This morning when we woke all our hosts of last night had departed and the place was silent, cool, and deserted. We took advantage of the morning peace and cool to prepare for the day with the usual myriad of chores.

Back on the road we headed south and a little west roughly towards Samarkand but more precisely towards a small town called Zarmin. We learned last night that there was a national park a little south of this town "up in the mountains" and we hoped that the "up in the mountains" bit might give us a slightly cooler place to sleep.

We passed through a number of towns during the day and tried a couple of banks to see if we coupld convert dollars to the local soms but no luck. Along the way we discovered that most of the towns prohibited trucks from their main streets and that there are many police check points. The check points seem to be of two kinds. Well established inspection points often at the entry/exit to a town and random stops where a couple of police set up shop to try and make a little money. We had no trouble today with the well established stops but at one of the improptu stops I negotiated my way down from "dollars" to 2 bottles of beer.


South of the town of Zomin the road began to climb along a river valley. Close to the town many road side food places exploitd the shade of the river side trees with there open air, shaded, eating areas and a little farther south we started to climb past a dam and the river that feeds it. We stopped to chat with some ladies selling produce beside the road just after the dam and a few miles later we were able to get down into the river valley, and into the shade of a cliff for what seemed like a good camping spot. Throughout the evening we had a number of groups visit the river but without disturbing us. Overnight the temperature dropped and we had a comfortable night.