Tajikistan 3 – Bartang Valley, A Great Shortcut

 

After the exertion during the last kilometres we go for wellness time for us. If we came straight from Germany and had to go shopping here, we probably would be horrified by the lack of diverse products in the shops. Compared to the last days we are in a Cockaigne: Indian food, Italian food, Burgers, chips, ... Besides we hunt down soeme new patches, after a long search we find huge ones normally used for car tires – as long as they might work – ok. The last point on our ToDo list is the choice of our route. After we discussed advantages and disadvantages of the 4 options, we nail it down to two. As we can’t find good reasons for the decision, we let matches decide. The winner is: The Bartang valley. That means for us we have to take lots of food with us, as it will get lonely, remote and bumpy.

 

 

The valley probably is the way least travelled crossing the Pamir mountains. It is known that there are rarely bridges but lots of river crossings. If the water level rises a bit, these get very adventurous. Asphalt ends after the first 20 of 275 km. The map also displays only few villages with the largest distance in between of 144 km. Besides we climb more than 2000m to 4000m above sea level, the air does get quite thin that high. At least we will find enough water and loneliness.

 

Easy to imagine, water level needs to rise only a bit to flood the road
Easy to imagine, water level needs to rise only a bit to flood the road

 

Loneliness? When we arrive at the entrance of the valley, we meet two other cyclists. Steve and Elaine from Canada. We start together, but they are a lot faster with their mountain bikes and lightweight gear. We cross some villages; everywhere people greet us very friendly. When the villages disappear, the colour green disappears as well. Grey then dominates in incredible shades. The rocks vary so much in their colours and shapes. We love this kind of landscape and are very impressed. Almost as much impressed as by the history teacher in Savnob. After we bought almost the complete stocks of both shops in the village, he invites us to have tea and cookies. As we are travelling during Ramadan and the villagers don’t eat from dawn till dusk we are pretty surprised – however they are aware that we don’t follow their rules and don’t mind us eating. So we rest for some hours and enjoy a conversation in fluent English. After the last village a teenagers helps us without any words to push our bicicles up a very steep climb. Together we are very fast and on the summit all of us gasp for the thin air like fish on land. After a while he says 24 Somoni – which is about 2,30 €.

 


 

We happily pay him 30 and joke about taking him with us to help with the next task. That is a climb of only 500m altitude, under normal circumstances no problem. But the high altitude of 4000m above sea level combined with the rough road conditions - a mix of rough gravel/sand/washboard – pushes us to our physical and mental limits. We only manage to push one bike together and even for this we take of parts of the luggage and carry it separately. Thus it takes almost the whole day and on top we hardly manage to pitch our tent due to strong wind. Exhausted we fall inside and sound asleep.

 

 

The next day cycling feels like visiting a cinema, pedalling on a plateau surrounded by 7000m peaks. Sun is shining and the blue sky makes a great contrast to the snowy peaks. The main road Pamir highway M41 now is rather close and we and our hurting shoulders look forward to an asphalt road taking us to the village Karakul. If just we had not had another idea, which was unlikely to be successful... Read more!

 

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