Before getting on to the activities of the day I wanted to introduce the young man that was our guide in Turkistan. He is pictured with me in the first photograph. His name is NurSultan and to our surprise he does not live in the town of Turkistan but in the town of Shymkent which is about 170km away. I wanted to say thankyou to NurSultan for being our guide and helping all of us get a better understanding of the history of this part of Kazakhstan.

Our primary activiy today was outside about 50km north of Turkistan where we visited the ruins of an acient city called Sauran, pronounced Saw-ran. I know that all the Lord of the Rings fans are thinking about Tolkien's villan but the correct pronunciation is slightly different. The city ruins are in a poor state of repair despite obvious restoration efforts. This is partly a result of the use of mud and straw as a major building material, and partly from vibration from the neatby railway tracks. The city apparently flourished between the 13th and 18th centuries as a major trading town on the Old Silk Road and finally was abandoned due to lack of water when other communities upstream on the river Syr Dara diverted too much water.

On our return from Sauran Nina and I spent some more time completing our exploration of the modern Keruen-Saray complex including a walk along the LasVegas/Venice style water way.

Again tonight our accomodation would be a sleeping compartment on an overnight train. This time our destination was the Kazakh town of Aral or Aralsk a former fishing port that was once on the shores of the Aral sea.

The final picture is of a young women we met on the station who wanted to practice her English. We were pleased to chat with her and in English as we know NO Kazakh.