The formalities of getting out of LAX went very well – I have nothing to complain about Turkish Airline except they don’t have Economy Plus, BUT I had an empty seat for the longest leg and was able to sleep easily, off and on, throughout the 13 hours. I just made the connection in Istanbul, arriving at the gate as they were boarding. After arrival in Urgench I went with a driver directly to Nukus which took another 3 hours.
The driver spoke only a few words of English but we communicated fine with google translate. The system can provide a written translation of Uzbek but doesn’t know how to speak it yet, so we used Russian. It seemed the driver could speak both fluently.
We drove for more than 2 hours through fields and fields of cotton. There were also rice fields, some corn, orchards I never identified, what might have been hay, grape vines, and I probably missed some of the crops. It felt quite prosperous, and then we hit the planes of nothing reminding me a little of what the I5 looked like before they started irrigation.
This is the Welcome to the Independent Republic of Karakalpakstan gate, an autonomous republic of Uzbekistan established in 1991, a year after Uzbekistan established independence from the USSR, although if you want to buzz through wikipedia you’ll see there is, of course, a long and interesting history of this area.
We made a toilet stop at a market-cafe-gas station place with the nicest toilets, it was great, and they had a huge bird cage which was fun to look at.
After settling into the Jipek Joli Art hotel (the room is lovely, the bathroom is great, the bedding is especially comfortable) I decided to walk the few blocks to check out the State Museum of History and Culture of the Republic of Karakalpakstan. It was small but interesting and particularly fun because there was a young woman, a few months from graduating university, who was practicing English by showing me around. She was a delight, and on a side note, I was nuts for the kids (yes I asked before I took this picture).
They had an example of the traditional house below, and a large selection of clothes. There was also a lot of paintings, jewelry, stuffed animals, ceramics, models of ancient forts and artifacts found there, and more.
Looking up at the roof of the traditional home.
After the museum I went for some food at Sofram, the place recommended by the hotel. It was comfortable, friendly, but also it was a Turkish restaurant with a special room frequented by tour groups-my least favorite, and I didn’t get to sample what was unique to this place.
I couldn’t keep my eyes open so I slept for a couple hours, did this, and now I hope to sleep until morning!