- Getting there
We were travelling from Shymkent in Kazakhstan. As the road border situation remains unclear for foreigners and taxi drivers were quite unhelpful about the whole thing we opted for the overnight train.
This was the Novosibirsk – Tashkent train and called at Shymkent at 21:29 and arrived into Tashkent bang on the scheduled arrival of 05:05. This cost us 6200 tenge in a second class compartment. Bear in mind that this train doesn’t run every day; check in advance.
The journey should take nowhere near that long, but the train stops at the border for effectively three hours and there is also an hour time difference between the two countries. The fact that one passenger decided to jump off the train at the border after a drug dog took a particular interest in his compartment didn’t help; we witnessed him being caught by the police, who didn’t mess around.
This prompted greater searches of bags, but I must say the search of our own compartment was only cursory.
Nonetheless be on guard for attempted shake downs from the Kazakh border guards. We had several “visits” from individuals and pairs who would come and sit in our carriage and attempt to communicate with us by rubbing their fingers together and making references to money. We just acted stupid and kept telling them how much we loved Kazakhstan and they eventually left, in part aided by the vigilant Uzbek train guard who kept hovering outside the door.
The Uzbek border guards were thorough in terms of wanting to see the currency we were carrying but in no way were looking for bribes. Contrary to what you may read in terms of difficulties faced by tourists, we had no dealings at all with the Uzbek police (who are everywhere really) albeit we didn’t use the metro.
- Accommodation
We stayed at Gulnara’s guesthouse, which was a bargain - $24 for a twin room with aircon and private shower. They also have dorms. This price included breakfast.
The guesthouse is well located, just next to Chorsu bazaar, but our taxi driver struggled to find; it took him over an hour! A good place to meet other travelers and they provided OVIR registration (interestingly, no-one seemed interested in this when we were leaving).
- Getting around / away
We stuck to taxis, which, in the main, are unofficial and mainly locals earning a couple of quid. No journey anywhere in Tashkent cost us more than £2.
We took the Sharq fast train from Tashkent to Bukhara – leaves at 08:15 and arrives at 14:45 (albeit our train was delayed and arrived at around 15:30). We left it too late to get first class and therefore had to take second class – a seat cost about £7 in mid June 2010.
If you can, get first class. Second class was hot, cramped, and hell on earth with the raging hangover that I had.
- Eating
During the day we tended to navigate towards the Bodrum Turkish Café on Navoi, which wasn’t remarkable but did the job and was relatively cheap.
The best meal we had in the evenings was at Elki Palki, pronounced as Yolki Palki, which I now understand is actually a chain of Russian restaurants! This was on Beruni Avenue, which is the continuation of Navoi. I had a great steak here for about £4.
- Drinking
We were in Tashkent on a Wednesday and Thursday evening and on the whole everything was pretty quiet.
Next door to Elki Palki is the Brauhouse – nice bar, with live music but woeful service – it took twenty five minutes for a waitress to even approach us on one occasion. Further down Beruni are another few wee nice bars, but it was pretty quiet. Be careful here though as there is a bar called OFIS which looked cool but thankfully the bouncer warned us that it was a strip club before we went in and therefore we avoided.
We also headed to the Diplomat 5 Club, just off Navoi which got pretty busy at around 11pm and was quite a good night out on the Thursday, with no cover charge. A double vodka and mixer set us back about £2.20.
- Sights
There was enough to keep us occupied in Tashkent for about a day and a half.
Chorsu Bazaar was a good introduction to Uzbek life and we got some great photographs of the traders.
We spent an afternoon wandering around Navoi Park, admiring the bizarre architecture, having walked from Independence Square and taken in the Senate building and Crying Mother Monument.
From there we walked over to Amir Timur maydoni, where a statue of Timur takes centre place with the Hotel Uzbekistan in the background. We also took a stroll down broadway. This area seems to be where the real money is in Tashkent, with lots of boutiques selling Levis, Armani etc which are far beyond the means of the average Uzbek. There are still a few street vendors selling paintings etc but we understood this to be a far cry from what broadway was in its tourist heyday a few years ago.
We decided to take in the Uzbek national football stadium and found the gates open when we arrived – thus we wandered in and managed to get some good photos in the dugouts etc! At this stage we met the friendly stadium administrator, who told us that the club side that plays out of the stadium – Pakhator – were playing an Uzbek cup tie that evening against FK Metalourg Bekobod. VIP tickets were arranged and cost us effectively £2.
We headed back that evening and watched a relatively entertaining 4-2 victory for the home side, watched by no more than 400 spectators (a combination of the World Cup and a thunderstorm reducing the crowd); in a city as quiet as Tashkent during the week it was a nice way to spend an evening. The free spending Bunyodkor, formerly managed by Felipe Scolari, have their ground just a couple of miles along the road.
- Money
There are two rates with regard to sum – the bank rate and the black market rate. The bank rate in mid June 2010 was 1600 sum. The black market rate varied between 1700 to 2100. While illegal, the black market rate is very prevalent – so much so that a request to a café owner for where money could be changed ended up with him producing a cereal box full of sum in order to do a deal!
We were initially worried that we would need to have a paper trail for all our cash conversions (thus ruling out any black market transactions) but this wasn’t requested at the border. Just ensure you’re taking less money out of the country than you brought in, especially if you’re making ATM withdrawals.
Nonetheless, bear in mind that ATMs are very thin on the ground in Tashkent and non-existent in Bukhara / Samarkand.
We found a National Bank ATM near Broadway that wouldn’t acknowledge our cards, despite showing the VISA logo. The Grand Mir hotel machine was operational but had no cash in it (common occurrence). Finally, we found an ATM at the Hotel Uzbekistan which would dispense US dollars. The Uzbekistan also has free, unsecured wifi in its lobby.
