From Osh to Kyzylart Pass
Fasten your seatbelts, off we go. After a short stopover in Istanbul, we landed safely in Osh in the early morning hours. However, our first contact with the Kyrgyz people had already taken place in Turkey, right in front of the gate security check, when a girl in her twenties handed me a huge and heavy IKEA shopping bag over without a word. At first, I didn't understand what was going on so I put it on the ground right away. The moment she saw it, she hurried to me again and explained to me that the bag is full of sweets and chocolates for her family. So what else could I do?! I helped her to "smuggle" a substantial amount of it on board because the gate security was doing a thorough search only on the locals returning home.
It was still dark outside when we met the guy from the car rental company at the crowded parking lot just outside the airport. Initially, we had planned to rent a car from Dushanbe, Tajikistan and drive along the Pamir Highway back and forth but as we had found out, there was not a single rental company willing to provide a car without a driver or a guide. We never really found out the reason why, but I suspect they just wanted to charge us more. So we ended up renting a Ford Ranger from Iron Horse Nomads in Osh, Kyrgyzstan and also asked them to sort out the border crossing documents.
It took just a minute to hand over the car keys/papers and there we went. With the first rays of sun sighted and knee-deep potholes avoided, we were heartily greeted by a "babushka" in a local grocery store. Its best times had passed already but nevertheless, we could stock up with plenty of water, colourful sugary sodas, plain bread and rock-hard biscuits. We filled almost the whole cargo area. As we later realised it was a wise thing to do. Potable water is really scarce along the Pamir Highway and the distances between settlements/towns are enormous.
Equipped with the most important, we set off on our journey. Soon after we left Osh (963m above sea level) the road started to get curvy and we found ourselves driving through one hill after another. With all the mountain snow melted just a couple of weeks ago, the countryside was lush and green. After a 3-hour long ride, we arrived in Sary-Tash (3170m above sea level) where we had to find our first accommodation.
As expected (we prepared a lot in advance, of course) there were many accommodation options along the whole M-41. Mainly homestays together with the locals. To be more specific, it works like this: the family moves out of their bedroom or living room to their kitchen and you get to sleep in their beds or they provide you with extra mattresses to sleep on the floor. The price of 10 or 15 US dollars per person per night is always a b&b rate. So it's very reasonable. It went like this during the whole trip except for two nights (spent at a hotel in Murghab on the way back).
As it was still only 1 pm after we put our backpacks down in our room, we decided to make a short detour to the area of Sary Mogul. It was a straight, car-free and mostly tarmac road, where we put all the horsepower of our Ford Ranger into action. When surprised by a road bump, we found ourselves in the zero-G state for a second. We arrived there in no time, drove off the road to the grassy plains south of the settlement to get at least a distant glance at the Pik Lenina and the Pik Oktobrskyi. It was a good amuse bouche to what Tajikistan prepared for us for the next couple of days. After eating the first meat spread we brought from home with some bread from Osh and enjoying the views a bit, we returned to Sary-Tash to spend our first and last night in Kyrgyzstan.
After a simple but tasty breakfast, which consisted of bread, butter, yoghurt, marmalade and hard-boiled eggs, we said goodbye to our hosts and left. Only 10 km out of the town we encountered the first military checkpoint (many more to come :) in this part of the world). Heavy armed and equipped soldiers, the majority of them wearing balaclavas. While one of them was inspecting our car documents, passports and visas, three others were pointing at us with assault rifles. Despite being aware of military checkpoints along the M-41, we didn't expect it to be that serious and moreover, it wasn't a pleasant feeling at all. From what I can say in hindsight, this was the most thorough check we faced during the whole trip. Not that the others were easier to pass by, but they were in no way so uncomfortable.
Eventually, they let us go (no bribes involved ;) those came in handy in Tajikistan) and nothing else stood in our way as we headed towards the border crossing. At least we thought so...
It was still dark outside when we met the guy from the car rental company at the crowded parking lot just outside the airport. Initially, we had planned to rent a car from Dushanbe, Tajikistan and drive along the Pamir Highway back and forth but as we had found out, there was not a single rental company willing to provide a car without a driver or a guide. We never really found out the reason why, but I suspect they just wanted to charge us more. So we ended up renting a Ford Ranger from Iron Horse Nomads in Osh, Kyrgyzstan and also asked them to sort out the border crossing documents.
It took just a minute to hand over the car keys/papers and there we went. With the first rays of sun sighted and knee-deep potholes avoided, we were heartily greeted by a "babushka" in a local grocery store. Its best times had passed already but nevertheless, we could stock up with plenty of water, colourful sugary sodas, plain bread and rock-hard biscuits. We filled almost the whole cargo area. As we later realised it was a wise thing to do. Potable water is really scarce along the Pamir Highway and the distances between settlements/towns are enormous.
Equipped with the most important, we set off on our journey. Soon after we left Osh (963m above sea level) the road started to get curvy and we found ourselves driving through one hill after another. With all the mountain snow melted just a couple of weeks ago, the countryside was lush and green. After a 3-hour long ride, we arrived in Sary-Tash (3170m above sea level) where we had to find our first accommodation.
As expected (we prepared a lot in advance, of course) there were many accommodation options along the whole M-41. Mainly homestays together with the locals. To be more specific, it works like this: the family moves out of their bedroom or living room to their kitchen and you get to sleep in their beds or they provide you with extra mattresses to sleep on the floor. The price of 10 or 15 US dollars per person per night is always a b&b rate. So it's very reasonable. It went like this during the whole trip except for two nights (spent at a hotel in Murghab on the way back).
As it was still only 1 pm after we put our backpacks down in our room, we decided to make a short detour to the area of Sary Mogul. It was a straight, car-free and mostly tarmac road, where we put all the horsepower of our Ford Ranger into action. When surprised by a road bump, we found ourselves in the zero-G state for a second. We arrived there in no time, drove off the road to the grassy plains south of the settlement to get at least a distant glance at the Pik Lenina and the Pik Oktobrskyi. It was a good amuse bouche to what Tajikistan prepared for us for the next couple of days. After eating the first meat spread we brought from home with some bread from Osh and enjoying the views a bit, we returned to Sary-Tash to spend our first and last night in Kyrgyzstan.
After a simple but tasty breakfast, which consisted of bread, butter, yoghurt, marmalade and hard-boiled eggs, we said goodbye to our hosts and left. Only 10 km out of the town we encountered the first military checkpoint (many more to come :) in this part of the world). Heavy armed and equipped soldiers, the majority of them wearing balaclavas. While one of them was inspecting our car documents, passports and visas, three others were pointing at us with assault rifles. Despite being aware of military checkpoints along the M-41, we didn't expect it to be that serious and moreover, it wasn't a pleasant feeling at all. From what I can say in hindsight, this was the most thorough check we faced during the whole trip. Not that the others were easier to pass by, but they were in no way so uncomfortable.
Eventually, they let us go (no bribes involved ;) those came in handy in Tajikistan) and nothing else stood in our way as we headed towards the border crossing. At least we thought so...