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2007 / Uzbekistan

Tamerlane's Tomb
 
Samarkand is not short of bloody huge monuments. This madrassa is one of three facades (two madrassas and a mosque) making up the main square, all ridiculously proportioned and incredibly impressive. And these weren't even the biggest things in town. <br/> <br/>I liked this one best of the three because of the cool tigers. Apparently they were supposed to be lions, but I mean, look at them, the guy designing it must have had a picture book translated badly.
Samarkand behemoth
 
Still in Bukhara... for the Asia trip Ferris Wheels were a bit of a thing for us. We would find them and ride on them wherever we could. This one, in a park in the north of town, was rather disconcerting as we found that some of the cabins were being used for storage. The cabin behiind us had witches' hats, and the one in front - this one - had a lawnmower.
Storage place
 
Very, very beautiful, but we saw so many of these damn things it is hard to keep track. I remember Genghis Khan supposedly rode up to the bottom of this minaret and was so impressed that he ordered it spared.
Mosque and Minaret
 
The top of this old soviet thing was where I took the photo of Bukhara's walls from. It looked very dodgy but noone stopped us when we very hesitantly climbed up.
Rickety water tower
 
The famous walls of Bukhara . Out front of the main gate in this picture is where the British officers Stoddart and Connoly were finally killed. Very great-game heavy, this place. The Russians bombed the crap out of the place in the 20's when it tried to declare independence in the wake of the Bolshevik / White Russian civil war.
Bukhara walls
 
Not the greatest picture but it gives you an idea. The very stubby minaret was planned on being the tallest in the world, and it would have been, by a long way, if the Khan hadn't died. And if it didn't fall over, I suppose.
Khiva skyline
 
There aren't too many of these boats left in the sands of the former Aral Sea, the desperate locals are selling them for scrap.
Aral Sea boat graveyard
 
A rather irreverent message on a WWII war memorial.
Welcome to Uzbekistan
 

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