Khorog-Dushanbe

In the morning we wanted some time to just explore Khorog a bit, but Ruslan offered to drive us around and show us things instead. We went to see the first car that ever drove the Pamir Highway, in the 1930s. It was a old Soviet truck, and it had been made into a statue, and after spending 5 days driving on the highway, it's amazing that a car of that kind could make it on the road that even our 4-wheel drive struggled on.

Then we went to the Khorog Botanical Gardens, which definitely weren't worth the 3 somoni entrance fee. There were lots of flower beds with labels in Russian and Latin, but nothing growing. We saw lots of clover, daisies, and some irises, but nothing special. We did get a nice view of the whole city of Khorog, which is quite beautiful and green.

We then stopped at the bazar, where we got some food for the road, and I bought some traditional crocheted Pamiri wool socks. Not like I'll need them for a long long time since we were out of the mountains and getting into regular summer weather, but they'll come in handy sometime in cold weather. Plus they are really pretttty.

We got a flat tire (again), but luckily Vladimir is a mechanic so he got it changed in no time.

Again we spent the whole day driving next to Afghanistan, which was getting busier than it had been. There were more villages and more people out and about with their cows and donkeys. If Osama is hiding anywhere along the Tajik border, he will never be found. There is so much wilderness, lots of mountains, caves, and tiny little villages that could be keeping him safe. Or he could have swum across the river and be living in Tajikistan like a Tajik- no one would ever know.

We spent the night in Kalaikhum, a small village. Our homestay was right on the edge of a river, so we fell asleep to the roar of the water.

The next morning we set off early again, because it was a long long way to Dushanbe. The first 45 kilometers were amazing- this part of the road had been redone by Turkish crews and was flawless- no bumps, 3 lanes, water canals, curbs, avalanche-prevention walls, everything. It was in this stretch that something went wrong in Ruslan's car, and the drivers spent almost 3 hours repairing it. We sat around in the hot sun, reading and waiting for them to be done. Good think Vladimir is a mechanic, otherwise we would have been there forever.

Shortly after the car got fixed, the road disappeared entirely. It was in the worst condition of any stretch of the whole trip, and we bumped around for hours and hours. We turned away from Afghanistan and then were high up in the Tajik mountains on dusty dirty roads

We stopped for dinner in Kulyab, a city along the way, and got ANOTHER flat tire. We got into Dushanbe after dark, and got dropped off at some hotel listed in Lonely Planet. It was $14/pp per night, but it was close to the center and one of the cheapest listed, so we stuck with it.

Our hotel was next to the opera house, and in front of it was a big fountain surrounded by outdoor tables and shashlyk sellers. We spent our first night sitting out with the Swiss couple, enjoying the warm evening and eating unfortunately bad shashlyk. It was the only evening when there wasn't a thunder storm, so we'd chosen a good night.

We spent 4 days in Dushanbe, just wandering around, staying in the shade to avoid the heat, and enjoying what we decided is the most beautiful Central Asian capital city. There wasn't much to see or do, but there are lots of parks, fountains (that were actually turned on) and trees. The next day the Swiss were leaving to spend 2 days at Iskender-Kul, a mountain lake, and then they were flying back to Bishkek to spend a week trekking in Kyrgyzstan. So we said our goodbyes and we were on our own for the first time since we left Kyrgyzstan.

Once we were crossing the main street in a place without a crosswalk, and a policeman was waiting for us on the other side when we got across. He asked us why we hadn't used the crosswalk about 10 meters away, and I said that there hadn't been any cars coming, so we just crossed there. I was sure he was going to ask for our passports and probably a bribe, but he told us that the crosswalk had been built for our safety, so we should have used it. He then asked where we were from, asked if London was the capital of England, and asked if we were enjoying Tajikistan. I said that it was pretty hot, and he pointed down the road and said that there was a river we could swim in to cool off. He then sent us on our way, wishing us good travels. So different from a run-in with a Kyrgyz policeman would have been!