Stopover in Istanbul
Turkish Airlines offers a free hotel if you have a long layover at IST. I took advantage and I’m now at the Renaissance Polat Hotel enjoying a stopover in Istanbul.
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Up Next: Madagascar and More
Two of my favorite trips have been adventures where animal encounters were the point. I love observing wild animals, whether on land, in the air, on the water, or under the water. So it should be no surprise that Madagascar has been a place I’ve been eager to visit for a long time. Over 90%…
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Bishkek: A Warm Farewell to Central Asia
The final stop on my tour of Central Asia was Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan. And after the chilly days in Issyk Kul, it was pleasant and warm for our last days before heading home.
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Issyk Kul: A chilly welcome to Kyrgyzstan
Issyk Kul is the second largest high-altitude lake in the world (after Lake Titicaca). It is also the eighth-deepest lake in the world, the eleventh-largest lake by volume, and the second-largest saline lake. Since it’s at an altitude of just about one mile above sea level, it tends to be chilly here, though the lake…
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Quick stop in Almaty, and a Happy Reunion
I’m now in a place with very slow wifi, so I will not say much about the day and a half I spent in Almaty. Which is okay, since there’s not much to say about a place when there’s so little time to explore it.
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Nukus: Avant-garde Art in the Desert of Uzbekistan
Visiting the State Museum of Arts of the Republic of Karakalpakstan named after I.V. Savitsky (aka the Nukus Museum of Art) was a highlight of my time in Uzbekistan. To my thinking, there’s really no other reason to go to Nukus. It’s a very ordinary, borderline-ugly city in the middle of the desert. It took…
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Khiva: Beautiful Inside and Out
My OAT trip leader said that the real beauty of Khiva can be found inside the buildings. But I can’t agree. It’s true that entering many of the monuments reveals glorious, colorful tile work. And most of the exteriors are dull, monochromatic, adobe-like, and mud-colored. But for me, I’m not sure I didn’t appreciate the cityscape…
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Bukhara: A gem for tourists that’s a real gem
Even though Bukhara is filled with tourists and the things tourists love, it also ticks all the boxes for me as a lover of travel. It’s a delight to wander around here. The old town is beautiful, and its newest buildings blend perfectly with the historical ones. Bukhara was a major hub on the Silk…
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My delayed overview of Samarkand
We left Samarkand yesterday (now I’m in Bukhara). I started to think about writing this post two nights ago, but I couldn’t figure out what I wanted to say about Samarkand. I’m still not sure, but I can delay no longer.
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Tashkent: Monuments, Markets, Ballet, and Plov
As usual, I’m too busy doing stuff to write a lot about what I’m doing, but here’s a rundown of two days in Tashkent, the first stop in my tour of Uzbekistan.
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Khujand, Tajikistan: Not much to say
I don’t have much to say about Khujand. The best part of visiting this uninteresting city was the scenic drive from Dushanbe on the M34 highway.
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Tajikistan 101: Two days in Dushanbe
Sometimes it’s easy to select a representative photo of the place I’m visiting to put at the top of my blog posts. This time, not so much. Dushanbe has many fascinating things, but no one of them captures the feel of the city. Perhaps that’s because this city is really just 102 years old. When it…
