So we board the plane and after a few more seat shuffling we settle down I am in row 4 with only locals in front of me.
A couple of business men a stout fellow in the seat in front of me who is trying to get the seat to go back but failing to press the button so he is just bracing himself against the floor and heaving which sort of works as he breaks the chair and it is now tilted on one side only so all he can do is look directly across at the guy in the window seat, he looks like a wrestler so I think it best not to comment (it is a small plane after all) there is a woman at the front with a red plastic bucket the sort you might use with your mop but this one had a muslin cover over it no idea what is in it or how she managed to get it through the scanner.
We take off and by the time we get to our cruising height we are on our way down again. Whilst waiting for our bags I try and get a peek at the red plastic bucket but it is being closely guarded and so it will remain a mystery to me.
Leaving the terminal building some guy wants to check the tags on our baggage against our slips but we dont have them the tour guide Jonathan checked us all in so he has all the tags stuck on his ticket. After a few minutes trying to match the first tag to a bag he realizes its a lost cause and lets us all through.
Outside we can see our coach which is good but there is a fence between us and it which is bad. We have to walk the best part of a kilometer around the new building works to get to it.
It seems wherever you are in the world these days that the Chinese are helping people build airports and roads and here is an example. Add to this the inability to get pavements to meet roads or pavements to be level and you have our route which is actually broken ground.
We fling our cases into the coach and off we go. We are not staying in Urgench we are off to Khiva which is our first dip into the silk Road Route.
Now we are staying outside the walls, right outside them actually in the “Hotel Asia” and they have laid on some Broth for us as we are arriving late which is nice and a local beer helps relax us after quite a long day.
We are in a low rise annex away from the reception, it is an interesting place with what looks like a nice pool and what seems to be an open air cinema neither of which I feel we will get the time to use.
A few random pictures I took during the day to keep the post colorful.
