Afghanistan – Uzbekistan – Turkmenistan – into Iran: A short cut in the Hindu Cush

 Current Location: Mashhad, Iran

(IF ANYONE HAS FRIENDS IN TURKEY, GREECE, ITALY, SWITZERLAND OR GERMANY WHO I COULD MAYBE MEET UP WITH AS I AM PASSING THROUGH, I WOULD BE VERY GRATEFUL IF YOU COULD PUT ME IN TOUCH – THANKYOU)

“But who are you in rags and rotten shoes? Ye dirty bearded, blocking up the way?”
-James Elroy Flecker, The Golden Journey to Samarkand

“The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed”

-Chinese Proverb

Kabul is quite an extraordinary city. Successive invading forces have come and gone here, but never has it been tamed for long. In 1840 a British invasion force marched in from India in order to place an inept puppet king on the Afghan throne. After a few years of watching the British camp throw tea parties and play polo, the local population had had enough, and so had an uprising and managed to destroy the entire regiment (which numbered over 12,000 including familes and servants)… there was only one British survivor who managed to stagger out of the blood bath and into the safety of a British fort on the Indian (now Pakistani) frontier.

One hundred and sixty years later, yet another foreign force has arrived. NGO’s and diplomats, adventurers and journalists, officers and analysts. I sincerely wish them well – they are working very hard to try and stabilize the country, and I hope that international politics grants them the time and resources they need to succeed. I spent a good few days meeting all sorts of these very kind and helpful people who could give me advice about the road ahead, before packing the panniers again and setting off north from Kabul.

Climbing a small pass out of the capital, I descended into a wide valley lined on both sides by the rugged, snow spattered peaks of the Hindu Cush. Not wanting to spend the night camping, I stopped early in the first main town I got to – which had apparently been caught on the front line during the civil wars in the 1990s.

I had no idea where I should try and sleep that night, but fortunately managed to meet  some local friends of friends who proceeded to cheerfully escort me around a whole array of local godfathers (in their seedy backrooms) resulting in my getting the nights accommodation (in an exceedingly dilapidated and overpriced Russian hotel) for free. To celebrate, my new found friends drove me up the side of a mountain where one of them owned a mulberry orchard. We shook berries from the trees into a rug and munched them happily as dusk settled quietly over the mountains – the peace only disturbed by the occasional sky shaking jet from the local NATO airbase as it took off on mission. I went to bed early – the next day would be the big climb through the mountains.

I set off at 5.30 in the morning, the sun already rising fast and scorching my back through the dry air. I followed the Hindu Cush highway as it wound around and around, following a stream higher and higher into the peaks. Mud brick villages cascaded off the mountain sides to the glacial waters which spilled on downwards below. Snow shelters and tunnels tore through the edge of the mountainsides as I got higher, and even though the altitude was mild compared to the Tibetan passes of February, I was by now unaccustomed to thin air and found myself really gasping to keep moving. At last, around noon, I reached the formidable Salang tunnel. An impressive feat of Soviet engineering, this tunnel burrows itself straight through the core of the Hindu Cush. I had been continually warned about the inadvisability of cycling this – 5km of potholes and water, big Pakistani Trucks and thick smoke, unlit and crumbling walls, and (according to one NGO friend) the occasional flock of sheep! Feeling paranoid enough about everything as it was, and remembering my responsibility to only take calculated risks, I decided I was not brave (or reckless) enough to ride it, and so for the second time that week (and the second time on the whole journey), I cheated and hitched a lift in the back of a mini bus . Out the other side, and back on my own wheels I began the huge descent which would eventually take me to the northern deserts of Afghanistan.

During the long, fast, downhill I swept past villages and truckstops and bemused children, as well as the occasional war ravaged tank. Whilst I zoomed down the valley sides I rather foolishly started to turn my eye towards possible photo opportunities, and in a moment of stupidly lapsed concentration managed to skid off the road and onto the gravelled shoulder – which at 40 kmph on a heavily laden bike is a severely bad idea. Braking too hard as the wheels skidded out of control I flew over my handlebars and sprawled and slid a good way down the path ahead. Very fortunately, as I picked myself up I realised I had come through my greatest wipe out to date with no more than torn trousers and a couple of cuts. The local village children quickly gathered around me and helped me get the bike back on its wheels – I cannot imagine what they must have thought – firstly a westerner on an odd looking bicycle zooming down through their hills, and then he manages to ride off the road and do some unimagined acrobatic routine. Perhaps the nearest equivalent in my own childhood in London, might have been to see a Bengali Tribesman sauntering down my street on his elephant, gazing wistfully at the houses all around him, before crashing his stead into a lamppost and tumbling off into the gutter!?

On the northern side of the Hindu Cush, I felt I was able to relax a little more, as I have to admit that I was spending much of my time in this country feeling rather nervous. It was not that people in Afghanistan were perceptibly threatening, it was just that I was feeling paranoid, and any gesture of unfriendliness I took to be an indication of violent intentions.
Of course, most of the people I met were very friendly – as elsewhere in the world – and you can understand them being slightly surprised to see a bedraggled foreigner on bike (though I am by no means the first cyclist to have passed through Afghanistan in recent years).
In fact, riding through Afghanistan was just like riding through most countries. I would wave at and greet the people I saw by the road and when stopping to buy a snack or a drink, I would again try and make a decent impression by saying the local greeting, smiling and shaking hands (in Afghanistan, a hand to the heart as you do this is an added sign of respect). We would then usually chat a bit about my route and I would mime out a few set routines about how high the mountains were, or how hot the weather was. Then they would get around to the question of where I was from and I normally just told them straight out that I was an English tourist. This did not seem to be a problem, apart from on the occasion when a sinister sort of chap with a big beard and white skull cap (upon finding out where I was from) did refuse to shake my hand outright. This is an incredibly rude gesture in Afghanistan and I took it to be a sign that I was not very welcome there! Hurriedly bumbling my way through the onlookers, I pedaled off into the desert as fast as possible.
I also met quite a few policeman with their Kalashnikovs who sat by the roadblocks getting fatigued with boredom. Fortunately there has been very little fighting in the north of Afghanistan in recent years, which means these guys have not had too much to worry about – long may that continue. It had been a very different atmosphere in Kabul, and the policemen there were extremely tense - on the lookout for would-be suicide bombers. In fact, one of them even mistook me for an IED (Improvised Explosive Device),  pointing his gun at me and shouting at me to move on after I had stopped to ask for directions. In all fairness, I did have a scraggy beard and suspiciously overflowing panniers, but I was careful in future to just ask friendly shop owners for help, rather than gun wielding officials.

Riding on, the valleys and gorges and plains continued to change in character several times a day. Sometimes there would be lush, irrigated paddy fields, sometimes camels and donkeys and sheep and cows on the pastureland, sometimes just barren desert, with signs warning against landmines. I was roughly following in the footsteps of Alexander and his great army who had crossed this way in the 4th Century BC whilst pursuing an enemy. Seeing the ancient city of Balkh (next to Mazar-e-Shariff), I tried to imagine what layers of history had occured here. Before Alexander showed up here and married Roxana, it had already earned a name in history for its massive walls and for being home to the founder of Zoroastrianism. Creeping down into an Archaelogical dig site, my bright young tour guide showed me evidence of the changing civilisations that have set themselves up here: Islamic styles near the surface; and then Buddhist influences; and then Greek columns at the bottom - still well preserved ten meters below the ground.

Finally I turned off the main highway and pedalled through a parched desert for 60km (with sand dunes encroaching on the road) and made it to a final series of roadblocks and immigration offices which led me over the Oxus river and into Uzbekistan. (Alexander swam his whole army across this river in pursuit of another enemy!). The contrast between Afghanistan and Uzbekistan was quite amazing. Rather than the gasping desert bleakness I had left behind me, there was an unending spread of green fields, unveiled (and unbearded) faces, and lots of smiles and invitations to stay. The Soviets had worked hard to spread irrigation (and cotton farms) throughout the country – though it was hard to believe that I was only a couple of kilometers from the Afghan frontier. It was like walking over a bridge in Mordor, and a few minutes later finding myself in the Shire. It was great to feel safe again, and to camp in pleasant pasturelands where my only worry was the hot sun waking me up in the morning.

A few days later and I had completed the Golden Journey and made it to Samarkand (please do read the poem below if you do not know it – though I warn you that it may make you vow to one day make the Golden Journey yourself). I was now again amidst backpackers and cycle tourers, and it was reassuring to exchange notes about the well travelled road ahead. Onwards through Bukhara with its huge Minaret and Madrassahs, and then a 5 day blast through the deserts of Turkmenistan (that is the country with the stark raving mad president who died last year having spent vast amounts of natural gas wealth putting up golden statues of himself wearing a superman cape!)… and now I am in Iran.
My first night here I camped on top of hill under a full moon, a cool evening breeze lulling me to sleep. The people in Iran are incredibly friendly and courteous. The landscapes are just what you hope for in the Middle East – rugged, weather beaten, unfathomably old…
I feel like finally the rough and tough and scarey parts of the journey are behind me. I will now ride for 3 weeks through Iran to the Turkish border and then jump on a plane back from Ankara to England in order to be at my sisters wedding… then I need to fly back to Turkey and cycle home!

The end is (almost) in sight!

Many thanks for your emails, prayers and kind donations to Viva Network (we have now raised over 15,000 GBP),

Best wishes and God bless

Rob
www.cyclinghomefromsiberia.com
 

THE GOLDEN JOURNEY TO SAMARKAND 

At the Gate of the Sun, Bagdad, in olden time

THE MERCHANTS (together)

Away, for we are ready to a man!
Our camels sniff the evening and are glad.
Lead on, O Master of the Caravan:
Lead on the Merchant-Princes of Bagdad.

THE CHIEF DRAPER
Have we not Indian carpets dark as wine,
Turbans and sashes, gowns and bows and veils,
And broideries of intricate design,
And printed hangings in enormous bales?

THE CHIEF GROCER
We have rose-candy, we have spikenard,
Mastic and terebinth and oil and spice,
And such sweet jams meticulously jarred
As God’s own Prophet eats in Paradise.

THE PRINCIPAL JEWS
And we have manuscripts in peacock styles
By Ali of Damascus; we have swords
Engraved with storks and apes and crocodiles,
And heavy beaten necklaces, for Lords.

THE MASTER OF THE CARAVAN
But you are nothing but a lot of Jews.

THE PRINCIPAL JEWS
Sir, even dogs have daylight, and we pay.

THE MASTER OF THE CARAVAN
But who are ye in rags and rotten shoes,
You dirty-bearded, blocking up the way?

THE PILGRIMS
We are the Pilgrims, master; we shall go
Always a little further: it may be
Beyond the last blue mountain barred with snow,
Across that angry or that glimmering sea,
White on a throne or guarded in a cave
There lives a prophet who can understand
Why men were born: but surely we are brave,
Who take the Golden Road to Samarkand.

 THE CHIEF MERCHANT
We gnaw the nail of hurry. Master, away!

ONE OF THE WOMEN
O turn your eyes to where your children stand.
Is not Bagdad the beautiful? O stay!

THE MERCHANTS (in chorus)
We take the Golden Road to Samarkand. AN OLD MAN
Have you not girls and garlands in your homes,
Eunuchs and Syrian boys at your command?
Seek not excess: God hateth him who roams!AN OLD MANTHE MERCHANTS (in chorus)
We make the Golden Journey to Samarkand. A PILGRIM WITH A BEAUTIFUL VOICE
Sweet to ride forth at evening from the wells
When shadows pass gigantic on the sand,
And softly through the silence beat the bells
Along the Golden Road to Samarkand.