Dushanbe: flying to Tajikistan and setting up for the next stage

July 3, 2016

"I don't know what I really expected of Dushanbe, but it wasn't this modern, big and clean city" Rachel says. The streets are clean, traffic is quiet, though still driving fast, and on the right side of the road.

Our flight into Tajikistan goes smoothly, Tajik Air's service is good. At check-in, we are escorted to the oversized luggage, then escorted to immigration, then escorted to customs. During the safety announcements, first in 3 languages, with the translation to English where the oxygen masks will "magically appear". The bike boxes and all our luggage shows up without delays and seemingly undamaged. We had contacted the Green House Hostel and they arranged a taxi for the 2.5km to the hostel for $4.

At the hostel we immediately see other touring bikes, and motorbikes. During the three nights we spend here several cyclists come and go. An English couple of about our age, Tony and Sarah are also on their RTW adventure and have just flown in earlier this morning from Almaty Kazakhstan.

The bikes are re-assembled, we find a supermarket for supplies, and an ATM for Tajikistan somoni (8 to 1 USD). Someone sells us a sim-card for the tablet and loads it with airtime. It sounds like sim-cards are not readily supposed to be sold to foreigners, but some shops go ahead anyway. We'll see how effective it is in the countryside. Walking around we are reminded of Georgia, where the above ground gas lines becomes a grape trellis.

We explore with Tony and Sarah for a supermarket stopping in a nice "Irish" pub downtown where we have our first beef in quite a while. Patrick a steak, Rachel a burger. The wheatbeer is pretty good too!

After two days we are ready to go. We have decided to take the "Northern Route" from Dushanbe to Khorog. This route is supposed to be the more scenic, slightly shorter, but on a much worse surface and with a high pass. Most of the motorized traffic takes the southern route which is sealed. After Khorog we will probably take the Whakan Valley route towards Murgab, recommended by so many cyclists, but that decision can still be revised.

Back on the road tomorrow.

We had hoped to see the Karakoram Range and some of its famous peaks on our route from Delhi to Dushanbe, but instead it seems the plane took a more western route over Afghanistan. Here is somewhere over the brown Afghan mountains.

Arrival in Dushanbe. Our hostel has arranged a ride, the driver does not blink twice over our boxes, instead he lashes them in and onto the trunk of the car. "No problem" is about all the english he speaks.

Downtown Dushanbe architecture. We are pleasantly surprised by the wide boulevards and many trees.

Public Pub advertises itself as an Irish pub. They don't have Guinness on draft, but the local weisbeer is excellent. Patrick has his first steak since Pokhara.

Rachel goes for the hamburger and a weisbeer.

The courtyard of the "green hostel" is a coming and going of cyclists and motorcyclists. The Pamir Highway is popular with self supported overland travellers.

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