Adventures between a Cliff and a Wet Place. Brighty in Central Asia and Mongolia

Glad you like the RR. I'll be in Turkey at Christmas on the Central-Asia-bike's twin bro, also a black late 80's Transalp.

Go for it. Central Asia is getting easier. e.g. since July, Kyrgyzstan no longer requires a visa. My parents live near Duesseldorf and the "twin bro" of the Central Asia Transalp lives there. (When it's not in Bulgaria, like it will be tomorrow, tonight it's still in Romania).

Indeed, TA all the way. I have 2... Also got an Africa Twin.

Yep, will keep the rubber side down.

…and they did.

Sorry, no pictures of bikes in this episode.

After a parting of the ways with the others, I set off to nowhere in particular. Riding along I spotted a German TLC parked on the side of the road. Hans and Ingrid were really nice people and also told me of a big party starting at Lake Song-Kul a couple of hundred clicks down the road. So that’s where I headed. Over the next 24 hours about 3000 other people also went my way:



Some rode, some used the horsebox.



They were there to celebrate the 185th birthday of a Kyrgyz hero for whom they had just finished building a monument. A great place to build a monument too:



Horses going for a swim.



Some vehicles sported the not yet released in Europe nor USA 2013-model all new design, high tech, Touratech Alli panniers

They drank and ate…



The most disgusting smelling (and tasting) boiled horse broth. I again had to endure the stuff in Mongolia later in the trip. Conveniently in Kyrgyzstan other foodstuffs were available, unlike Mongolia.



The also came in Audi 80s. There were lots of them in Kyrgyzstan. Some showed off their pets.



They wrestled. The Kazakh and Russian competitors received the biggest boos. Luckily a Kyrgyz won the final.



People would regularly call you over and insist you took their picture. All they wanted was to say hello, shake your hand and look at the picture in the camera display. No requests for money, nor the “Donne moi un cadeau” sh!t as pedaled in central and west Africa.



I had the opportunity to meet young local women, dressed to impress...



...Watch horse against machine. Horse wins.



Spectate several round of "Horse murderball"(!?) (closest analogy is American Football on horses with a headless male goat as a “ball”)! You could tell it was a male goat because another part of his analomy hadn't been trimmed!



Said hello to local men, also dressed to impress.

The 48 hours I spent at Song Kul were some of the most memorable from the whole trip. Kyrgystan was my favourite country on the trip.

wow. just great and thanks putting up some incredible pics.

Glad you like them.

Down the hill from Song Kul



What do you do when you know there’ll be a power cut. Pump fuel into barrels and dispense using a bucket. No smoking please!



Camel at Sary Tash, an old Caravanserai Fort on the Silk Route, not far from the Chinese border.



Meeting the ladies. Nothing happened. Honest! But they did feed me.



Promoting adventure motorcycling amongst the young of Kyrgyzstan.

After Sary Tash I headed towards Tajikistan;



Dodging the rain storms



Mother and child on the move

A video

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The OSM base map on my Garmin was good, but not 100% accurate



The people you meet: A couple of Dutch bikers. Both bikes have xr250 paperwork. Which one isn't an XT250?



The people you meet: A crazy Japanese cyclist. I met lots of people on pushbikes in Kyrgyzstan. Most were heading for Tajikistan. They wouldn't be getting let in;



The people you meet: Some other bloke and his dad. Said his name was Leonardo Di Caprio. Also doing the ADV thing&#8230; Apparently the ship sinks at the end of the film.



En route to the Tajik border. Which way was the wind blowing?

Transalp eh? Think I'll hang on to mine for a while.

Great report, thank you.

These beasts are awesome, I know several people who made RTW trips with one... It's a shame to see what the current 700 has become... not an adventure bike anymore...

Great report too !

+ 1 and superb RR Chris...

Cheers
Potski

Hi Bert
I've seen you and your TA at Timpo's MM events in Wales. I attend too, usually on a DRZ, so you probably won't recognise me . Seeing how your TA performed in the Welsh mud told me that getting dirty is also possible on a shed.

See you next March, assuming you're coming to the UK again. Let's drink a beer.

cheers
Chris

Looks a lot like Kazak wedding dresses. I went to a Kazak<->Sril Lankan wedding earlier this year and the girl was dressed like that.

Ah, Buzkashi: Gotta love that sport. It's nice to have something more dangerous than Enduro to point out to your other half that you could be doing that instead.

Hi Chris,

Great pics!
We made it back home and are back to work...
Udo

So you mean these 2 were having a civil partnership? Bollox, I missed the party and the chance to watch some girl on girl action

Yeh, I think that's what it's called. Utterly mad activity. They were highly skilled and much more friendly than the Polo club ponces I've observed prancing around Windsor, Berkshire.

Thanks for the kind words. I recon the current 700 TA looks like a homogonised pile of Jap-built Eurotrash

Cheers mate!

Hi Harald and Udo
Good to hear you made it home safely. Work, horrid work. Needs to be done, I suppose. I'm already looking forward to by trip back to Mongolia and Siberia next summer. The bike is parked in the cellar at you know where.

I rode the "parts donor twin" of the Mongolia bike to Bulgaria in October and will fly back to Sofia and head for Turkey for Christmas and New Year.

Where is your next trip going?

If you're ever near Yorkshire in England please do look me up.

All the Best
Chris

Awesome stuff!

Glad you like it!

A short excursion into Tajikistan

The minor case of an assassination of the KGB chief in Khorog over 1000km away caused the authorities to turn off the phone and internet networks and close all roads and then force all tourists to leave the country. They wouldn’t want outsiders to witness the murder of their own people. A big shame.

And from a personal point of view a PITA. It meant I wouldn’t make it to Uzbekistan (not a biggie: everybody told me how unbearably hot it was there and I’m not actually that interested in looking at architecture anyway). On the plus side, I’d have more time in Mongolia later in the trip.





A little windy




A slightly spooky shot. I kinda like it. It was really windy. Down hill at 80km/h I had my own dust cloud overtaking me! And the temp gauge was on max too.




Mr Sadat and a Polish Af Twin rider called Robert and his Slovak mate whose name I forget. Nice people.




Full yard at Sadat’s in Karakul: my Trannie, 2 Polish Africa Twins and 5 Russians: 2 Af Twins, 2 Transalps 1 xt250 Baja




Ak Baital Pass at 4655m on Pamir Highway between Karakul and Murgab. The bike was running fine here, over a vertical km higher than when I had my cliff incident. Hence the theory regarding the dodgy cdi unit suddenly kicking back in and launching me into space. Or not?




The gps reads only 4 meters lower. Not bad considering the distances to the satellites.




Long yes, winding? My arse.




A quick panorama




A vaguely artful shot. Or not? Lake Karakul




Crazy Scottish cyclist called Stephen and Marek and Rarek from Poland




A solo (pretty) German cyclist... The following will sound really sexist. It is: On all my travels every time I meet solo female travellers, they tend to be “functional”. All the pretty ones have a fella in tow. This lady was actually very pretty and on her own, on a pushbike in the Pamir mountains!

I first met Christine at the border between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. We had heard of problems ahead and due to her slow average speed and her visa running out she had a big dilemma as to whether to continue on or not. In the end her decision was made for her: The authorities put her and several other cyclists in a jeep, drove them to the border and said “get lost”. Here she’s with my Polish mates Marek and Radek with whom I rode back to Osh in Kyrgyzstan.

Over the fence behind them is China




Yours truely




Getting gas in Murgab




An artful photo?




End of the road at Murgab. They weren’t letting anyone into the rest of the Pamir region. Bollox




Leaving the country