Just a quick summation of our hols in Central Asia. We visited Tashkent, Samakand, Bukhara, Almaty & the Kolsai / Kaindy Lakes / Charyn Canyon.

Observations:
1. Wonderful people and felt safer than any European city. Any.
2. Some of the plazas and buildings are really impressive and look different to a jaded palate used to European classic.
3. My Russian was very handy. Soviet influences of the central planning sort quite obvious, but also distinctly different people. And you need the Yandex app for taxis.
4. Cheap but the exchange rates (and processes) did muddle our brains to begin with.
5. Loads of travellers turn up in the same places but a great mix of people and overall not the usual stupid instas.
6. Meat on the menu and vegetarians will have a hard time. Some of the shashliks were at the very top-level of tasty, but that was expected. Beer was quite readily available if you looked for it.
7. One of the better places we’ve visited and thinking about another visit to include Kyrgystan, which a lot of travellers rated highly. Their outdoors is a whole different level to the UK.
8. Tourism felt like something new-ish to them and I think they could have leant into the Silk Road story a bit more, especially in the historic sites of Samarkand and Bukhara.
9. We were very happy with the organised tours; one for a private car round Samarkand for 5 hotspots (Olimjon), and the other from Almaty to the Tian Shan range (Serzhan and Alex).
10. Istanbul airport was crazy expensive. £23 for 2 coffees.