
Winter is coming…
Almost a year has passed since I made a start on writing a second book… I had returned from my winter cycle ride through Siberia in April and was struggling…
Almost a year has passed since I made a start on writing a second book… I had returned from my winter cycle ride through Siberia in April and was struggling…
I’m now back in the UK. Again. It’s wonderful with the warm sun and green fields, leafy trees and chirping birds. What a contrast to Magadan in the Russian Far…
Well, there are many stories to tell from the last couple of months. The 2000km from Yakutsk to Magadan was a fantastic ride, made all the more memorable by the…
Oh where do I start?! I think for now, I will just show you the photos from the last couple of weeks. Mostly it was too cold to stop and…
Just over a week has passed since leaving Irkutsk… and now I’m back. Briefly. Tomorrow I take a train to Neriyungri to begin the very cold cycle to Yakutsk. But…
Time for a long-awaited update… After a few weeks back home, I’m finally back out in Russia – in Irkutsk, near Lake Baikal. The first 3 weeks at home were…
Each time I return home from an extended time abroad, I am engulfed with a mixture of emotions and impressions. And each time it is different. Last time, it was…
I am back in the UK! Yes, that happened fast you say. Indeed, I’d been keeping my return quiet so I could surprise my mum for her birthday. But now…
Rather than retrace the direct route to the main road via Urgench, cycled along the smaller roads for a short cut towards Nukus. Riding through small towns and farmland. Uninspiring.…
I pushed on towards Khiva, rather than camp – it would have been the crap kind of camping. Where you have to hide and make no noise and try not…
Because it had taken three hours for the taxi driver to find 3 other passengers, it was well after dark when I arrived in Tortkul. So rather than cycling out…
After Samarkand, came Bukhara. On the route I’m cycling west, at least. It was the same for those merchants from the East trading along the Silk Road so many centuries…
Samarkand was founded around 700BC by the Sogdians. It became one of the greatest cities in the world at the time due to it’s central location on the Silk Road,…
Time is flying by. I have so much I could write about, but too little time to do it justice. That has been the trouble with this trip… not enough…
So this was the plan… cycle through the Pamirs and on to Dushanbe, pick up my Uzbek visa and be on my way to Uzbekistan to see the Silk Road…
It was a struggle leaving Langar. After a night in a bed (=mattress on floor), I was more tired than usual. Not much energy either (soup and bread for dinner…
I woke up in my dim unlit room in Murghab, went to the window and pulled back the curtains. White light blinded me. I blinked and rubbed my eyes and…
My legs and busting lungs screamed for a day off in Sary Tash (that’s what you get when you sit on a horse for a month). But the clear skies…
Having lingered long enough in Bishkek while arranging onward visas, I took a bus straight to Osh. From there, it would be back on the bike. In at the deep…
This year is galloping on and before you know it, it’ll be Christmas. Well, that got me thinking about calendars recently. So I’ve been looking through all my photos from…