Arrival in Ashgabat
When you arrive at Ashgabat Airport, you will immediately be given a COVID test which you then pay for. From there, you get on a bus and get driven to the arrivals terminal. As you walk into immigration, make sure to go to the right and get your visa immediately. There is a visa office. You must first process the visa at one window. The guy working there will give you a slip of paper that you think take you to the next window to pay for your visa. For some reason, they seem to add $14 to every visa fee regardless of which country you are from so be prepared for that. For Americans, the total price of the visa is $99 and for other nationalities seems to be slightly more expensive than that.
Day 1
After I met my guide and Katelyn, my travel buddy for this trip, we headed to our hotel around 5 a.m. where we got 6 blissful hours of sleep before starting our tour. Our guide came and got us at noon and we headed for lunch at a Turkish restaurant in a big shopping mall before picking up snacks at a supermarket for our long train journey that night. The supermarket was very modern and full of international brands from all over the world which was quite unexpected.
From there, we drove 15 kilometers out of the city to go to Nesa Fort, one of Turkmenistan’s few UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The fort/residence was occupied from the 3rd century BC to the 3rd century A.D. We also stopped to see the ruins of an old mosque that had been toppled by the enormous 1948 earthquake that wiped out most of Ashgabat.
That night, we climbed aboard a train for the 15-hour ride to Turkmenbashi armed with pizza and beer. We spent the rest of the evening chatting, drinking, and eating before passing out for the night.
Day 2
We woke up bright and early as the train neared the port/resort city of Turkmenbashi. A driver picked us up and we started our sightseeing tour with a visit to a memorial dedicated to the Japanese POWs interred here at the end of World War II. It was located in the Kazak cemetery which was interesting to see in itself.
After that, we dropped off the car at a huge parking lot, jumped in a taxi, and headed to the tourist zone of NAZWA where Turkmenbashi’s beach resort stands at the edge of the Caspian Sea. It felt like a mixture of Dubai and Miami with a lot less people. Although previous tourists had mentioned that everything was empty there, we actually saw quite a few Turkmen there enjoying the public holiday. We went swimming in the (cold, but not too cold) Caspian Sea and I was shocked to see how crystal clear the water was, especially considering that Turkembashi doubles as a port city. It was a lovely experience and my first time swimming in the Caspian Sea which I think makes it pretty cool!
We explored the hotel zone a bit more before hailing a taxi back to the parking lot and rejoining our driver. We went to the local bazaar to grab food for the night and had lunch at a waterfront restaurant before venturing out into the desert.
We drove for about 3 hours, two of which was on a very bumpy dirt road, before reaching the Yangikala Canyon. Roughly translated as Fire Fortress, the canyon is one of the remnants of a huge sea that once covered Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The name is fitting with rugged cliffs colored with white, yellow, orange, and red. We stopped to climb one of the smaller hills and I was surprised to see how crumbly the earth was. At times, it felt like walking up a sand dune.
We then drove up to the top of one of the biggest hills/cliffs, set up camp for the night, and spent the rest of the evening watching a beautiful sunset, eating dinner, and then climbing into bed.
Day 3
I woke up the next morning around 5 a.m. to check out the stars which had been obscured by the full moon the night before. The lack of light pollution and clouds made the stars dance in the black sky above me. I eventually nestled back into bed to wait for the sun to rise. Although the sunrise itself was nothing spectacular, we managed to get some good photos and after it warmed up a bit, we all ate breakfast before starting the long bumpy drive to our next destination.
We made the long six-hour drive to the mountain village of Nohur, stopping in the much larger city of Balkanabat for lunch. As we pulled into the parking lot of the restaurant, we were greeted with a car covered in gold and blue balloons, baby dolls, and stickers of Boss Baby and were told that there was a baby birthday celebration happening there. We watched people file by in their best clothing and finally the man/boy of the hour whose birth they were celebrating. It was nice to see a celebration like that and I can honestly say that I haven’t really ever seen anything quite like that car.
The drive was pretty uneventful, just driving through hours and hours of desert until we finally reached the Balkan Mountains where Nohur is located. The village itself was tiny with just a handful of shops, fruit sellers, and the hottest herb sellers I have ever seen in my life. The village is apparently famous in Turkmenistan as a wholistic health destination but I was too busy staring at the beautiful man in front of me to focus on any of the details.
We spent the night sleeping on mats on the floor of a local homestay which was also home to four very adorable kids, a friendly cat, and a smorgasbord of farm animals.
Day 4
The next morning, we had a leisurely breakfast at the homestay before starting the 100-kilometer drive back to Ashgabat. We stopped along the way to check out a cave lake that was supposed to be renowned for its healing waters. We went down about 6 flights of stairs only to find that the water levels had dropped significantly, making the underground lake much smaller than expected. What was significantly more interesting were the Soviet-era steps and changing rooms that reminded us of another era.
We made it back to Ashgabat for lunch and then had to do some visa formalities before heading back out to the city of Mary/Merv where we would be spending the night. The four-hour drive was pretty uneventful with virtually the entire drive being in the desert.
We arrived late in the evening, had dinner and beer at an outdoor restaurant, and then checked into the hotel where Katelyn and I decided to check out the hotel bar to ensure that we could eventually say that we had visited a bar in Turkmenistan. After a few quick beers, we headed up to our room to pass out in our luxurious twin beds. It was the first full night sleeping in an actual bed and it was heavenly.
Day 5
In the morning, we drove 40 minutes east of Mary to visit the ruins of ancient Merv, an important Silk Road city. There were only a few structures still standing, including a renovated mausoleum that holds the body of one of Turkemnistan’s most esteemed writers. It was interesting to see although it was a lot fewer ruins spread out over a much larger territory than I expected.
I was a tiny bit disappointed by it but my travel buddy was absolutely enthralled. If you are thinking about going and aren’t sure if it is worth it, I would definitely recommend it. Besides, it’s not every day that you get to travel through Turkmenistan! After checking out the ruins of Merv, we made the long drive back to Ashgabat, arriving back in town l around 7 p.m.
We made it back in time to go for a drive through the city, checking out all of the crazy lights that made the city look like a mixture of Dubai and Las Vegas. It was fascinating to see how much work they put into making the city beautiful. We got to go for a ride on the “largest indoor Ferris wheel in the world” which gave us a bird’s eye view over the newest section of Ashgabat and it was just as over-the-top as the photos suggest! We finished off the night with a few beers at Ashgabat’s British Pub (yes, it really does exist!) before hitting the hay for a good night’s sleep.
Day 6
The next morning, I was lucky enough to spend a few hours strolling around the city center of Ashgabat. It was a quiet Sunday morning and I watched as people walked their dogs, waited at bus stops, and rushed to work at the Russian Bazaar. I even stopped at a cute little coffee shop to grab a coffee. It all felt so incredibly normal that it was hard to reconcile the place that I was experiencing with the one that other travelers had talked about.
In the afternoon, we started making the long drive to the Darvaza Gas Crater. This enormous gas crater was created after the Soviet Union had a bit of a whoopsie while drilling for minerals and struck gas. It then lit itself on fire and has now been burning for around 50 years. This was one of the main things to see in Turkmenistan and although it was interesting, it was also a bit underwhelming. We arrived just before sunset and had the gas crater to “ourselves” for a while before the tour buses began to arrive. It was a surreal feeling after having not really seeing many other tourists for the past week.
We camped next to the crater that night and despite being next to an enormous fire pit, I spent the night shivering and kind of wishing that we had slept in the yurt that was offered to us instead!
Day 7
We left very early the next morning for the long drive to the Uzbekistan border after taking one last walk around the crater. We headed to the town of Konye Urgench, the former capital of the Khorezem region. It is home to many different monuments dating back to the 11th century, including mosques, minarets, tombs, and even the old gates to a caravanseri. After exploring the old town for a bit, our driver drove us for around an hour or so to the border where we said goodbye to the guys who had kept us safe, well-fed, and happy for the last 7 days and made our way to Uzbekistan.
