Day 22

Scrambled egg, sausage and strong coffee prepared us for the onward journey. After several days of disciplined stops an significant mileage the team have become a finely tuned machine. We do some maintenance checks on Defender 1 and the remainder of the team get busy cleaning windscreens, head & tail lamps and sorting ipod cables, Garmin nuvi units with charging leads, radios and water between each vehicle. The route out of town is simple, we follow Ben's route along roads in a relatively good condition. The cosmodrome is near our location and at least 2 of the team want to go, we hadn't pre-arranged our visit so unfortunately we had to decide to move on. Ben had lined up a unique stop instead. The abandoned town of Sauran was listed as 240km along the road to Turkestan. At 236 we saw a pathetic collection of huts on the left. The team decided it wasn't even worth slowing down. Patience yielded a hint of a larger site to the right a few kilometres further on. The team excitedly took photos of our approach, the crisp modern lines of the vehicles a stark contrast to the ancient form of the crumbling town walls. We could have been in an Indiana Jones movie. Moments later Dave added to the drama by pointing out a tiny and likely to be deadly poisonous scorpion.

The team left the ruins reluctantly in order to press on.

Turkestan towen was the next stop. We needed minimal guidance to find our destination, the mausoleum. It's shimmering blue domes were visible from the main road. We pulled in to a parking bay in sight of the mausoleum and found a leafy, shady spot for a picnic. It was a luxurious moment of tranquillity. Some children were playing nearby, a water fight, we didn't want to pull them away from the fun to decorate a handprint but they shyly accepted some plum flavoured sweets. The team got into a good routine after we'd eaten. Half cleaned the windscreens and half struggled to the mausoleum in the heat, then we swapped. Elanor wore a headscarf and we all wore full length trousers out of respect for what was clearly a significant place of worship for the locals.

One of the highlights was the exposed wooden beams on the lofty frontage which housed a cacophony of chirping birds. Admittedly some of them were pigeons but the overall impression over the ornately carved wooden entrance doors was both visual and aural, the kind a camera can't capture.

Camels were browsing near the vehicles when we returned, we left them behind and headed off to Shimkent. We have been driving in consistently flat and dusty territory, so the introduction of some gentle hills and more marshlands was welcome. We passeed groups of horses & cattle cooling their heels and occasionally having what looked like a blissful roll in the clear water.

Shimkent is a large city, we managed to get into the town centre with miniumum fuss to find a likely hotel. Andy was excited to see our hotel was near a "plane on a stick" a surprisingly common structure across Russia & Kazakhstan. Reminiscent of Spitfire Island (Castle Bromwich) but definitely Soviet in style.

Ben encouraged us to get out again quickly and explore the bazaar, however the majority of the stalls had closed. A variety of unidentifiable meat was on display on bloodstained cardboard sheets, and stale versions of the local round breads. We took a decision to return in the morning to do our grocery shopping!

A wander for a suitable evening meal stop yielded a cold beer on a 1st floor terrace view a view over a park. Shimkent had the usual quota of stray dogs and flower vendors on it's streets. We even passed a large shopping complex before settling in a restaurant with a pleasant collection of greenery. The food was slow to arrive but tasty. We had company during our wait, a local man who seemed to click with Dave and started talking about Rangers and Glasgow when he found out he was Scottish. He also said it was his dream to visit London. After expressing his love of Vodka and (we think) offering to buy us all a round of shots (we refused politely) he was gently encouraged by the maitre d' to return to his table and to a lady whose face expressed the international language of "long-suffering-wife".

A few of us risked the adventure of a local taxi and the remainder walked back. A golden mosque opposite the hotel was a good landmark to navigate back to. I anticipated an interrupted night from the lilting call to prayer, however the 4.30 call was brief, lyrical and wasn't repeated.