It wasn’t a hard day today nor was it exciting. The ride basically brought me to the foot of the mountains.
The wind has gone and Issy Kul looked very nice. It looked far better than the roads I took to leave town – straight and boring.
I stopped on the way out of town at the local Globus supermarket. It’s now my favourite in Kyrgyzstan. They have everything I need.
I turned off the boring road and onto a bumpy but almost traffic free shortcut road. It was nice but fairly unexciting, as was the rest of the trip to Kochkor. It was dry and fairly barren, but there were horses and people stopped by the road with the bonnet of their Lada up. The excitement for me starts tomorrow.
I had snacks beside the road and rolled into Kochkor, pleasantly surprised by the town. From the guesthouse, I walked into the centre for a late lunch. I only needed a snack and there was a fast food place right there. I walked in and the staff were having their lunch. All five of them ignored me so it was a supermarket lunch for me.
Cheese, pickled gherkins and multigrain bread – yum. On the way back, I saw two bikepackers and stopped to talk. They ended up staying at the same place – lovely people Ralf and Marion. I also met Leah from NZ and she was the first native English speaker I had spoken to in months (from memory).
Travel stories were a large part of the evening.
