Impressions

Short impressions from a place — a square, a workshop, a morning at the market.

TashkentBukharaSamarkandKhivaChimgan

How to read this

The place first, the route after

Registan towards evening — The square that stays with you is the one the crowds have already left

A square, a bazaar, a road — you remember them not as a list, but by the hour you happened to be there.

One moment

Not a rundown of the sights. Amir Timur Square, the wall of the Ark, Chorsu at eight in the morning — and everything that manages to happen while you stand there.

Practical details

How late the facades stay lit, where to put the tripod, whether the camp takes cash, whether the museums are shut after six. The things a short photo caption never tells you.

Alongside the route

A note stays about the place. How to fill the day and what to combine it with — that is in the routes.

What's here

Written on the spot

Three ways a place ends up in a note. Not “what to see in the city”, but the hour when the city is still yours.

Squares and streets

Registan, when the square goes quiet, and the same Registan at night, while the facades are still lit. Chorsu at eight, before the best of it is gone. Itchan Kala after the buses: a museum by day, a town again by evening. Amir Timur Square — who stood on the pedestal and why the fountains don't run all day.

Workshops and the table

A workshop by Toqi Zargaron, where you don't browse the display case but wait for the craftsman's hands to come free. Plov in a Bukhara home: the carrots are cut in front of you, and the vegetarian version comes with quince. The Khovrenko cellars in Samarkand: five wines, a non-alcoholic juice and a bottle you can take home in your luggage.

The road and the light

Chimgan: setting off in the dark, on the ridge by seven, back down before the cable car. Charvak an hour from Tashkent: the dam, a picnic at Yusufkhona, half an hour in a boat, fires only where they are allowed. The camp at Ayaz-Kala: a warm shower, the toilet across the yard, cash only, and the moment they put out the last lamp.

Cities

Squares, bazaars, the road

Tashkent, Bukhara, Samarkand, Khiva, Chimgan and Charvak.

Tashkent

A square where, in a hundred years, Kaufman, Lenin and Amir Timur have each taken their turn. And the Chorsu bazaar, worth reaching at opening time rather than at lunch.

Bukhara

The Ark from the wall: the throne hall, the coronation, the coin collection. Nearby a workshop, and a home where plov is not cooked for show.

Samarkand

The Registan in the evening, when entry still costs money but shooting from the street is free. At night the tripod can stay up until half past nine. By day, the cellars, if you want a table rather than a square.

Chimgan and Charvak

Mountains and a reservoir on the same road out of Tashkent, but they are two different days. You head for the ridge before first light. You go out on the water once it is warm and it is clear where a fire is allowed.

Khiva

Itchan Kala: a day ticket, streets clear after six, museums shut, and the climb onto the wall starts at the West Gate. Beyond that, the desert and a camp where the light ends when the generator does.

Notes