1. Khojand.
In Sovjet times Stalin created some strange
jigsaw puzzle borders for the autonomous
Sovjet Replublics in Central Asia.
The mainly Tajik provinces of Bukhara and
Samarkand became part of Uzbekistan, the
mainly Uzbek province of Khojand became
part of Tajikistan, just to give it enough
square kms and population. There are even
a couple of Uzbek enclaves in Kyrgyzstan.
Khojand is a pleasant city on the Sir Darya
river with beaches, restaurants and parks
and remains the odd one out in Tajikistan.
2. Road works near Ora Teppa.
All the way from the Uzbek border to Ayni
we came across roads in various states of
construction. Chinese companies are upgrading
the roads all over Tajikistan in order to
make the country better accessible.
Several detours were made around major works with
slow progress and torture for bikes and bodies
as result: we were to early you could say!
 
3. Sharistan Pass, 3378m.
This was our first 3000m pass. We waited until
after lunch to start the main climb due to rain.
The legs protested higher up, but all in all
everything went fine. On the pass we had a 
fantastic sunset view over the Fan Mountains.
The descent on the other side was quite
different: steeper it seemed, very bad and
rough road due to the Chinese blasting to
widen it. They are also making a tunnel here.
When it became too dark to continue
on this seemingly endless rocky descent, at
parts dangerous, we stopped at a road workers
camp and ate and slept in a Tajik cabin.
The next morning we continued refreshed, but
it was still a long way down to Ayni, where
the road had turned into thick red mud.
Amazing rock formations down at the river
with a detour via a temporary bridge and
we finally arrived in the village where we
could clean the bikes and rest a little.
Ayni is a major junction town with amazingly
few (little) shops, an almost empty bazaar and
for the rest almost a ghost town.
We met a Tajik woman in our hotel, who had been
working and living there for a German Aid
organisation and the UN for more than 4 years
and she was dying to go back to her hometown of
Khojand since she started here...!
4. Kullikalon.
We left our bikes in Ayni and did a sidetrip
by taxi/bus/hitchhiking to Artuch in the
Fan Mountains. After a night in the well-
equipped Alplager we walked up over a 3000m
pass, where we had this view over the Kulli-
kalon, a mountain valley with several lakes.
We camped in between some smaller lakes and
walked out the next day, returning the next
day back to Ayni.
  
5. Iskanderkul.
On the way to Dushanbe, the capital, we had some
relatively good road through an awesome river canyon
and made a detour to this beautifully situated
mountain lake. To get there though we had to
climb for about 7km over a steep bluff.
Well worth the detour also because we met up
surprisingly with fellow travellers there.
The swim at the end of the day was VERY
refreshing I can tell you; the food in this
alplager was however not so good. We had fried
eggs and sausage with bread for dinner and
breakfast. A friendly local guest gave us his
big leftover meal and watermelon which was
accepted gratefully.
6. Anzab Pass, 3373m.
Further on the way to Dushanbe roads were deteriorating
again before and after this pass. The Chinese are
constructing a tunnel here as well. The reason is
obvious as you can see: to keep away from glacier
passages like this!
7. Garam Chasma.
After two days in Dushanbe and half way our 1-month
visa we took a taxi to Khorog, to be able to cycle
at least the stretch through the Pamirs entirely.
We left Khorog in stormy conditions for a short
afternoon trip to the hot springs of Garam Chasma:
little Pamukkele (Turkey)!
We stayed here an extra day to give my stomach
some rest before continuing along the Panj river;
that is how the Amudarya (formerly Oxus) river and
main drain of the Pamir region is called here.
8. Carpet Cleaning.
The road being not exactly busy with traffic
people use it for other purposes!
A very jolly bunch Pamiri women in bright
colours and with flickering golden teeth.
They have their own customs, language and
outfit, like other valley tribes.
9. Wakhan Corridor.
Cycling along the Panj and later Pamir
river with great views into every valley
of mountains on the Afghan side.
The Wakhan Corridor is a small, narrow
piece of Afghan territory that separates
Pakistan from Tajikistan.
10. Push.
Climbing out of Langar was a major task.
The road was steep and consisted mainly of
coarse loose gravel. Luckily we each had two
little helpers pushing us up the worst part!
11. Camp.
Not every campsite was so perfect as this one:
green grass, small river, nice view and nobody
around except a couple of camels on the Afghan
side! We underestimated the water flow though;
it had been warm summer weather for quite
some time and the river side streams that
ran through the green paddock became bigger
with the melt water forcing us to move the tent
to higher and drier grounds.
12. Pamir Shepherd Family.
Very bad roads had slowed us down considerably
along this alternative route.
Having climbed over the Khargush Pass, 4344m,
we finally arrived on the Pamir Plateau.
We had poured away our fresh water reserves
to save weight for the climb, hoping to take
fresh on the way down. Helas, no clean water!
We cooked pasta with water from a salt lake,
which was too salty. Imagine our joy the
next day, when we had rolled onto the Pamir
Highway on smooth asphalt rolling down, to
find this family waiting beside the road to
welcome us with just collected fresh water
and later cool fresh yoghurt, tea and deli-
cious homemade bread!!
13. Ak balik Spring.
Further down the road around lunch time we
stopped at this holy White Fish Spring to
collect more water and eat fried fish in
the little restaurant next to it, frequented
by Chinese truck drivers.
 
14. Pamir Highway.
Apart from the occasional truck, car or
motorbike we mostly rolled side by side
over almost perfect road with barren
mountains all around, especially very
impressive early morning and late
afternoon. Most of the way to Murgab
was downhill and because of a big tailwind
we hardly noticed going over a small pass.
15. Ak Baytal Pass, 4655m.
Turning north, we fought against headwind
that became very strong from midday onwards.
The last steep climb, starting at this sign,
took us over the highest pass, but not after
we were invited for tea, bread and by the
pass caretaker.
16. Qarakol.
Strong winds, good progress and rain made us
stop for a rest day after a short ride at a 
homestay near Lake Qarakol at 3915m.
The next day we continued with beautiful
weather up and over two 4000m passes and over the
Tajik border. We stayed with a family just over
the last pass, 16km before the Kyrgyz border post.

Let's go: