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North America United States

Best COVID Day Trips from Salt Lake

It’s been a year since lockdown started. A year ago today, I had my last day in the office. The weekend before, I had gone to brunch, seen a theater performance, and gotten my hair cut. That Tuesday, I got off the train after work and went to a happy hour with some coworkers. It feels like a lifetime ago.

The bleakest thing about life under COVID is how much my world has narrowed. Before, I would commute over 40 miles each way to work. And listen, I know that sounds crazy, but reserve your judgment there for a moment. Because the point of this story is that I was traveling over 80 miles a day and now I can go days at a time without even leaving my house.

That said, one of the silver linings is that I live in an absolutely stunning state! Utah has its bizarre quirks, but it is without a doubt one of the most beautiful states in the country. Having these types of landscapes within a couple hours have made for some really nice outings. So far, here are the five best day trips I’ve taken since lockdown started.

1. Albion Basin

I recommend this one in the late summer when the wildflowers are blooming. It’s out by Alta, which is already gorgeous, and then you round the corner into the wildflower fields and it’s spectacular. We went early in the morning, when there was hardly anyone else around, and it was amazing.

2. Bridal Veil Falls

We went in the winter. It was early in the morning, right after a snowstorm, and no one else was out. Most of the path didn’t even have any footprints on it, and it felt like walking through a magical winter wonderland. By the time we got back to the parking lot, it seemed like the rest of the world had woken up and realized this place existed. The craziest part was that we saw people ice climbing on the falls, which did not seem safe at all! We’ve had a very warm winter. But to each their own.

3. Bonneville Salt Flats

This one was my first COVID day trip. These pictures were taken on March 22, 2020, back when we were going totally stir crazy and we were optimistic enough to think this might be wrapped up quickly. A few weeks, we told ourselves, as we snuck back into the office on a Sunday morning to pack up our desks and monitors.

The midpoint of this trip is Wendover. Wendover is one of those Nevada border towns that exists to keep gambling accessible to the rest of us. It features a few casinos, a liquor store, and apparently a dispensary now. Back in ~the before~, my book club had talked about going as a fun weekend jaunt to gamble away a few hundred dollars and drink lots of cocktails. When we were there in March 2020, it was during the period when Nevada had suspended all of the casino licenses, and so the doors to the casinos were shut and there was caution tape at every entrance.

4. Bear River, Wyoming

Sometimes you just want to see a buffalo without having to go all the way to Yellowstone, you know? Also, side note, the drive up is beautiful too. We made a stop at Echo Reservoir, pictured below, and were stunned at how blue the water was.

5. Sardine Peak

This one is up by Snowbasin. It was a bit of a spur of the moment trip. It was the day after New Years, and we wanted to just take a scenic drive, and then we realized we needed to be out of the house for a little bit. Some people were biking this and others were snowshoeing, but we just hiked it. I was pleasantly surprised by the views at the top!

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Cuba North America

Cuba’s Southern Coast

As we left Viñales, we had one stop scheduled: The Bay of Pigs. Yep, the site of the failed invasion in 1961. Do you know what I did there?

Sunbathed. Dipped my feet in the ocean. In fact, I actually got a bit sunburned.

There’s something so crazy about going to the places you read about in history textbooks and making new memories, ones that aren’t about death and the Cold War. We also spent part of our day at the Korimakao Cultural Project, which serves rural communities by offering arts education! We got to see several performances, including singing, dancing, and playing instruments, and ended in the gallery where students had drawings and paintings on display.

We spent the night in Cienfuegos. Our first stop was this stunning hotel for drinks!

Cienfuegos was lovely. We didn’t have a ton of time there, but we spent the night and then had a few hours in the morning to shop for souvenirs. There was a nice pedestrianized section in the center of town that had lots of little stalls with artists selling their wares. One of my favorite finds from the trip was a beautiful little wooden dancer statue. As a bonus, it was wrapped in local newspaper. I would like to note that the newspaper front page that I received had not only the date it was printed, but the number of years since the revolution.

Side note, I would like to put in a word for the hospitality of the people running the casa particulares. They made us breakfast every morning, and there were some great ones! Lots of tropical fruit, alongside bread and cheese and meat. My personal favorite was this tropical fruit plate. To quote Mulan, “and it’s happy to see you!”

The last place we went while we were in Cuba was Trinidad. Not so fun fact, Trinidad was having issues with their water when we were there. The New York Times did an interesting article on the struggles that they as a nation have had with water distribution, and they mention the time I was there, January 2020, as a point where Trinidad went without water for 20 days.

Unfortunately, we weren’t told about that when we arrived, and so we didn’t know to do our part to help ration things. The water at our accommodations was off starting that first morning when we woke up, and it was a few days of baby wipes and dry shampoo. Despite this, Trinidad was a great experience!

We had lots of wandering around, going to museums, and eating ice cream while trying to stay out of the heat and humidity. During our last night in Trinidad, we had a picnic on the beach! They pulled out all the stops to give us a feast, and we stayed there until it got dark. The sunset was absolutely stunning!

We weren’t quite done with Cuba, though. En route back to Havana, we stopped in Santa Clara and went to the Che Guevara Mausoleum. The museum had the Cuban take on the revolution, and I found it interesting to compare that to the books I’ve read on Cuba’s history. The one I would recommend here is Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba, which chronicles both the history of Cuba and the history of the Bacardi rum brand. The Bacardi family actually had a dispute with the Cuban government over who had the rights to produce Bacardi rum, which is…. possibly the most interesting trademark dispute ever? Unknown, but I do know it’s one of the books that first sparked my interest in visiting!

A fascinating way to end the trip, for sure. Getting back to the US was a little bit of a nightmare. It took ages to exchange my money back and I had to run through the airport to catch my flight, and then I got delayed nine hours in Orlando and so my last flight didn’t even take off until about 3:50 a.m. Still, I might not have complained if I had realized it would be over a year until I would be back on a plane. It’s been over 13 months now. Not exactly what I expected when we started 2020. Still, it seems like there’s hope now. My family and friends are starting to get vaccinated, and I think there’s a light at the end of the tunnel that isn’t merely an oncoming train.

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Cuba North America

Viñales: A Valley Lost In Time

So it turns out that roosters don’t just crow in the morning, as I have been led to believe in cartoons. They crow constantly, all night long, at intervals of about 3 minutes. Isn’t that fun? I learned that at our homestay in Viñales, at about 2 a.m. Needless to say I have a new least favorite animal.

Real talk, though, Viñales might be the most stunning place I’ve ever seen. It’s cracked the top ten for sure. Apparently Steven Spielberg wanted to film Jurassic Park here and the State Department was not on board. This was our next stop after Havana, and it is a tourist hotspot for one reason: cigars. Yep, Viñales is the region of Cuba that produces that world-renowned tobacco.

Before we got there, though, we had a few other detours! The first was an absolutely amazing place called Fusterlandia. An artist, José Fuster, wanted to reclaim his neighborhood and created these mosaics. The whole place feels like a trippy dream world, and it was so cool to wander through and see all the different murals and characters he created out of tile.

From there, we went to Las Terrazas, which is an effort to re-forest one area of Cuba and to stimulate the local rural economy. One of the aspects of my trip that I absolutely loved was the fact that we met so many organizations who were working all over Cuba to improve life for the citizens. I was impressed, time and time again, with the creative solutions to problems that people had. While in Viñales, we saw Soviet-era laundry machines that were somehow still running, cobbled together with parts that the family had been able to scavenge.

Side note, the whole time we were in Las Terrazas, our guide kept pointing out cool birds, which was around the time I realized I am terrible at birdwatching! How am I supposed to spot them in the trees?

Anyhow. We got to try some local coffee and meet some artisans. I bought my mom a wooden hummingbird sculpture. At first, I was hesitant because it looked very delicate, with the beak and the wings, and I didn’t think I could bring it back to the US safely. I asked the guy selling them what he wrapped it in, and I kid you not, he held up a piece of paper. At my expression, which surely read ?????, he took the hummingbird and broke it down to its components, showing me how I could fit the pieces back together once I got it home. Way cool.

On to Viñales! Look at that valley. This is a more agricultural section of the country, and we had a lot of wonderful farm-to-table food, including a live cooking demonstration. I was low key worried about food on this trip, because some places are really weird about me being vegetarian (looking at you, Eastern Europe and Central Asia), but in Cuba, there is always a vegetarian option. Even if there are only 3-4 dishes in the restaurant, one will be vegetarian. A few highlights: plantain chips, taro root, and so much pesto! Plus all the rice dishes were stellar. I had never had taro before and it was delicious.

One other brief anecdote from Viñales: getting out money! So, money in Cuba as an American is a challenge, because American bank cards cannot work there. I mean, your first barrier is that a lot of places will not have credit card machines, but even in places that do, an American card is no better than a used napkin on the side of the road. You have to bring in cash and exchange it. I brought euros, because I figured I’d have a better time with those than with USD.

The other quirky thing is that there are actually two different currencies in Cuba. One is Cuban pesos, CUPs, which are the local currency. The other is Cuban convertible pesos, or CUCs, which are for foreigners and are tied to the US dollar. Fun fact, Cuba is actually in the process of phasing out CUCs. No idea how that will work, but I can only report on how it was when I was there. Basically, you want to take care that you don’t end up with CUPs as a foreigner because they are useless to you, you can’t convert them back and they’re only really accepted at local grocery stores/markets, which you won’t be going to anyway.

All that to say…. when I was at the airport, I wasn’t able to convert as much as I wanted, and so I was dangerously low by the time we got to Viñales. And I mean, I wanted to buy cigars so I needed cash. So I went to the bank super early, way before it opened, so I could stand in line with the locals. I got a pretty good spot too. And there was a Cuban grandma there who was enforcing who had what spot – you didn’t need to really stand in a line, because people were keeping track of who was where. Locals are willing to cut in line in front of foreigners if my time at the airport exchanging money back to USD was any indication, but this time it went smoothly and the whole banking experience went well. I do definitely prefer the ability to just go to an ATM and pull out what I need.

The tobacco farm was a fascinating experience! They walked us through the entire process, from growing the tobacco and drying it out to the art of rolling a cigar. I was able to bring some back to the US, since there’s a certain amount allowed through customs, and so my dad has them carefully packed away for special occasions.

Here I am, loving the option to pay an extra dollar and have my drink in a coconut. Afterwards, the waiter took the coconut and hacked it up with a machete so that our table could eat it.

Viñales was a highlight of the trip for me. I’ll never forget eating dinner in that restaurant at the lookout point, watching the sun set over the valley while I drank daiquiris. The people we met were friendly and excited to show us their traditions, and the landscape was unparalleled. If it’s good enough for Steven Spielberg to want to put velociraptors there, it’s good enough for me.

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Cuba North America

Havana: Wifi is Scare, Rum is Plentiful

So my last trip pre-COVID was to Cuba. I had a whole plan for all my vacation days, and I had a week left over, and I had a few people recommend Cuba to me as a destination and I figured why not?

As an American, it’s hard to travel to. It’s probably even harder now. Frankly, that’s something that has always baffled me. I found the Cuban people to be warm and friendly. Of all the strange Cold War holdovers, it’s one of the strangest – we’ve decided that a small island in the Caribbean is our enemy, apparently. Fun fact, I was legally not allowed to work while I was in Cuba, because our company can’t be associated with them in any way. I had to delete all my work-related apps, like email, Slack, Gchat, Zoom, etc., and I couldn’t even check my notifications while I was there.

Anyway, to legally go as an American, you have to meet one of the official categories and follow certain guidelines. I went with Intrepid, which is a tour company that has a special itinerary for Americans under the “support for the Cuban people” category. We stayed local, we did cultural immersion programs, we met with nonprofits. Honestly, it was the ideal way to do it. It was a little more structured than the trips I usually choose, but it did feel like we got to connect to locals way more than most of the places I’ve been.

One of the things I loved about Cuba was staying in the casa particulares. Basically, the United States doesn’t want to support the government, so they insist that you stay with locals in Airbnb-style accommodations. There was a wide variety of places we stayed, which was interesting. We ate at only local restaurants, too. Nothing owned by the state.

Havana is beautiful. It’s one of those places that I would have loved to experience in its prime, because you can tell the buildings need more work on restoration. The government and locals are doing their best, and a lot of areas have been renovated, but there are a number of gorgeous buildings in disrepair. Obviously, it’s famous for the old cars, and we saw a lot of those. I got to ride in a few too (which I think my dad was jealous of!).

Most of my first day there was spent wandering. I forgot that I didn’t actually know where my accommodations were, promptly got lost, and then figured I’d be able to find it again, so I enjoyed my day of exploration. I saw a parade go through, walked along the water, and found some sort of fort to check out. The next couple days were with my tour group. We visited local artists, took a tour in historic cars, walked around some of the neighborhoods, and soaked in the atmosphere. I am a little sad I didn’t get to see a ballet. I don’t think they were performing while I was there, but I’ve heard wonderful things about Cuban ballet! We did get to see a dance performance by students and we took a salsa class, but it’s not quite the same.

The other note I have is this: as cool as Havana is, I appreciated the rest of Cuba even more. It is naturally and culturally beautiful, and I feel like I got a really cool look at a country that seems almost frozen in time. Beyond the rum, cigars, and classic cars, it’s a special place, and I’m glad I got to go before the world shut down.

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North America United States

Virtual Sundance

One of Utah’s big claims to fame is Sundance. Both the original ski resort founded by Robert Redford, where I once broke my arm, and the film festival that happens annually at Park City! Pictured above, from a nice pre-COVID day trip with my parents. Because of COVID, the 2021 festival is being held mostly online, which has ended up being a positive. I didn’t usually get a pass and it was hard to find movies at good times and convenient locations, and life got in the way. But this year, I got an all access pass and really committed.

Movies Watched: 18.5

Short Films Watched: 23

Yes, I actually took a PTO day to sit around and watch movies. Yes, it was worth it. I’ve had a great time. Here are a few outstanding movies I watched, in no particular order.

CODA: This stands for Child of Deaf Adults. The basic gist is that Ruby is the only hearing member of a deaf family. After her choir teacher hears her sing, he encourages her to pursue music school, and she has to choose between that and her obligation to help her family and their fishing business. Reader, I bawled at this one. It was so good and so heartwarming, and I spent at least half the film wondering why we don’t teach all our children sign language starting in elementary school.

The Pink Cloud: Umm, can Iuli Gerbase predict the future? The film tells the story of a Brazilian town trapped under a pink cloud, which kills people within ten seconds of going outside. It arrives quickly, forcing some into awkward situations, like being stuck with a one-night stand or at a friend’s sleepover. What follows is a movie that is uncanny in its familiarity. Despite being filmed from 2017-2019, it feels beat for beat like the beginning of 2020, as people adjust to being trapped at home and then learn to live in their new reality. Also, aesthetically, the soft pink lighting coming in through every window is quietly gorgeous.

Strawberry Mansion: According to Sundance, it “transcends genre,” which is accurate. The director introduction said they wanted it to feel like being a video store, and each cover transporting you to a different world. And boy, does it ever deliver that. It felt like a strange fever dream. The oversaturated world. The concept of a dream tax that sometimes involves auditors, which, frankly, I want to know more about. A turtle eating a strawberry. This movie has it all, alongside an exploration of what it looks like when capitalism invades your dreams.

Passing: A black and white film set in the 1920s about two black women who can pass as white. Gorgeous cinematography, timely themes, and Tessa Thompson is always a delight.

One For The Road: This is a Thai film that follows a man dying of cancer and his somewhat-estranged friend who helps him meet up with his exes for closure. The three main actors are all stellar, and it explores some interesting emotional territory as Aood’s exes come to terms with the way their respective relationships ended and his impending death. Also, I’m always here to live vicariously through a road trip when I can’t go anywhere myself.

John and the Hole: A boy keeps his family in a bunker. This one is so compellingly odd. The closest thing I’ve ever watched was probably My Friend Dahmer. It’s hard to walk the line between a coming of age story and an examination of a sociopath, but I think this might have done it.

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair: I haven’t seen many movies that successfully take on how much of our lives we live on the internet. Thus far it’s really only been Searching and Eighth Grade that I thought nailed it in that respect, in very different ways. I’d like to submit this one as well. It presents a girl who joins a Youtube challenge, the World’s Fair challenge, and we go down the rabbit hole with her as her videos get increasingly stranger and more concerning. It does a great job on the blurred line between fantasy and reality, and how we present ourselves on the internet.

It’s going to be a good year ahead for indie film!

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Denmark Europe France United Kingdom

The Last Rotter Family Trip Before COVID

Fun fact, this is my 100th post! I started this in the form of a Tumblr back in 2014, which is absolutely wild. It’s been nearly seven years, which I think might be roughly the amount of time it takes for every single cell in the human body to be replaced? Seven years ago I was in my sophomore year of college. A lot has changed since then, both in my life and in the world. Since 2014, I went on study abroad, traveled alone for the first time, graduated college, moved halfway across the country, started a job, got promoted (twice), started a masters degree, and bought a house. I’m looking forward to seeing what comes next!

It’s also been over a year now since I was on a plane. The world changed completely last March, practically overnight. The last trip I took out of the country was Cuba (which I will be posting about at some point soon). The one I wanted to talk about on this post, though, was last Thanksgiving. In November 2019, my parents and I visited Europe together. I am so thankful that we went before COVID. I can’t just get on a plane and visit for a long weekend anymore. Seeing my family now requires quarantining and driving, planning to minimize as many risks as we can. It will probably be a long time before we’re all vaccinated and can travel together again, so I’m glad the last trip was a good one.

Highlights from London:
– Going to the Tower of London in the rain and trying to imagine what it must have been like in the Tudor period
– Staying in Trafalgar Square in a beautiful boutique hotel
– Visiting Christmas markets and drinking mulled wine
– Going out to pubs with my friend Will and getting a tour of some of the more off the grid places
– Getting to go on the Harry Potter Studio Tour with my parents, who read me the first book back in first grade
– That amazing Italian pizza place near our hotel
– Going to the Shard and having cocktails as we look out over the city

Highlights from Paris:
– The charming café that we found near our hotel! The waitress heard me reading the menu and came up to my parents and started speaking French to them because she assumed we were all French speakers, which, not going to lie, I’m a little proud of….
– Wandering around the Louvre during their night hours
– Going on a dinner cruise down the Seine and seeing the city at night
– Taking a day trip out to see Chambord and Chenonceau, which I’ve been wanting to see for ages
– Dad trying escargot for the first time in that lovely little bistro

Highlights from Copenhagen:
– Showing my parents where I went to school! Copenhagen was my first big trip on my own, and so it was amazing to get to show them all my favorite places
– The Christmas market at Nyhavn. I used to stay away from Nyhavn when I lived there, because it always felt touristy, but all the little stalls were so cute and we had a favorite mulled wine place by the end of our time there
– The fabulous restaurant a few doors down from our hotel with some of the best gnocchi I’ve ever tasted
– Tivoli’s Christmas season
– Just being back in Denmark. Copenhagen is one of the cities I love most in the entire world, and I have so many happy memories associated with it. I met one of my best friends in the world there, I learned so much about myself and about traveling, and I love being able to walk around and revisit my favorite places again <3

It was the first time I got to go to Europe with my parents, but hopefully it won’t be the last! I’m excited for all of us to get vaccinated and be able to take more trips together in the future.

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North America United States

Weekend Getaway to San Francisco

Starting in 2019, my company decided that Veteran’s Day was an official holiday, and in an even more exciting turn of events, it was a Monday! I booked a flight and a hotel on the edge of Chinatown and made a weekend of it. It was also a bid to get to the next level in frequent flier miles, which I achieved only to have it be absolutely useless within six months. Alas.

I had been to San Francisco before with my parents, a long time ago, and we’d done a lot of the famous stuff. Walked across the Golden Gate Bridge, took a tour of Alcatraz, driven on Lombard Street. So there was no pressure to see anything specific.

I started at Golden Gate Park. After a lovely wander through the paths, I visited the de Young Museum and the Japanese Tea Garden. The museum was great, I went to the extra exhibition about Black history and explored the rest of their gallery. Interestingly, they actually had some Turkmen storage bags on display! I tried to test my knowledge of the regions where they were created. The Japanese Tea Garden was stunning as well, I loved exploring all the different pathways.

After lunch at a food truck, I headed back to the Ferry Building and spent some time walking along the piers. There’s nothing quite like the sound of the ocean beating against the shore.

The next day, I got up bright and early for a hike that I’d read about, Lands End Trail. It was a bit of a trek from my hotel on the bus, but it was totally worth it. It was the highlight of my trip!

I’m kind of obsessed with this maze made out of stones. There was even a good view of the Golden Gate Bridge from the eastern portion of the trail.

I had one other goal in mind for my last full day, which was the Palace of Fine Arts! It showed up in my research as another cool landmark and it didn’t disappoint. It felt almost out of place in such a modern city.

Anyway. That’s all I’ve got. I don’t claim to be any sort of expert on San Francisco or anything, but it makes a great weekend trip for anyone who lives close enough. When travel is safe again, I’m looking forward to visiting again and exploring more of the city!

Categories
Asia Turkmenistan

Adventures in Ashgabat

How can I begin to describe Ashgabat?

It’s unlike anywhere I’ve ever been before.  It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen in a movie or TV show, unlike anything I’ve ever read about in a book, unlike anything I’ve ever contemplated.  It feels a little like the world’s largest science fiction movie set, or perhaps what would result if Walt Disney and President Snow from the Hunger Games decided to collaborate on a city.  I spent the entire time we were there glued to the bus window, trying to capture every second into my memory, and actually strained my neck in my effort to see out both sides of the bus simultaneously.

Almost every building in Ashgabat is built out of white marble, imported from Italy.  Everything is designed down to the smallest detail, from the lampposts to the telephone booths to the bus stations, and nearly every park and roundabout has a stunning monument of some sort. The government buildings are often themed to what their purpose is, like how the Department of Education looks like a giant book and I think the one for Energy or Natural Gas looks like a giant lighter. The stadium is recognizable from anywhere in the city, because it’s shaped like a horse. The airport (which is gorgeous, by the way) looks like a flying bird on the outside.

Ironically, the aspect of Ashgabat that felt the most unusual was the lack of people. When I started writing this post back in October, that was something that I had planned to comment on extensively. We could cross six lane streets and not see a single car. And then when COVID first hit, suddenly it felt like the whole world was like that. Nevertheless, for a pre-COVID city, it was shocking to go to parks and restaurants and malls and not see anyone around. We did spend some time in a mall that had locals, but almost at all of the monuments and museums, we were the only people there.

One of my absolute favorite places we visited was the park in the pictures above. See if you can spot me in that picture. The scale of the monuments is next level. While we were here, we got to watch a changing of the guard ceremony – I’m sad I didn’t get the chance to photograph or videotape it! They’re very strict about photos of anything involving the military, which is fair. But it was pretty amazing. The man twirled the gun like a baton.

This is the largest indoor ferris wheel in the world. I know, weird flex, isn’t it? But we arrived in the middle of a hot and hazy day to find it empty and turned off. We all sort of shrugged and got ready to get back in the bus, but our guide said they would turn it on just for us. And he went and got the employees, and sure enough, they ushered us in and turned on the ferris wheel.

There’s the view from the way down. There was an arcade at the bottom of the ferris wheel, and that was all off too. Our guide went to get the employees again and they turned it all on for us. We played a few rounds of air hockey, and then he asked us if we wanted to do bumper cars. “Sure,” we said. Out came the employees again. Is this what it feels like to be a movie star?

One of the other world records held in Turkmenistan is the largest handmade carpet. We went to the Carpet Museum while we were there. I wasn’t sure what to expect – a whole museum of rugs? But it was amazing. Our guide talked about how each design represents a specific region, and taught us to recognize where the patterns come from. The craftsmanship is very impressive, although sadly I could only take pictures in the final room.

One last picture to highlight before the gallery – this one, taken not by me but by someone else on my tour group. This is a bottle of water that a waiter brought out at one of our dinners.

Images speak louder the words, so here’s a selection of pictures I took while I was in Ashgabat. It’s not an easy place to go, but I’m so glad I got to have even a small glimpse into one of the most private and unusual countries in the world.

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Uncategorized

Hello Again

It’s been a while, hasn’t it?

I got behind on posts, because I was traveling a lot, and then COVID hit and I didn’t travel at all. And suddenly it’s been over a year since I’ve posted something here. I wish I could say that it’s because I’ve been acquiring some fabulous new hobbies, but that’s not true. I’ve been working and doing a masters program. I’ve read plenty of great books. I’ve baked bread. I’ve tried not to keel over from Zoom fatigue now that everything is done through a webcam.

Anyway. I’ll be posting soon on the remainder of my trip to Turkmenistan and a few guides of cities I traveled to in November 2019 and my last big trip, in Cuba. And then I’ll move on to what I’ve been doing since the pandemic started, like hiking and road trips. As it turns out, living in the American West is good for something. There are some world-class natural wonders within pretty easy driving distance. I’m looking forward to the day when I can get back on a plane and travel to foreign cities again, but for now, it’s nice to recharge out in nature.

Happy holidays, and stay safe out there!

Categories
Asia Turkmenistan

Thoughts from Turkmenistan

This post is basically going to be everything we did outside of Darvaza and Ashgabat, with a few random reflections on my time in the country.  It’s going to get a bit out of order, because I want to keep my pictures from Ashgabat together.

I wish I had a picture of every single billboard we saw, because they were all fascinating. Most of the time, they had this sort of font, but sometimes there were horses or pictures of the president.
What’s a road trip without a couple stops at local gas stations? In Turkmenistan, every gas station is state run and looks exactly the same.

During our drives across the country, there were a number of checkpoints we had to go through. Tourism is highly restricted in Turkmenistan, and any visitor is required to be part of a tour group. I believe there’s an exception for anyone who can get a five day transit visa, but even so, it was incredibly helpful to have our guide. He warned us when we weren’t allowed to take pictures, explained about the history and culture, and arranged activities and tours based on our interests.

The countryside reminds me a lot of Arizona in the United States. There were less cacti and more camels, but otherwise, it felt like we could be driving to my grandma’s house. There are a lot of stalls on the side of the road selling melons throughout Turkmenistan, and we stopped at one of them on the way out to the gas crater and bought some for dinner.  The woman selling them cut off a few chunks of them and let us try, and it was so delicious. At one point on a drive, our guide played music sung by the president of Turkmenistan.  Apparently, he’s put out several albums. Some of the songs were pretty catchy.

As we left the Darvaza gas crater the next morning, we stopped by a few other craters that had collapsed but were full of mud or water – they weren’t quite as impressive as the one full of fire.  Nevertheless, it seems like maybe that’s not the best area of the desert to drill for natural gas.  Then our guide took us to a semi-nomadic village.  Comparing that with Ashgabat, the difference was rather stark.  Our guide told us that some of these villages don’t have running water.  They still live essentially how they lived prior to the Soviet Union, except they no longer migrate the way they did historically.  Not all the villages we saw were as poor as the one pictured, but it was an interesting look at income inequality in Turkmenistan.

This was especially startling considering our next stop was Ashgabat. I’ll get to that in my next post. From Ashgabat, we took a day trip to ruins at Nisa, which is an ancient fortress. We saw several locals taking wedding pictures from one of the hills, which was understandable – it was absolutely beautiful to walk around as the sun set.

We headed out to Mary, which is the 4th largest city in Turkmenistan. On the way, we stopped off at ruins in Abiverd, which were probably my favorite that we saw. More of it seemed to be standing, and we spent maybe half an hour just wandering through. There were so many pottery shards and other small artifacts throughout the ruins, and it almost felt like living out the fantasy of being an archeologist. I could kneel down and wipe away dirt and find a piece of a glazed pot, and there’s something so thrilling about that.

At one point on our way both to and from Mary, we passed within about 10 miles from the border with Iran.  Turkmenistan is at such an interesting crossroads – it borders both Iran and Afghanistan, and Russia is just on the other side of the Caspian Sea.  Turkmenistan actually petitioned the UN to become formally neutral, which is something they’re very proud of.  There’s a monument in one of their parks, the Arch of Neutrality, that celebrates this.

Mary felt like a city that had developed more naturally than Ashgabat – it had less of that intentionally planned vibe.  There was one section with the types of buildings that we saw in Ashgabat, with a large mosque, a library, and a few other monuments.  We stopped there after dinner one of the days we were there and walked around.  When we went back to the bus, our bus driver had begun talking to two local older ladies, and they ended up talking to us as well.  It was a bit of a challenge but one of the people in our group spoke some basic Russian and they could communicate that way.  They said that the Canadian prime minister (Trudeau) is very attractive and that the UK prime minister (Johnson) looks like he just got out of bed, which sounds accurate on both counts.

We had a day trip from Mary as well.  We went to Merv, which was one of the world’s largest cities at one point.  It was an oasis city in the Silk Road for centuries. So much of it has been destroyed, but we got to walk around the remaining structures.  It’s fascinating to see the scale of what remains.  We literally had to take the bus between the ruins.  Like the other ruins we visited, shards of pottery still littered the ground.  Occasionally we saw them embedded in the walls of the ruins.

At one point, we saw a herd of camels being shepherded into a new area.  I’d never seen a camel outside of a zoo before this trip!

After Merv, part of our group wanted to go to a different archeological site, which is something that was a logistical challenge for our guide because of the controls on tourism. Three people elected to go to Gonur Tepe, which is an important historical place, but it required a drive through the desert that was 2+ hours each way, and the majority of our group wasn’t that interested.  We’d been coming off of a number of extremely long days in Ashgabat and wanted a little free time.  So our guide dropped us off at a restaurant for lunch with the bus driver and went with them.

For the afternoon, we mostly stayed at the hotel, but we were allowed to take a quick trip to the market across the street.  The bus driver watched us from the hotel.  Crossing the street was a bit of an adventure, as there weren’t any crosswalks and drivers have the right of way over pedestrians, but we followed the locals and made it there and back in one piece.  The market was mostly fruit and vegetables and other food products, so it was all locals.  It was pleasant to just be among them after so many places we’d gone that had no Turkmen people.  Our guide told us locals prefer markets since they can haggle on the prices.  After walking around for a bit, we ended up playing cards and drinking while we waited for the rest of our group to get back for dinner.  We played cards the next day on the bus as well and invited our guide to join us.  He told us he had never played cards with women before. He picked up the games quickly and the ride back felt much faster.

Turkmenistan was fascinating for many reasons, a number of which I’ll get into in my next post.  Few countries are so isolated from the rest of the world.  When we would wander through grocery stores, the prices of any imported products were outrageously expensive. The Nutella pictured above is about $32 USD for the larger size.  There was not a single Western chain that I saw throughout the entire country.  No McDonald’s, no Starbucks, nothing.  All of the gas stations were state run.  I had been shocked at the number of Western food chains when I was in China, and here I had the complete opposite reaction.

One of the other aspects I found interesting is the cult of personality surrounding the leader of Turkmenistan. There were a number of billboards and images of him throughout the city, which is something I’ve never seen before in the countries I’ve visited. This billboard above was next to the large mosque in Mary.

My next post will be on Ashgabat, which was absolutely a highlight of this trip for me!