Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan: Song-Kol, the Fergana Valley and Samarkand

1. Day 1: Arrive in Bishkek

   Manas International Airport (FRU) to your hotel in Bishkek, then a walk in the centre

   • Drive about 45 min
   • Dinner
   • Stay in Bishkek
   Day 1 details

   Fly into Manas International Airport (FRU), about 30 km north of Bishkek, where a driver meets you for the 40-minute ride into the city. Many flights from Istanbul and the Gulf land early in the morning, so your room may not be ready at once; leave your bag and rest. Plan to land by about 2 pm to join the late-afternoon walk. Your See Sight Tours guide meets the group at the hotel and walks you through the leafy centre: Ala-Too Square, where the statue of the epic hero Manas stands in front of the State History Museum, the honour guard at the flagpole, Oak Park with its open-air sculptures, and Erkindik Boulevard. Bishkek was a Kokand clay fort in the 1820s and was laid out as a Russian and then Soviet town, so it is green, flat and easy on foot. Over a welcome dinner your guide explains the next days: the long drive to Song-Kol, what the yurt camp is like at 3,000 m, and how the border works.

   Included

   • Pick-up at Manas International Airport (FRU)
   • Late-afternoon walk with your guide: Ala-Too Square, the Manas statue, Oak Park and Erkindik Boulevard
   • Welcome dinner and briefing

   Free time: Free until the late-afternoon walk

   Activity: Land by about 2 pm to join the walk. The welcome dinner is the fixed point of the day: if you land later, a driver still meets you and you join the group at dinner.

2. Day 2: Burana Tower, Kochkor and up to Song-Kol

   Bishkek to Burana Tower, Kochkor and Song-Kol over the Kalmak-Ashuu pass

   • Drive about 7 h
   • Breakfast, lunch and dinner
   • Stay in Song-Kol
   Day 2 details

   This is one of the trip's two long road days, about seven hours of driving, because there is only one practical road to Song-Kol and it starts at Kochkor. We break it into three parts. We leave at 8 am and drive an hour east to Burana Tower, the stump of an 11th-century minaret that is nearly all that remains of Balasagun; it is part of the Silk Roads World Heritage listing of 2014. Climb the narrow stair inside, then walk among the balbals, carved stone grave markers, in the field below. We follow the Chuy valley through the Boom Gorge to Balykchy at the western end of Issyk-Kul and turn south to Kochkor for a home-cooked lunch and a visit to a women's felt cooperative, where shyrdak rugs are cut and stitched by hand. After lunch the gravel road climbs over the Kalmak-Ashuu pass, at about 3,400 m, with photo stops, and drops onto the high pasture around the lake. We reach the yurt camp in the late afternoon, in time for tea, a walk to the shore and dinner.

   Included

   • Burana Tower, its small museum and the balbal field
   • Home-cooked lunch in Kochkor
   • Shyrdak felt workshop at a women's cooperative in Kochkor
   • Dinner at the Song-Kol yurt camp

   Free time: Late afternoon free at the lake

   Activity: The camp is at about 3,000 m. Take the first evening slowly, drink water and tell your guide if you have a headache.

   

3. Day 3: A whole day on the shore of Song-Kol

   Song-Kol, on foot and on horseback

   • Breakfast, lunch and dinner
   • Stay in Song-Kol
   Day 3 details

   Day 3 is a full day at the lake. Song-Kol lies at about 3,016 m on a wide summer pasture, a jailoo, where herding families bring their horses, sheep and yaks up from the valleys for the warm months and live in yurts. Get up for sunrise if you like: the light comes over the eastern ridges onto still water and the horses are already moving. After breakfast a local horseman leads an easy ride at walking pace along the shore, about two hours, or you walk the same way with your guide. We stop at a herding family's yurt for bread, cream and tea, and to see how a yurt is put together and how kymyz, fermented mare's milk, is made. Lunch is at camp, and the middle of the day is yours: read in the sun, nap, or walk the shore on your own. Late in the afternoon the light turns gold on the grass. After dinner, with no town for many kilometres, the stars are very bright.

   Included

   • Morning horse ride along the shore with a local horseman (about 2 hours, at a walk), or a guided walk
   • Visit to a herding family's yurt with bread and tea
   • All meals at camp

   Easier option: Skip the ride and walk the shore at your own pace, or stay at camp.

   More active option: A guided walk of about 3 hours up to a ridge above the lake, to about 3,300 m, for the view over the whole basin.

   Free time: Middle of the day free at camp

   Activity: Horses are calm, used to beginners and led at a walk; helmets are provided where the provider has them. Weather at this height changes fast, so bring a warm layer and a rain jacket.

   

4. Day 4: Down from the lake and a flight to Osh

   Song-Kol to Kochkor and Manas International Airport, then fly to Osh

   • Drive about 7 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Osh
   Day 4 details

   The second long road day, about seven hours of driving, and the reason is geography: there is no good road south from Song-Kol to Osh, and the alternatives through Kazarman or the Suusamyr valley take two or three days on rough roads. So we drive back towards Bishkek and fly. We leave camp at about 7:30 am, after a last look at the lake, and take the gravel road back over the pass to Kochkor, about three hours. Lunch is an early sit-down meal in Kochkor before the paved run past Balykchy and through the Boom Gorge. We stop for coffee and stretches on the way and reach Manas airport in the late afternoon. We book the evening flight of about an hour to Osh with at least two hours' margin after our planned arrival, so a slow road or a long lunch does not put it at risk. Osh is Kyrgyzstan's second city and sits in the Fergana Valley. A driver meets us at Osh airport for the short ride to the hotel. Dinner tonight is your own, and late; your guide will point out what is open near the hotel.

   Included

   • Drive from Song-Kol to Manas International Airport with stops
   • Sit-down lunch in Kochkor
   • Flight from Bishkek to Osh (economy, one checked bag)
   • Transfer from Osh airport to the hotel

   Activity: Flight times change by season and are confirmed with your final itinerary. Pack a small overnight bag in case the checked-bag weight limit on the domestic flight is lower than on your international flight.

   

5. Day 5: Osh: Sulaiman-Too and the Jayma Bazaar

   A day in Osh on foot

   • Drive about 30 min
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Osh
   Day 5 details

   Osh is one of the oldest cities in Central Asia, and its centre is a single rocky ridge, Sulaiman-Too, listed by UNESCO in 2009 as a sacred mountain. We go up at about 7:30 am, before the heat and the school groups. Stone steps climb for 20 to 30 minutes to the small rebuilt house of Babur, the Fergana prince who founded the Mughal dynasty, with the whole city laid out below. Your guide shows you the rocks polished smooth by pilgrims who slide down them for health and children, the old petroglyphs, and the cave that holds the National Historical and Archaeological Museum. Back down by late morning, we walk into the Jayma Bazaar, which stretches for more than a kilometre along the Ak-Buura River: bread ovens, knife makers, dried fruit, felt hats and the tea stalls where the city meets. Lunch is southern-style plov at a local tea house. The afternoon is free to rest, wander or take the optional trip to Uzgen.

   Included

   • Sulaiman-Too with your guide and a local guide, including the museum in the cave
   • Walk through the Jayma Bazaar
   • Lunch at a local tea house

   Optional experiences

   • Uzgen, a Silk Road town about an hour away with an 11th-century minaret and Karakhanid mausoleums, as a half-day trip in the afternoon

   Easier option: Take the lower path to the museum cave and skip the climb to Babur's house.

   Free time: Afternoon free in Osh

   Activity: About 2 hours on stone steps and rock at Sulaiman-Too, then an hour or so on foot in the bazaar.

   

6. Day 6: Across the Dostuk border into the Fergana Valley

   Osh to the Dostuk border on foot, then Andijan and Fergana

   • Drive about 3.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Fergana
   Day 6 details

   After breakfast we drive about 200 km in all today, starting with half an hour to the Dostuk border post, called Dustlik on the Uzbek side. Here is how it works. Our Kyrgyz vehicle drops us at the gate; we walk through the Kyrgyz exit post, cross a few hundred metres on foot with our bags, and go through Uzbek passport control and customs. Formalities usually take one to two hours, depending on queues, and your See Sight Tours guide crosses with you and helps with forms. On the other side the clocks go back an hour and our Uzbek vehicle and driver are waiting. From here the road runs through cotton fields, orchards and mulberry trees, the food of the silkworms that made this valley rich, to Andijan, birthplace of Babur, where we stop for lunch. Another hour and a half brings us to Fergana, a 19th-century Russian-planned town of wide, shaded streets and our base for two nights. We arrive by mid-afternoon, and the evening is free.

   Included

   • Drive to the Dostuk border and help through both posts from your guide
   • Uzbek vehicle and driver from the border
   • Lunch in Andijan

   Free time: Late afternoon and evening free in Fergana

   Activity: You carry or wheel your own bag across the border; a soft bag or one with good wheels makes it easier. Photography is not allowed at the border posts.

7. Day 7: Margilan silk and Rishtan ceramics

   Fergana to Margilan and Rishtan, and back to Fergana

   • Drive about 2.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Fergana
   Day 7 details

   Two of the Fergana Valley's oldest crafts, in the order the light and the work suit best. Margilan, 15 minutes from Fergana, has been a silk town for centuries. At the Yodgorlik silk factory you follow the whole process: cocoons softened in hot water and unwound into thread, bundles of yarn tied and dyed again and again for the blurred ikat patterns called abr, and women weaving atlas and adras silk on wooden hand looms. If the day falls on a Thursday or Sunday we go early to the Kumtepa bazaar outside town, a working market for the valley's villages. Then we drive about an hour west to Rishtan, where potters have used the local red clay since at least the medieval period, glazing it in turquoise and cobalt. A master potter's family shows us the wheel, the kiln and the plant-ash glaze, and lunch is in their home. We are back in Fergana by late afternoon for a free evening.

   Included

   • Yodgorlik silk factory in Margilan with your guide
   • Kumtepa bazaar on Thursdays and Sundays
   • Rishtan ceramics workshop with a potter's family
   • Lunch at the potter's home in Rishtan

   Free time: Evening free in Fergana

   Activity: An easy day: about 3 hours on foot in workshops and markets.

8. Day 8: Fly to Tashkent: the old city and the metro

   Fergana to Tashkent by air, then the old city, Chorsu Bazaar and the metro

   • Drive about 45 min
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Tashkent
   Day 8 details

   A morning flight of about an hour takes us from Fergana to Tashkent and replaces a five-hour drive over the Kamchik pass. From the airport we go straight to the old city. Lunch is near the Chorsu Bazaar, under its great blue dome, where you can taste the dried apricots, sesame sweets and round breads stacked in the halls around it. A few minutes away is the Khast Imam complex, a square of madrasas and mosques rebuilt in pale brick, whose library keeps a very early Quran manuscript traditionally linked to the Caliph Uthman. Late in the afternoon we ride the Tashkent Metro, opened in 1977, and get off at a few of its decorated stations: Kosmonavtlar with its space-age blue, and Alisher Navoi with its domes and ceramic panels. We finish at Amir Timur Square, close to the hotel. The evening is free; Tashkent has the widest choice of restaurants on the trip.

   Included

   • Flight from Fergana to Tashkent (economy, one checked bag)
   • Chorsu Bazaar and the Khast Imam complex with your guide
   • Tashkent Metro ride through its decorated stations
   • Amir Timur Square
   • Lunch near Chorsu

   Free time: Evening free in Tashkent

   Activity: Flight times are confirmed with your final itinerary. About 3 hours on foot in the afternoon, with stairs in the metro.

9. Day 9: Fast train to Samarkand and the Registan in late light

   Tashkent to Samarkand by Afrosiyob fast train

   • Drive about 30 min
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Samarkand
   Day 9 details

   A mid-morning Afrosiyob fast train takes about two to two and a half hours from Tashkent to Samarkand, through cotton country and over the Syr Darya plain. We arrive for lunch and an hour's rest at the hotel, because the Registan is best late in the day. At about 5 pm we walk into the square, which Samarkand's UNESCO listing of 2001 calls a crossroads of cultures. Three madrasas face each other across it: Ulugbek's, finished around 1420 by Timur's astronomer grandson, and Sher-Dor and Tilla-Kari from the 17th century, the one with its tiger-like lions, the other with a gilded prayer hall inside. Your guide takes you into the courtyards and up close to the tilework while the low sun warms the facades. As the light fades we walk on to the Gur-e-Amir, the ribbed blue dome over Timur's tomb, built in the early 15th century; it is at its best at dusk. Dinner is your choice tonight.

   Included

   • Afrosiyob fast train from Tashkent to Samarkand
   • The Registan in the late afternoon with a local guide: the Ulugbek, Sher-Dor and Tilla-Kari madrasas
   • Gur-e-Amir at dusk
   • Lunch in Samarkand

   Free time: Evening free in Samarkand

10. Day 10: Shah-i-Zinda at opening and the Siab Bazaar

    Shah-i-Zinda, Bibi-Khanym and the Siab Bazaar in Samarkand

    • Drive about 30 min
    • Breakfast and dinner
    • Stay in Samarkand
    Day 10 details

    We are at the gate of Shah-i-Zinda when it opens, in the cool of the early morning, when the street of tombs is quiet and the tiles are still in shade. The necropolis climbs a slope at the edge of the old city of Afrosiyob, a narrow lane of mausoleums built mostly for Timur's family and court in the 14th and 15th centuries around a shrine to Qusam ibn Abbas, cousin of the Prophet. Each doorway is covered in a different glazed and carved pattern, and your guide explains how to read them. From there it is a short walk to the Bibi-Khanym Mosque, built on Timur's orders around 1399 to 1404 and once one of the largest in the Islamic world, and next door to the Siab Bazaar for Samarkand's dense round bread, nuts, dried fruit and halva. Lunch is your own choice at the bazaar. The afternoon is free. In the evening we join a local family at home, help with the plov and eat together.

    Included

    • Shah-i-Zinda at opening with a local guide
    • Bibi-Khanym Mosque
    • Walk through the Siab Bazaar
    • Plov dinner with a family at home

    Easier option: Skip the walk on from Bibi-Khanym to the Siab Bazaar and return to the hotel by van after Shah-i-Zinda.

    More active option: Walk back to the Registan from the Siab Bazaar along the pedestrian Tashkent Street, about 1.5 km, with your guide.

    Free time: Afternoon free in Samarkand

    Activity: Shah-i-Zinda has steep steps at the entrance; there is a gentler path round the side. Covered shoulders and knees, and a scarf for women.

11. Day 11: Ulugbek's Observatory, Afrosiyob and a free afternoon

    Ulugbek's Observatory and the Afrosiyob museum, then free time in Samarkand

    • Drive about 45 min
    • Breakfast
    • Stay in Samarkand
    Day 11 details

    A slower morning. At about 9 am we drive ten minutes north to the hill where Ulugbek, Timur's grandson and ruler of Samarkand, built his observatory in the 1420s. All that survives is the curved trench of his great meridian arc, cut deep into the rock, and a small museum, but it is enough to understand how his astronomers measured the length of the year so closely. Next door is the plateau of Afrosiyob, the city that stood here before Genghis Khan destroyed it in 1220. Its museum holds the Ambassadors' painting, a 7th-century Sogdian wall painting of envoys arriving at the court of Samarkand with gifts. We are back in the centre before lunch, and the rest of the day is yours: return to the Registan, browse the craft workshops, or rest in the shade of the hotel garden. Your guide will suggest restaurants for lunch and dinner and book a table if you like.

    Included

    • Ulugbek's Observatory and museum with a local guide
    • Afrosiyob museum and the Ambassadors' painting

    Optional experiences

    • The Meros paper workshop at Konigil, where mulberry-bark paper is made by hand, about 20 minutes from the centre

    Free time: Afternoon and evening free in Samarkand

12. Day 12: Fast train to Bukhara and an evening at Lyabi-Hauz

    Samarkand to Bukhara by Afrosiyob fast train

    • Drive about 30 min
    • Breakfast and lunch
    • Stay in Bukhara
    Day 12 details

    A late-morning Afrosiyob fast train takes us west to Bukhara in about an hour and a half to two hours. We have lunch near the hotel and rest through the hottest part of the day, then walk out in the late afternoon. The historic centre of Bukhara was listed by UNESCO in 1993, and it is still a walking city. We start at Lyabi-Hauz, the 17th-century pool shaded by old mulberry trees and framed by the Nadir Divan-Begi madrasa, with its tiled birds, and the Kukeldash madrasa. From there your guide leads you through the domed trading halls, built in the 16th century over crossroads for money changers, cap sellers and jewellers, and down to the Magoki-Attori mosque, sunk below today's street level, where layers of the city's past show in the walls. At dusk the square at Lyabi-Hauz fills with families, and the evening is free to eat at the tea houses by the water.

    Included

    • Afrosiyob fast train from Samarkand to Bukhara
    • Late-afternoon walk with a local guide: Lyabi-Hauz, the Nadir Divan-Begi and Kukeldash madrasas, the trading domes and Magoki-Attori
    • Lunch in Bukhara

    Free time: Evening free in Bukhara

13. Day 13: Bukhara: the Kalon Minaret, the Ark and the Samanids

    Poi-Kalon, the Ark, Bolo-Hauz and the Samanid Mausoleum in Bukhara

    • Drive about 30 min
    • Breakfast, lunch and dinner
    • Stay in Bukhara
    Day 13 details

    We start early, while the brick is cool and the square is empty, at Poi-Kalon. The Kalon Minaret, built in 1127, was so admired that Genghis Khan is said to have spared it; it stands over the Kalon Mosque and the blue domes of the Mir-i-Arab madrasa, still a working school. A short walk west brings us to the Ark, the walled citadel where the emirs of Bukhara lived and ruled until 1920, and opposite it the Bolo-Hauz mosque, whose porch stands on tall carved wooden columns reflected in its pool. We drive a few minutes on to the Samanid Mausoleum in its park, built in the 10th century and one of the oldest surviving buildings in Central Asia, its baked bricks laid in patterns that change with the light. Lunch is together in the old town, and the afternoon is yours: the Chor Minor gatehouse, a hammam, or a last browse in the domes. We end the trip with a farewell dinner.

    Included

    • Poi-Kalon with a local guide: the Kalon Minaret, the Kalon Mosque and the Mir-i-Arab madrasa from outside
    • The Ark citadel and its museums
    • Bolo-Hauz Mosque
    • The Samanid Mausoleum
    • Lunch in the old town
    • Farewell dinner

    Optional experiences

    • A traditional hammam in the old town

    Easier option: Take the van between the Ark and the Samanid Mausoleum and rest at the hotel after lunch.

    More active option: An afternoon walk with your guide through the back lanes of the old town to the Chor Minor gatehouse.

    Free time: Afternoon free in Bukhara

    Activity: About 3 to 4 hours on foot on old paving in the morning.

14. Day 14: Fast train to Tashkent and home

    Bukhara to Tashkent by Afrosiyob fast train, then Tashkent International Airport (TAS)

    • Drive about 45 min
    • Breakfast
    Day 14 details

    A free morning in Bukhara: walk the quiet lanes of the old Jewish quarter, buy a last suzani or scarf in the domes, or sit with a pot of green tea at Lyabi-Hauz. Late in the morning we take the Afrosiyob fast train back across the country to Tashkent, about four hours, with lunch on board or at the station at your own expense. Your guide travels with you, and a driver meets the train in Tashkent for the transfer to Tashkent International Airport (TAS), where many long-haul flights leave in the evening and through the night. Book a flight leaving after about 8 pm. If your flight home leaves from Bukhara's own airport instead, tell us when you book and we will take you there from the hotel and skip the train. Your guide sees the group to the airport before saying goodbye, after two countries, a border on foot and thirteen nights on the Silk Road.

    Included

    • Afrosiyob fast train from Bukhara to Tashkent
    • Drop-off at Tashkent International Airport (TAS), or at Bukhara airport if you fly from there

    Free time: Morning free in Bukhara

    Activity: Book a flight from Tashkent leaving after about 8 pm.

Wildlife and weather: We run this trip in June and September: Song-Kol's yurt camps and the pass road are open only in summer, and Uzbek cities are very hot in July and August. Expect warm days and near-freezing nights at the lake, and dry, sunny days of 25 to 35 C in the Fergana Valley and Samarkand.

• Bishkek1 night
• Song-Kol2 nights
• Osh2 nights
• Fergana2 nights
• Tashkent1 night
• Samarkand3 nights
• Bukhara2 nights