Kazakh Steppe en route to Bishkek

Leaving Samarkand a couple of days later for a shared taxi to the Kazakh boarder we pulled in to a petrol station to fill up. We were made to get out of the car (more Central Asian weirdness) and saw a sign on the wall of the building that seemed to state “no people allowed in car!” – all in pictures of course, but that’s our interpretation, and it was borne out by the pump attendants’ comical insistence that we get out. We then saw the attendant ignoring the fuel cap on the side of the car and instead crawling under the chassis to fit a narrow pipe to some connection under the boot. They proceeded to fill it up with something that smelt a bit like the gas that had heated the last place’s bathroom, but that also dripped liquid when they took the pipe out. Definitely Central Asian weirdness!

We made it to the Kazakh border - where we very nearly got mugged by taxi drivers trying to get us to take their cars for the 200 yard trip through the border posts - we were having none of it. Eventually got across (after having to fill out umpteen tiny bits of paper for Uzbek customs and despite the fact that they wouldn’t believe my passport picture was of me) and stumbled out into Kazakhstan – a long dusty road full of money changers and taxi drivers. We’d read about the buses to Almaty in The Book – but it didn’t give any information about where to find them. Luckily we were so pissed off with the pressure from the taxi drivers that we charged through them all and continued up the road, eventually finding the bus park. We chose the newest of the buses (not saying much) and bought a ticket from a scary looking woman who seemed to be in charge, but kept our bags close to us until we were sure the bus was actually going somewhere.

Food was reduced to ‘Something in Batter’ from a local stall and a bag of yummy (?!) Russian apricot biscuits and our usual fill of water. It was at this point that we discovered that Kazakh bus stations have the worst loos in the world. That cheered us up. Eventually the bus cranked into life and we loaded up. We were then further disappointed by the fact that the loo on the bus wasn’t going to be much use to us as it was used as a luggage bay and the door locked shut for the journey. We made an executive decision not to drink anything on the journey to put off the inevitable for as long as possible.

Then began a lovely night bus across the Kazakh steppe to Almaty. Which wasn’t great as we'd been travelling from 9.30am to 8am the next day. It didn't help that the road was blocked at some places and the coach had to off road across the steppe - not what the makers intended when they proudly build their Mercedes bus for the German transit system (according to the labels inside the bus) rather than the Central Asian dirt roads!
However, the view of the wide open spaces was pretty amazing - as was watching the sun go down and seeing young Kazakh boys riding their horses across the steppe to herd the family's animals back to the corral for the night.

Our ongoing obsession with Kazakh loos was fuelled by those we discovered in service stations through the night – when all the passengers were kicked off the bus at God forsaken hours and made to huddle by road side stalls watching old men crack sunflower seeds and spit them out all over the place (and pleasantly in the bus as well). Service station loos are holes in the ground with no partitions or anything around them - just you and all the other bus passengers in a line. And when I say “ground” I do actually mean ground, not some nicely tiled bathroom. Lovely. And enough to give any self respecting Westerner total stage fright! We just couldn’t.

There were some of the in transit food options. At one small village a women got on with loaves of bread and lumps of meat. She walked up and down the bus aisle hawking her wares and making up sandwiches on the spot for anyone who wanted one. Fresh, almost tasty – and most importantly, not involving batter.
We got to Almaty the following morning after no sleep and no food for 2 days - not feeling 100%. We then had to run the taxi driver gauntlet again with all of them trying their best to rip us off. After a horrid night – at one point waking up in cold sweats convinced I was about to throw up and desperately trying to find something waterproof to vomit into – I perked up, much to The Aussie’s surprise, but in response to the taxi drivers’ aggression. Eventually we got a cab into town, with help from a lovely Kazakh girl telling us what we should pay, only to find out that all the hotels were booked up for conferences. I could have coped with that fact, but wasn’t prepared for the legacy of Russian customer service. Women called Svetlana with scary dyed hair all yelling “no room! no room!” at me as if their establishment was so exclusive I couldn’t possibly be allowed in!

We wondered around feeling increasingly hopeless and considering going straight back to the bus station and heading down to Bishkek, until we ran into the international educational exchange office where a very nice girl helped us by phoning around and eventually found us a place that was well out of our budget, but did have hot water (most of the time).
After a nap we had a bit of an explore to which my conclusion was Almaty - just don’t bother (possibly because I was still feeling ill). Maybe in the future - but for the moment it is a smelly and very Russian city - a total lack of customer service - and the sad sight of aging Babushkas on street corners selling their belongings and pot plants to make ends meet; old men drinking in parks wearing moth eaten cardigans but with rows of lopsided, tarnished medals telling untold stories pinned to their chests, whilst young people strolled by enjoying the prosperity that oil has brought the country. We took a trip to see the Russian Cathedral – in the favourite Kazakh colour combo of turquoise and gold and then ended up at a Russian restaurant, with a KGB theme (!) eating suspect lasagne – but at least it was food. Despite the grime on the streets the city still has an amazing backdrop of snow covered mountains, it feels a little surreal to glance up from the dirt on the streets and see this panorama in the distance.
So after a day we set off again to Kyrgyzstan. We got a shared taxi from Almaty to Bishkek (with just a small amount of off roading) and found a much less Russian feeling city surrounded by towering snow tipped mountains. It is a very green place with wide tree lined boulevards and lots of parks all with the trees just turning to autumn colours. We checked in at a very random homestay with a friendly Kyrgyz family and sheets that did look vaguely clean......