two days in Murghab: what to say about Murghab....

July 22, 2016

There is not much to say about Murghab. A rather desolate place in a high altitude desert.

It is surrounded on three sides by red brown rocky canyon walls, while the river valley to the east looks out upon two 7000 meter plus peaks in China. Most buildings, except for the hotel, are one story, white washed adobe square structures with flat roofs. Only two streets are paved, the main M41 which passes right in front of the Pamir Hotel on its way to Kyrgyzstan, and a second road which branches off and heads towards Kashgar China. That border crossing is still closed to foreigners though.

The beds in the Pamir Hotel are very nice, real mattresses and nice clean comforters. The restaurant is also excellent, even though they serve only a couple of dishes, there is some variety; and the fried chicken and barley soup are good. If you ask early enough they also have cold beer ready. And an absolutely wonderful breakfast! Two fried eggs, a crepe pancake with sweetened condensed milk swirled on top, bread with jam and butter, tea or coffee.

Murghab only has a couple of hours of electricity per day, but the hotel runs a generator most of the other hours to provide power. We can charge all our devices and use the computer almost non-stop. There is no WFfi and our sim wireless data is very slow, but by just letting it run for hours we are able to catch up on CGOAB, emails, news and a little facebook time for Rachel.

On day one we visit with Maarten and Edwin while later in the day the Super Cycling Man, Will, arrives. Day two is when Sarah and Tony and a little later Jo arrive. Will and the Dutch guys have already left by that time. We roam the container bazaar and several larger shops and manage to collect enough edibles to get us to Karakul and maybe on to Sary Tash.

Our plan is to get to Sary tash in five days and we’ll try to reach Osh in seven.

Buying goodies for the ride to Karakul. They love their cookies, sweets and chocolates in Tajikistan and sell them in bulk.

Traditional Kyrgyz hats in the Murghab bazaar.

Portrait. Notice the different designs on the hats.

Weighing our sugar cookies. The shops in the bazaar are all very similar selling pratically the same products. It takes some searching to find all the items you want.

Our route will take us first to Sari Tash, then to Osh.

Maarten and Edwin setting off from the Pamir Hotel in Murghab.

Kids eating icecream at the Murghab bazaar.

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