In the next few days we will follow the Panj River upstream and gain more and more altitude until we reach the high plateau of the Pamirs. Following the Panj River also means we will also follow the Afghan border. Today, we cycled the first 90 km and gained in total 400 m of altitude.

Cycling through narrow gorges

In the village where we spent last night, the valley floor was quite wide, but soon after starting to cycle, we entered a truly impressive gorge with high rock faces, with dimension I have not seen before. On a length of roughly 30 km the rock walls were going up very steeply for up to around 3000 m on both sides. The valley floor was sometimes only a hundred meters wide, from which the Panj River took up most of the space. The two roads, one on the Tajik side and one on the Afghan side of the river, were squeezed between these rock faces and the river and it was stunning to cycle through this narrow canyons, even though I was a bit nervous passing under such high rock faces, because there is always a danger of rocks falling down and the road was at some places covered with holes from falling rocks. And at one place, the whole road was torn down by a landslide, but there was already a workaround in place through lose rocks.

The Panj River itself was also very impressive. Now in spring it is basically carrying all the melting water of a large part of the Pamirs. Because of all the sediments that get washed down, the water was colored in a deep brown. There were violent rapids where the water was splashing up several meters when flowing over rocks inside the river. I am no river rafting expert, but I would never attempt to go down this river in a small boat, despite the awesome scenery.

After 30 km, the valley got a bit wider again, but not less impressive, as we could spot then better the high snowy peaks of the Hindu Kush on the Afghan side.

Life inside the gorge

There is not much space for life in these narrow canyons, but every few kilometers there was a small stretch of land either on the Afghan or the Tajik side not taken by the river. This land was then used for agriculture and small villages. Especially on the Afghan side, sometimes the houses were even built onto rocks leaving more space for agriculture. And where the slopes of the mountains were a bit less steep, there was also agriculture up the mountain flanks. They really optimize every usable square meter here in the valley in order to survive.

The political situation along the Afghan border

When I tell family members or friends that I am cycling along the Afghan borders, they usually get worried about it. But during the first two days, apart from the increased military presence on the Tajik side, everything was quite unspectacular. We passed quite a few Afghan villages with sometimes only a few hundred meters distance. The Afghan people on the other side were equally happy to see us as on the Tajik side waving their hands, children were playing outside, animals were roaming around. No sign of war at all. Sometimes it is a pity not being able to actually visit these small villages because I am sure the Afghan hospitality would be similar to the one we experience on our side of the river.

Staying overnight in Yoged

After 90 km impressive kilometers, we decided to stay at a homestay in Yoged, another small village along the river. Tomorrow we will continue the valley and collect more impressions of this wonderful area.

Detailed Track

Today we had to climb Shuroobod pass and descend into the Panj Valley. The valley is named after the Panj River which separates Tajikistan from Afghanistan on a length of several hundred kilometers.

Starting early in the morning again

Just like the night before, we slept again at some local farmer’s house. This time we knew the drill, the farmers will get up at dawn to get the most out of their day. And this was again 5:00. But this time, we really appreciated it, because for climbing a pass of 1400 m altitude difference in the sun, we were happy to not get the full heat of the afternoon.

Tedious climb

After the city Kulob, Tajikistan’s third largest city with around 100’000 inhabitants, we started our ascent. At first the road was quite nice, and it was a moderate climb. But after about half the altitude, the road turned into a dirt road with lots of holes and the tarmac was barely visible anymore. At the same time, there were some very steep parts and the road was also exposed fully to the sun. This cost a lot of energy and we had to stop a few times on the way up to refresh ourselves. As there were no shops along the way, we usually took water from springs. The water looked very clear, and I actually risked drinking it unpurified. So far I don’t regret that. On the way up we also got to see some tanks in front of an army base. We could somehow feel that we approach the Afghan border slowly, even though everything was peaceful.

After a bit more than 5 hours of climbing, we finally reached the village Shuroobod, which at the same time was the top of the pass. But before entering the village, we had to pass a military checkpoint because we were entering the autonomous region of Gorno-Badakhshan. For this region, a special permit that can be obtained together with the visa is necessary. For Anne and me, who had both an e-Visa, this was no big deal, but for Lucie first they said she cannot enter. But after disappearing for a few minutes with our passports, the Captain came back with the passports and everything was fine. In the meantime, Anne was taking some pictures with one of the soldiers who did not care too much about military correctness.

Descending into Panj Valley

After another extensive lunch in Shuroobod, we then started our 1000 m descent to the Panj Valley and hence to the Afghan border. The road started very nicely with perfect tarmac, but as it turned out, it was under construction in various places. So instead of a speedy descent, we had to cycle through loose gravel again and again. We were in the end happy to finally reach the valley floor with beautiful views on the Hindu Kush on the other side of the Panj River. Afghanistan was now only a few kilometers away and we could see villages on the other side that looked just like the Tajik villages on our side. It is hard to believe that this country is currently at war.

For those who did not read my previous post: We will follow now the Panj river and hence the Afghan border for a few hundred kilometers. This will give us a lot of impressions also of Afghanistan’s mountainous regions, but we will NOT cross the river to Afghanistan as it is politically too unstable.

For the night we will stay at a family again. It is nice to see that even in far remote regions such as the Pamirs, the hospitality of the people living here is still outstanding.

Detailed Track

On our second day towards the Pamirs, we passed in the morning through beautiful green hills and descended from our sleeping place around 600 m to a wide plain. At only 500 m above sea level it got quite hot today, definitely more than 30 °C. In the evening we arrived at the foot of the Shuroobad Pass near Kulob.

Getting up at sunrise

Because we slept with farmers the last night, this also meant we will get up when the farmers get up – and this is at 5:00. It was shortly before sunrise, and because we were close to the beautiful Norak Reservoir, we had a beautiful scenery right at sunrise. After a short breakfast, we left the farm at around 7:00 in order to avoid the hottest time of the day.

Scenic ride in the morning

Having spent the night on 1100 m, the first thing in the morning was to descend from the high plateau down to the flatlands through wonderful green hills. It was a 600 m descent, and the first 20 km we did in only 40 minutes. After that, we were cycling through less attractive sceneries, mostly fields and villages.

Long lunch break

Shortly before 12 we started our lunch break which lasted 3 hours. Not because we ate for that long, but we just did not feel like cycling in the heat outside. And besides, we already did 75 km so far, and our goal for the day was 110 km. In the late afternoon we then continued cycling and stopped shorty before Kulob, at the foot of the Shuroobad Pass. From here we will climb almost 2000 m tomorrow and descent to the Afghan border. No worries, we will NOT cross to Afghanistan, but only follow the valley for the next 400 km. On the other side of the river will always be Afghanistan and we should be able to see the peaks of the Hindukush.

Detailed Track

The Pamirs cover the largest part of Tajikistan and are located in the eastern half of the country in the autonomous region of Gorno-Badakhshan. From Dushanbe it is roughly 500 km to reach the Pamirs, so today we did the first part of this journey. My back pain got a bit better, but it is still far from being gone. But it was possible to cycle around 70 km.

Southern Route to Pamirs

There are two routes that lead to the Pamirs. The first one, the M-41, leads over the Saghirdasht pass (3252 m) and is more delicate to cycle because of its altitude. Especially in spring and after the rainfalls in the past few days, there is an increased risk of the road being blocked by either landslides or avalanches. Therefore we decided to take the southern route, the A-385. The highest elevation on that road is only around 2200 m and it is also the road that is nowadays taken into the Pamirs by most of the motorized traffic. In addition, the A-385 is paved most of the way, making progressing easier.

I cannot say anything about the northern route, but the scenery on the southern route started was very beautiful. In the background we could always see the peaks of the Fann Mountains that we passed earlier, and after 40 km we reached Norak Reservoir, an artificial but very beautiful lake. Unfortunately the lake itself was not very accessible for swimming, but it was still nice to see it in the evening sun.

On the map, the route looked quite flat, but in fact it is quite hilly in these region making us climb on bicycle again and again, in total more than 1000 m. Together with temperatures at around 30°C, that was not always easy. Nevertheless, the hills were very beautiful and offered nice views on Norak Reservoir.

Staying on a farm

When we wanted to set up our tents close to a small village, a farmer invited us to stay at their farm overnight, so we accepted. The farmers were living in very simple conditions, as you can see in the pictures. Three generations were living in the same hut that had around 30 m2 of space. They had their own oven for bread, and bread is also the main food they eat. For dinner we had some soup with bread, the same in the morning. Their life is very simplistic and when we arrived the grandmother was milking a cow, and donkeys and chicken were roaming around.

But what was also not missing here was a TV and mobile phones. It was again impressive to see that even in the simplest places, electronic devices are available and help people making life better. The mobile phone of the grandmother was ringing several time tonight.

Our sleeping place was outside the hut next to the bread oven. It was open-air, but covered. And due to the nice temperatures here, it was actually pleasant to sleep outside. Let’s see however how well we can sleep, there are plenty of dogs barking nearby, and the donkeys also tend to communicate quite loudly.

Detailed Track

Because of my continuous back pain and the heavy rain in the morning, we all stayed another day in Dushanbe today. Since we have seen most of the sights already yesterday, we did not do any sightseeing today, but we changed to another hostel because the old one was too far out of the city center, only provided one toilet for the 16 beds and it was at times quite noisy because people were talking in the courtyard in the middle of the night.

Moving to new hostel

In the new hostel, which is famous among cyclists and other backpackers, we met many interesting people. Some of them just came through the Pamirs on bicycle, others failed on motorcycle because there is still too much snow up there, and again another girl wants to hitchhike and walk through the Pamir in the coming days. It was an interesting exchange and helped us to prepare a bit for our traversal of the Pamirs in the following weeks.

Leaving for the Pamirs tomorrow

Since my back pain got a bit better today, I am confident that we can start cycling towards the Pamirs tomorrow. This also means we will be leaving the last big city for several weeks, the next one will most likely be Osh in Kyrgyzstan. So I am curious if I will keep on having good Internet coverage to update the blog in regular intervals, or if I have to collect the blog posts for several days until I have time to publish them. Nevertheless, the live tracking will always show my current position as this goes directly via satellite connection and is independent of the cell phone network.

After a long day of cycling yesterday and in total 9 cycling days in a row, I was happy to have a day off today and to visit the center of Dushanbe, Tajikistan’s capital.¨

The Bazaar

After a nice breakfast we were heading first to the green bazaar, which in fact is a market with mostly fresh fruit and vegetables, but also other things like clothes, shoes, etc. After having had a limited variety of vegetables consisting mainly of tomatoes, cucumbers, and onions in the past few days while travelling through Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, it was nice to see a larger selection of vegetables again, such as eggplants, peppers, zucchini. However, since we don’t cook ourselves here in Dushanbe, we did not buy anything except some strawberries.

Rudaki Park

In the afternoon we visited the Rudaki Park, around which many of the sights of Dushanbe are located, such as the government building, the national palace, the national museum, and in the middle of the park a giant flag pole of 165 height, the flag itself is 60 x 30 m and weighs around 300 kg. Even though we have seen many supersized flags in Iran and Turkmenistan, this flag tops them all and is the most impressive attraction in the Rudaki Park.

Dushanbe – a modern city

Dushanbe itself is very modern, completely different than the whole rest of Tajikistan we have seen so far. It is clearly visible that we are in the capital with wide boulevards, trees, parks with fountains, etc. There are international cafés like Segafredo, supermarkets, restaurants, and luxury hotels. While this is completely different from rural Tajikistan, we still appreciated a change in meals and infrastructure – probably for the last time until we reach Osh or even Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan in more than 40 days. That’s also why we had dinner in an Indian restaurant today.

Today was a very eventful day. When starting to cycle I discovered that my rear tire was out of air so I had to start a repair session which took longer than expected. After 15 km I had to take a rest for 2 h because my back pain did not allow me to continue, and then I decided to still continue over Anzob Pass towards Dushanbe in partially heavy rain.

Morning surprise

We stayed at a local family again last night and had a nice evening with them. However, they had the feeling that everybody should get up at 6:00, so we were woken up by the mother of the family. After a short breakfast we were ready to cycle shortly after 7:00. But unfortunately, my bicycle was not ready, my rear tire lost all its air during the night. So I took out the tube and fixed in total 3 punctures which probably got accumulated over the past few days. Once I put in the tube in the tire again and pumped it up however it exploded. One hour of work for nothing. The tube of course was beyond repair (see picture), so I took a replacement tube I was carrying with me. With more than one hour delay we started cycling down to the main road that leads to Dushanbe.

Back pain

The bike fixing and the bumpy road down to the main road did not really help my back pain to get better – more the opposite. So when we reached the main road, I told Anne and Lucie to go ahead towards Dushanbe, which they did. So I was left in a restaurant along the road in basically the middle of nowhere. I ate a soup and took some strong pain killers and stayed there for at least two hours. So I was basically left with three options: Either hitchhike by loading my bike on one of the countless trucks that are going to Dushanbe anyway, or stay the night in the middle of nowhere, or being unreasonable and still climb 1000 m to Anzob Tunnel and descend on the other side to Dushanbe, a total length of 120 km. People who know me can guess which option I chose…

Anzob Pass vs. Tunnel

There is an old road leading over the Anzob Pass on 3370 m. In beautiful weather conditions the view from that pass should be exciting, but the road to there is long, unpaved and very remote. Except from my personal ego everything spoke against taking the old road, such as the bad weather, the amount of snow still left in the mountains, and me biking alone today. So this time I was reasonable and chose the tunnel, which meant I would have to climb 1000 m up to the tunnel, pass it and then descent almost 1900 m towards Dushanbe.

One word about the tunnel: There are many reports that the tunnel is very dangerous for bicycles due to mud, water, ice and huge potholes on or in the road surface and due to being quite narrow. This used to be the case, however in recent years the whole tunnel was renovated so passing it with the bicycle was no problem, and because it was a Saturday, there was also not too much traffic, so passing it was no problem at all.

Descent to Dushanbe

After the climb and the tunnel followed the pleasant part. After a quick lunch at 16:00 right after the tunnel on 2700 m, I put on my rain gear. Accompanied by heavy rain at times I descended in three hours from the pass to Dushanbe and because the road was constantly going down and I even had tail wind, the ride was very pleasant. Also it was very exciting to see the changing landscape, reaching from Alpine climate with snow reaching up to the road down to green, warm and humid Dushanbe climate. During all the excitement, the back pain was only secondary, but it caught up with me once I arrived in Dushanbe and my muscles were getting cold.

Dinner in Dushanbe: The other side of Tajikistan

What we have seen so far in Tajikistan were people living in very poor conditions. For example last night in the small village, there was no running water, no shower, no real toilet, and the son of the family told me that the day before he took care of the sheep of the family instead of focusing on his studies. By far not everyone owns a car, there are small carts with donkeys on the road or no transport at all.

On the other hand, what we have seen tonight in Dushanbe was completely controversial. Fancy cars (Mercedes, Lexus, BMW, and so on) were parked in front of the quite fancy restaurant which was close to our hostel. Inside, there was live music with belly dancers, fancy food, and people walking around in expensive dresses. Anne, Lucie and I were really underdressed there in our trekking clothes. In was really a huge contrast, and this all within 12 hours. Anyway, I enjoyed a decent dinner after the exhausting day and a few cold beers and went to sleep happily – but still with back pain. I will have to rest a bit the next days in Dushanbe in order to be in good shape again before aiming for the Pamirs.

Detailed Track

After yesterday’s very steep climb to Iskanderkul and a peaceful night at the lakeside in our tents, today we went to explore more valleys in this wonderful region. The whole area reminds me a lot of the Swiss Alps, with the difference that everything is around 1000 m higher and the valleys are much more remote and infrastructure like cable cars, hotels, etc. is basically non-existent. If I were not on a cycling tour through Central Asia, I would happily spend at least a week in these mountains for trekking and paragliding.

Beautiful morning

Waking up at the shore of a beautiful mountain lake on a campsite was wonderful. The waters of the lake were deep blue and in the background, steep and majestic mountains were rising, some of them still covered with snow and beautifully lit by the morning sun. It was completely calm as we were the only guests on the campsite.

The only negative thing that morning was: I woke up with back pain. My back most likely did either not like yesterday’s bumpy roads up to the lake or I was sleeping in a weird position in the tent. It is the first time since I started my tour 42 days ago that I have problems with my back, which for me is not so bad because my back can be quite delicate. But I did not let the back pain ruin my day and we proceeded as planned.

Cycling and hiking in Sary-Tag

After many days of cycling we decided that we will do a short hike today to get to see more of the region than just the view from the roads. And in order to do so, we followed the lake with our bicycles and at its end Lucie and I cycled another very steep 200 m up to a surreal looking wide valley on 2400 m with a village named Sary-Tag. Once arrived, we were hiding our bicycles behind a bush and started hiking uphill, first on a small path, and then simply through loose rocks as the path disappeared. The goal was to reach a mountain pass on 3300 m from which we could have had a beautiful view on Iskanderkul. But unfortunately the mountain got steeper and steeper and proceeding would have been too dangerous. At the same time rain was coming up from the west, so we stopped our hike after climbing 250 m and went down to our bicycles with which we rode down again to Iskanderkul and later on a bit further towards Dushanbe.

Tough test for my Tout Terrain bicycle

Cycling with a fully loaded bicycle on bumpy roads puts all your material to the test, and I have to say, my Tanami Xplore from Tout Terrain resisted all the bumps, rocks, and holes on the nature roads when going downhill 700 m on mostly non-paved roads. The bicycle felt rock solid and against my expectations it was actually fun descending on those paths, even or especially with a fully loaded bicycle. After that descent however I need to readjust the rear brakes or maybe replace the break pads to regain the full braking power. So far my Avid BB7 mechanical disc brakes were however completely satisfying.

Sleeping in small village

While descending towards the main road to Dushanbe, the rain got stronger and when we stopped in a small village along the road. In the same village where we had tea with locals when climbing up to Iskanderkul yesterday, we were invited to spend the night in the house of a local family. This was very welcome because none of us felt like putting up the tents in the rain. And my back was also happy not having to sleep in a tent again tonight.

Detailed Track

Iskanderkul is a very beautiful mountain lake that is located at an altitude of 2200 m. It is only a short 24 km detour from the main road linking the Zarafshan Valley with Dushanbe, so we decided to cycle up to this lake today and enjoy the afternoon there.

Steep climb

Last night we spent in a small village on 1650 m, so we expected a climb of only 550 m today. After a few kilometers on the main road we entered a remote valley and found ourselves on only partially paved roads. There were several small villages along the route through that valley up to Iskanderkul, mainly in the first half of the track. There, we did not gain a lot of altitude as the valley floor was still quite wide. But after the last village, the road started climbing like crazy. I could very well use the low gears of my Pinion transmission, mainly I was in the 1st gear. Even like that, it was at times very hard to climb with my heavy bike through unpaved roads with loose rocks. In addition, we realized that the climb actually is 750  m instead of 550 m because there was a small pass in between the main road and the lake. So instead of an easy 24 km ride today, we were quite tired when we arrived at the lake and we were happy that we did not have to cycle any more today. But on the other hand, we are all very happy we took the detour up to this lake, because the scenery on the way up was simply breathtaking.

Relaxing afternoon

After a small lunch, we mainly spent the afternoon at the campground. There was plenty of time for enjoying the scenery, setting up our tents, doing laundry, doing bike maintenance, and even for a short 30 s swim in the very cold lake. Tomorrow we hope that the weather will still be nice so we can explore a bit the area that consists of several small lakes and mountain peaks of up to 5490 m.

Detailed Track

Today was one of the days I was looking forward most when planning my bicycle tour. We crossed the Turkestan Range of the Fann Mountains via the Shahriston Pass and then climbing again the Zarafshon Range towards Dushanbe. In perfect weather, we were rewarded with fantastic views in deep valleys and up the rock walls of deep gorges.

Cold Morning

Last night on the “container”-farm on 1900 m was not as relaxing as I hoped. First, the farmer’s dog had the need to defend his territory the whole night by barking at whatever moved outside, and second, it got quite cold inside the metal container so it was not too comfortable for sleeping. Therefore we only got up shortly before 8:00. We had a quick breakfast in the morning sun and then left at around 9:00 to climb the remaining 1000 m to the pass – or that’s what we thought at the time.

Chinese Tunnel through the Mountain

Lucie and I were very motivated to actually use the old road that leads over the pass at more than 3300 m instead of the newly built tunnel. But when approaching the junction where we had to choose between going for the tunnel and over the pass, we saw that there is simply still too much snow in the mountains and the road is most likely covered with snow. Not the best preconditions for my heavy trekking bike. In addition, we saw that the road actually was officially closed.

As a logical consequence, we decided to use the 4.2 km long tunnel. And actually the tunnel entrance was already at 2600 m, and not at 3000 m as I thought. A pleasant surprise. This tunnel has been built by the Chinese and after the horrible tunnels in Iran, it was very relaxing to use this tunnel. It had proper lighting, was very wide, the surface was in excellent conditions, and there was also not a lot of traffic. Nevertheless, I still tried to get through the tunnel as quickly as possible because the air inside is not the best. After about 15-20 minutes we reached the exit of the tunnel which was actually 100 m higher than the entrance.

Descending into Zarafshan Valley

After climbing 2500 m in the past two days, we now could collect our reward: A descent of 1400 m into the Zarafshan Valley. For about 20 km our legs could relax and our fingers were challenged with the usage of the breaks. It was extremely beautiful to slowly descend from Alpine climate with snowy peaks through various geological layers down to a fertile and green valley.

Once arrived in Khushekat in the valley, we filled our energy reserves with ice cream, Snickers, Mars, etc. Then we decided to continue our route south towards Dushanbe for another 30 km.

Climbing again on the other side

Tomorrow we want to visit Iskanderkul, a small but very beautiful lake in the middle of the mountains with an official campground next to the lake. This lake is a small detour from the route to Dushanbe but from what I heard definitely worth a visit. In order to have more time tomorrow at the lake, we therefore left Zarafshan Valley towards south again and proceeded 30 km into the mountains through a very impressive gorge that was carved by the Fan Darya River into the loose rocks. Even though it looked very majestically, it was kind of scary to cycle through this narrow gorge because a land slide or falling rocks had to be expected at any time. Only after 30 km the valley got a little bit wider and we found a village named Zarafshon, where we found first a small bar to get a well-deserved beer after a day full of impressions, and then also a small guest house where we could take a more or less decent shower and have a bed again for one night, before spending the night tomorrow on the campground at Iskanderkul lake.

Detailed Track