decided that 150 would be enough. Crowd control I guess …

Another factoid is that the pass ahead is a whopping 3350m apparently. Great. I am at 400m right now. Two days and 2900m, can’t beat that.  

daily distance: 52km
total distance: 9875km
riding time: 4h

Here is the picture I couldn’t show you the last time I posted. 

It was time to leave Tashkent. I was glad I did and could get back on the road. The break had been long enough I feel and now I was ready to hit the road again. Running around Tashkent one last time (thanks for all the patience Ahmad), I ended up at the taxi station for the Fergana Valley. It is a busy place and when you get out, there are 20 hopeful drivers barraging you. All names of substantial towns were shouted at me and in the end I settled for one driver and got a decent price after the initial offer had been twice as much.

This guy needs cruise control though. His driving style was unorthodox to say the least. He kept getting on and off the gas pedal, slowed down when he talked to another passenger (about 20 km/h less and he did that often, turned out the lady was an English teacher half way through the ride), and he talked a lot, but sped up when another driver overtook him and went silent right away. On the downhill he kept switching off the engine all the time to conserve gasoline … But no passport control at all (quite in contrast to the other time I made the trip) and he got me there in under 4h. So all was well. A couple of things though. First, doing the trip three times now makes the area look very different. On the bike I couldn’t enjoy the scenery because the road was in the state it was in. Second, a word about police here. They are everywhere. That goes for the whole of Uzbekistan, but here is a typical scene. Driver does his thing and all is well. He maybe rolls a few inches over the line. A police guy waves him out. “You will get a fine.” This means trouble. But of course the officer has a solution. “You can avoid that of course …” And there it goes. Most people do of course pay. And the sums are substantial. For the area covering the Fergana Valley crossing I heard a sum of more than $1000 that has to be paid to the chief of police there. That is pretty staggering. You can figure out for yourself that it is being passed upward (where does it end you can ask) and that the total is much higher given that everyone in the pyramid somehow benefits.

Sherzod’s family really wanted me to stay for another night and I was considering it, but in the end decided against it. It was a hard decision to make, but I didn’t want to lose any more time. The Pamir is calling and it is getting cold - the last two days were nippy in the morning already. So I set out with a heavy heart - but will hopefully be back at some point.  

The ride was uneventful - it was slow going into the wind. A hard wind and I just barely made it to the border in time before they closed it down.

That was when the trouble started. The Uzbek side felt that they should search me completely. Empty all bags … something I should fault myself for. They had asked me for the money I was carrying and I hadn’t declared everything. When they saw the rest they said they would keep it. That’s when the searching began. I had to take all my belongings out. “What is this and this?” was all I heard. Having a sleeping bag was the problem all of a sudden. Then some copies of my passport. They couldn’t understand that I was taking more money out of Uzbekistan than I had brought in. The cards meant nothing to a couple of them - until the boss came in and said that “Yes, you can get money with this.”

At some point it was clear that they wanted a bribe, I was unwilling to give it to them. And so I thought this could be fun, grabbed my money in the middle of things and stuffed it into the biking pants (figuring that they would be loath to grab it from there). All the while I thought about the closure of the border in a few minutes and sure enough when I finally left (I was let go without a fine) it was past 5pm. This could be fun. A 10m noman’s land. Pitching there could be interesting. But the Tajik side was still open and everything was done very quickly. Open the book, close it after noting the details. Customs check … forget it. They wanted to go home and made short shrift of it. Good, works for me.

The Uzbek side of the border …

and the Tajik side.

I pedaled on for a while until it was dark. Bought a SIM card and got in touch witht he lcoal German Agro Action staff, found a place to pitch and turned in.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot - I have been warned yet again of the people on the other side of the border. Some things don’t seem to change.

The day of reckoning … for some reason, I had some butterflies in my stomach again. Just like in Tehran. I got in line before the Chinese embassy, many more people being there than on my previous visit. I talked to another biker and found out that Bastien is in town also, but I decided that I would try to be in touch with him only if the Tajik visa didn’t come through.

The Chinese visa … came through without a hitch. I have a shiny new visa in my passport now. And ran off with it to drop it off for the Tajik visa. Spent the rest of the day around town, waiting and waiting again. I was hopeful because I hadn’t heard anything until lunchtime. But wait. That didn’t prevent the embassy from sitting on the passport before for a full. Quite apprehensively, I went to the office and waited around … until the driver came back. Blank face … but a yes. I got both visas!!! And can move on.

And I would like to show you the picture to prove it … but the internetcafe is unable to even move the picture from the flash card to the computer. Sorry.

I decided that I wouldn’t head to the Fergana Valley any more tonight, but would do the trip tomorrow. No need to really rush anything. And I wouldn’t have to do the trip at night. Instead, we ran around trying to get everything sorted. And thanks to Ahmad we did. So, tomorrow I am off to the Fergana Valley by taxi and then to Tajikistan the same day. Moving closer to where the donations will be going … if you want to donate, go here for more info.