One of the great attractions to me of riding my bike big distances far from home is the excitement of the unknown. Around every corner is a new vista, and the constantly renewing element of surprise that comes with that is hugely motivational.

But in the desert, things can be very different! For the last five days, I’ve known pretty well what lies ahead. There have been very few corners to turn, and just as few ‘big reveals’. For the most part, the road has been very long and very straight, and that has been a test of mental fortitude as well as physical resolve. Sometimes, certainty can be a much more difficult foe than uncertainty!

The challenge has been compounded by the weather, with a heatwave having exerted its considerable influence over all of the last five days. The saving grace in such an arid place is that accompanying humidity levels are low; the last thing I’d have needed was any inhibition of the sweating process that allows the body to cool down. But highs of 43c – even if ‘dry’ – are not to be taken lightly as a cyclist riding across a shadeless desert.

Remarkably, given that the temperature when I left Khulo in the Georgian mountains just over a month ago was -7c, I’ve now experienced a Celsius temperature range of 50 degrees so far on this journey from Turkey!

For all of the superficial monotony, the last five days have nonetheless been punctuated with adventures and moments of great kindness. On my first day riding eastwards from Khiva, a bone-shaker of a road for about 20 miles had left me feeling fairly bruised and battered (if only metaphorically), but as a smooth dual carriageway abruptly replaced the decaying surface of the previous couple of hours, a family of ten pulled up in their mini van to say hello. It was the son (aged about 14) who made the conversation while his family proudly looked on, and it was a joyful moment that left me smiling and the travails of the rough road forgiven. 

On day two, there were multiple instances of kindness on the road, with one particularly touching one coming when a truck driver slowed alongside me to allow his passenger to hand me a large bottle of cold water! It came at a good time given that by that point every drop of fluid I had on the bike had heated up to the (very high) ambient air temperature! I also had some good chats whenever there were opportunities to stop for further water top-ups. I came across a group from Moscow, and chatted to one of them about the Trans-Siberian Railway and the renowned natural wonder of Lake Baikal in particular; and later I met a couple from Edmonton, Canada who were doing a road trip across the Silk Road cities.

For the second night running, I stayed in a roadside motel. At this one, the owner, a lovely man called Davron, was keen to share his love of Adele with me by pumping out some of her songs on a (very) loud speaker – enabled by a combination of Bluetooth and one of his tech-savvy daughters who ably assisted in setting up the connection. I’m not suggesting Davron overdid it with the volume, but his playing of ‘Set Fire to the Rain’ was the prelude to a five-hour power cut at the motel! As I sat and ate some delicious dumplings and a tomato salad with him, Davron resorted to playing me music by the ‘Uzbek Adele’ on his phone, while also trying to sell me the virtues of buying a bottle of his Uzbek whisky.

On day three, I set off early from the motel to try to get ahead of the building heat in the desert. With the prospect of sleeping on the floor of one chaikhana (tea room) later that night apparently now ruled out, I’d heard from Bijou (the British cyclist riding a couple of days ahead of me and providing very helpful intelligence about sleeping options across the desert) that a guy called Aziz, who is building his own chaikhana, was happy to let passing cyclists pitch a tent in his construction site.

Meeting Aziz was a relief, and he was evidently keen to provide help in a situation where options were definitely limited. After parking my bike and belongings with him, I had lunch at the nearby Kizilqum tea house (which no longer extends its hospitality to the overnight use of its floor, but does serve good food).

Kizilqum was inundated with tour parties doing the Silk Road expedition. As jarring as I can find organised tourism like that, it was a pleasure to get chatting to friendly people from all corners of the world – including Namibia, Poland, and California. Many of them asked for photos of me with my bike. “You’re a celebrity”, one of them proclaimed, which was very flattering, but of course ludicrously inaccurate!

While I was hugely grateful for Aziz’s welcome, as well as the nourishing chicken, chips and tomato salad he cooked up for me in the evening of my stay, my night in the construction site wasn’t optimal in terms of recovery ahead of the following day’s ride. Despite having a fan, which Aziz kindly set up for me, the heat was pretty stifling and the steady succession of stopping truck drivers actually became more frequent as it got late, with Aziz still cooking for them after midnight. The noise and distraction of that weren’t conducive to being able to sleep. 

After a shortish night, I woke up at 5.30am and was on the road by 6.30am to get ahead of the heat again. Aziz kindly got up to see me off, and it was good to be able to thank him and wish him all the best for the chaikhana when it opens (in August by the sounds of it).

On the ride down to Gazli, I encountered a huge number of desert locusts over a distance of about 50 kilometres – all of them travelling from north to south across the main A380 highway. They weren’t swarming – more limping their way across the road surface, motivated to break into a hop only by the drafts of passing vehicles. Their migration seemed on the face of it to be pretty futile given the lack of obvious vegetation for them to feast on in the desert (and most appeared to be hugely weakened by the process, with large numbers of their dead piling up against manmade obstacles – particularly at a petrol station where I stopped for water). I’ve read, however, that swarms can travel up to 130km in a day, so no doubt I underestimated their ambitions!

I reached Gazli by about noon and checked in at a gas workers’ hostel that’s happy to open its doors to adventurous travellers. It provided a hugely valuable stop-off point for me that allowed me to split my journey to Bukhara and gave me respite from the relentless heat of the desert. At £3.50 for the night, it was unquestionably good value, although the latrine and showering facilities are probably best glossed over!

I set off on the ride down from Gazli to Bukhara at 6.15am this morning, which again allowed me to get ahead of the most intense heat of the day. The locust activity escalated during the middle part of today’s ride, and any attempt to slalom between the little creatures became impossible as they began to blanket the road. A number of them confused my legs for vegetation, which gave me a close-up view of their vivid green and yellow colouring!

Bukhara, like Khiva before it, provided a real sense of a destination to head to, and arriving here has given me a sense of contentment. I’ll be exploring the city tonight and spending the day here tomorrow too. After the exertions involved in crossing the desert from Khiva, it’ll be good to have some respite from turning those pedals!