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Adventures of a Global Wanderer
My guide had said that driving from Samarkand to meet us at Shakhrisabsz this morning there was heavy fog. We had some drizzle coming from Bukhara but not fog. However, upon leaving Shakhrisabsz and retracing her route back to Samarkand the weather did change suddenly.
I think we were in a different weather pocket due to elevation and mountain valleys. Suddenly we were driving in heavy fog and the rain drizzle changed to heavy snow flurries.
All of a sudden it was a totally different landscape as the valley was almost covered in fresh snow when we had never seen snow thus far on my trip. We were barely an hour out from town where there was absolutely no snow.
There were some very scenic valleys and it would be an nice place for a slow drive in better weather. In many places there were early cherry blossoms but the car kept moving too fast for me to get photos.
As we came out of mountain valleys to more open roads the snow flurries changed back to fog and drizzle.
After about an hour we were in the historic city of Samarkand. For such a fabled city I was surprised by my first impressions.
We came down a wide central boulevard where traffic drove one way in each direction. There were arched trees and it would have been very scenic once the trees had more leaves.
The central divider of the two one way roads was another long tree lined boulevard and a central pedestrian walkway spanning the road like a long elongated park.
At the tail end of the road was a roundabout with a giant bronze statue of Timurlane.
As we turned the roundabout and came down the other side one way we passed by the Russian Orthodox Church. This was on my town map and something I wanted to see again so I was trying to pay attention driving to see how far our hotel was.
We came into a very modern European looking district and I was quite surprised that this was the historic silk road city of Samarkand. It felt more like Germany or somewhere in Europe with the type of architecture and tree lined boulevard we had just come down.
This was in complete contrast to all the town architecture we had seen thus far in other parts of Uzbekistan. Arriving at the hotel my driver Anvar told me it was a very high standard and he was not exaggerating. He was also quite proud of my first impressions of his hometown.
I think we were in a different weather pocket due to elevation and mountain valleys. Suddenly we were driving in heavy fog and the rain drizzle changed to heavy snow flurries.
All of a sudden it was a totally different landscape as the valley was almost covered in fresh snow when we had never seen snow thus far on my trip. We were barely an hour out from town where there was absolutely no snow.
There were some very scenic valleys and it would be an nice place for a slow drive in better weather. In many places there were early cherry blossoms but the car kept moving too fast for me to get photos.
As we came out of mountain valleys to more open roads the snow flurries changed back to fog and drizzle.
After about an hour we were in the historic city of Samarkand. For such a fabled city I was surprised by my first impressions.
We came down a wide central boulevard where traffic drove one way in each direction. There were arched trees and it would have been very scenic once the trees had more leaves.
The central divider of the two one way roads was another long tree lined boulevard and a central pedestrian walkway spanning the road like a long elongated park.
At the tail end of the road was a roundabout with a giant bronze statue of Timurlane.
As we turned the roundabout and came down the other side one way we passed by the Russian Orthodox Church. This was on my town map and something I wanted to see again so I was trying to pay attention driving to see how far our hotel was.
We came into a very modern European looking district and I was quite surprised that this was the historic silk road city of Samarkand. It felt more like Germany or somewhere in Europe with the type of architecture and tree lined boulevard we had just come down.
This was in complete contrast to all the town architecture we had seen thus far in other parts of Uzbekistan. Arriving at the hotel my driver Anvar told me it was a very high standard and he was not exaggerating. He was also quite proud of my first impressions of his hometown.
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