Friday, 18 September 2026

 

Start: Bishkek (KY) 8:00

Arrival: Jalal-Abad (Manas) (KY) 20:00

 

Total: 574 km

 

 

What a day this has been! I had been looking forward to this so much. It started out good enough. Well, in a manner of speaking.

 

 

We got to the breakfast room five minutes after they opened. Today would be a long day, so better start out with a nourishing breakfast. The fried eggs were lying in a heap in the tray, the lid wide open. "This is quite disgusting", my sister said, shaking her head, "and where is the butter? Yesterday they were out of jam, today no butter." She went to ask the waitress. I hesitated, then loaded a fried egg on my plate, followed by fruit and raw veggies. Sonia came back. "They're out of butter", she announced, "at 7 in the morning. How is this even possible?" I shrugged and tucked into my eggs. "This is cold", I said, shuddering. "The lid was open", Sonia reminded me. "No, not just lukewarm. Really cold, like from a fridge." "Don't eat it then." The other options were chicken mash, probably from the fridge too, and tons of sickly-sweet cakes. Where was the great bread that travellers in Central Asia enthused about? Other than deep fried baursag, we had not had a single normal bread, except for a stale, dry bun on Lake Issyk Kul. Just cheap toast and brioche-like buns. Sighing resignedly, I ate the congealed egg-mess. "It's food."

 

At 8 o'clock, we were on the road. We'd checked the oil, the tyres and were ready for a long trip through the mountains. On the way out of town, we passed the Bishkek Arena. So cool, it looked like a huge yurt! This must be the place where our two German football fans had watched the match.

 

 

In the last small town before the mountains, we filled up on petrol. This way, we would easily make it to Jalal Abad without having to worry about finding a gas station. I was relieved to leave the ever dusty, smoggy area around Bishkek. How did people with asthma manage to survive here?

 

The road wound up into the mountains at a steady pace. We encountered several large troups of animals, sheep, horses and cows. Naturally, they had the right of way. We wondered why the shepherds didn't walk them through the dusty paths on the side. Why use the street? It must be stressful for the animals and probably hard on their hooves as well.

 

 

 

 

Around 11 o'clock, we made a pit stop at a viewpoint. Far below us, the road, barely visible, wound in switchbacks all the way up. This was the picture I had chosen for my blog, the famous road leading up to the Too Ashoo Pass. Hard to believe that only five weeks ago, I'd sat at home, dreaming about this. And now we were really here! I could have cried of joy and wonder.

 

Leading up to the pass, the switchbacks were getting tighter and steeper. Still, the road was in excellent condition, there were not that many cars and trucks on it, so it was relatively easy to pass slow-moving vehicles. Our old car was taking the height like a pro. Only 1300 cc, and it had no problems whatsoever climbing from 800 m in Bishkek to 3200 m in just a few hours. Don't we have the greatest little car in the world! Admittedly, the other cars around us didn't look much bigger or newer. The travel forums warning that the road to the "infamous" tunnel was so hard were clearly greatly exaggerating. Now for the tunnel itself. "Film it, all of it," I had said to my sis. Only three months ago, a Greek biker had taken the same route. On Facebook, he had lamented the lack of ventilation, no lights inside and dangerous potholes everywhere. People had celebrated how he had dared braving this undevelopped dangerous route. I was a bit nervous. How bad could it be? "Close the incoming air, and film it!" I said again, and in we went, into the tunnel.

 

 

The tunnel was a surprise, to say the least. Either a pleasant one (lighted, no potholes) or a let down (no dangerous adventures to brave!), depending on how you wanted to look at it. When we got out on the other side, we actually parked the car and checked, whether this really had been THE tunnel, and not just a smaller one leading up to it. But no, it was the infamous "smoke-filled hellhole" the bikers had been bragging about. We took a picture (bikers don't have a monopoly on bragging, after all) and then I sent the picture to my parents. We did it! King of the World! And the internet worked up here like a charm too.

 

 

Now for the drive back down the other side. I was a bit worried about the constant breaking, so we made two stops along the way to give our car a chance to cool down. Luckily, the southern slope was less steep than the northern, so our brakes did not have to work quite so hard.

 

Just past noon, I felt an unpleasant cramp in my stomach. My ears were clogged up too. "I'm not feeling too good", I moaned. "We can make a stop", Sonia suggested. I got out, tried to walk it off. "Ok, let's get going, or we'll never reach Jalal Abad before nightfall." The cramps got worse. Much worse. Soon it was clear that I could not go on driving. So Sonia took the wheel and I rode shotgun, feeling sorry for myself. After an hour, there was no doubt I had food poisoning. The cold eggs? The yummy salad I had eaten yesterday? Could be anything. We had to make more and more stops as my body rid itself of the unwanted bacteria.

 

 

"Just try to get some sleep", Sonia suggested. "I want to die", I moaned, "please, I can't take this anymore. Let's just stop here." Sonia was horrified. "Stop here in the mountains? We're hours from the next hospital, in case you need help." She drove on, over mountain passes, through tunnels, overtaking the same trucks again and again because of the many stops we had to make. She was getting good at it too. Not as foolhardy as the Kyrgyz, but you can't be too hesitant unless you want to trundle for hours behind a slow truck or tricycle. I was not even of any use as a navigator. I had so been looking forward to this day, the eerie moonscapes, the mountain lakes and gorges, the seemingly endless unpopulated desert of the Western Tian Shan ranges. And now I barely saw any of it, too busy not to die of pain. Sonia pointed out a sentence painted on a hillside. "Talasüm üyük zherim". What could it mean? We took a picture. We would check it out later, when I was among the living again. It actually means: "On the sacred land of Talas", a reference to the homeland of the Kyrgyz hero Manas. The town Talas is further to the North, but maybe this whole area is connected to the legend.

 

 

In the late afternoon, the landscape changed to alpine pine forests and pastures. From time to time, we passed through a little village. Unfortunately, this also meant that traffic increased slightly. But now it was clear that we would not be making it to Jalal Abad before nightfall. No more stops, Sonia declared. She would get me back to civilisation today.

 

 

But driving on these roads, especially when you're not used to driving for hours at a time, takes its toll. So we stopped again at a crystal clear lake. The far shore looked like white sand, or maybe even ice. Surely that must be an illusion, it was over 30 degrees outside!

 

I took a deep breath. "I think I can drive", I offered. Sonia took one look at me and got behind the wheel again. "I'm almost good again", I moaned. She was having none of it. "Just try to sleep."

 

 

She drove us all the way into the valley, where we made a left just before the Uzbek border and headed straight south. The street led through a string of small towns. Stalls lined the main thoroughfare, and everywhere police controls ensured that drivers stuck to the 30 km/h at pedestrian crossings. I found this highly annoying, as it was obvious from very far away whether someone wanted to cross the street. Why slow down that much near a completely empty sidewalk?

 

 

 

Just before nightfall, I did feel better. "Please let me drive", I begged. Sonia relented, we switched seats, and she booked us into the best hotel Jalal Abad had to offer. She guided me through the traffic chaos of this city, we stressed out on a police car that drove behind us blinking all their lights. Had I sped through an empty pedestrian crossing with 50 km/h? Had I burnt an amber traffic light? Guilty on both accounts. But they weren't interested in me and in the end passed me, lights still blinking. Odd.

 

Jalal Abad (which seems to be called Manas now, even though all street signs still read 'Jalal Abad') is a busy town in the evening. The apartment complexes looked new and quite sumptuous, at least in the part near the airport, where our hotel was located.

 

 

We found the hotel, I parked the car, switched off the engine and closed my eyes. We had made it. I really had not believed it. Without my sister, I would still be in the mountains, lying in my car, probably have died of heatstroke by now. She always has my back. Always had. Always will.

 

I dozed off. Sonia checked us in, woke me up, I somehow got to the room, fell onto the bed and was dead to the world for the next thirteen hours.