The 80 kms into Bukhara this morning was through flat hot country. Initially somewhat desolate but increasingly inhabited as we got closer. We had lost a little altitude since Samarkand (700 m down to 250 m) so the morning was hot, 85°F by 10:30. On the outskirts of Bukhara we found a fuel station selling diesel at 3750 soms per liter ($5.45 / gal) and then we ran into the now expected no trucks sign on the towns main entrance road. After a little looking around we found an alternative and managed to get within 2 km of our hotel, the Kabir. I left Nina to look after the truck while I walked to the hotel to find its exact location. There was a bit of confusion at the hotel as I expected that they would have arranged a parking place for us, but they seemed to know nothing about it. After a bit of looking around I found the parking lot of the Asia Hotel only about 300 meters from the Kabir.

Once settled into the Kabir we spent some time walking around to get our bearings. Like Samarkand there has been a lot of development here in the past 5 years and after a while we understood why. Initially during our walk there were few people out and they seemed to be mainly tourists. As the evening unfolded and the temperature moderated the number of people in the streets increased and while many were locals the majority were tour groups and as a result hundreds of tourist.

Nina and I pondered what the local Uzbeks must deduce about the populations of western countries as all of the tourists are old.


As mentioned above we parked the truck in the parking area of the Asia Hotel. By 7:00pm at night the area in and around the parking area was crowded with cars and tour buses. It seemed possible that we could have simply parked in the street.

Also during our afternoon walk-about we found that there is a paid parking lot near the Ark at about N39.77717 E64.41204 which could also be a suitable over-nighting spot.