I awake in the middle of the night and walk to the bathroom building and on my return notice that the crescent moon is bright orange and just on the horizon. Beautiful. Now that I’m fully awake, I briefly think about grabbing my tripod and camera but don’t want to wake the rest of the yurt so save the “picture” to my memory and head back to bed.
The rays of the sun stream through the yurt’s door and I jump out of bed in time to catch sunrise. As the sun rises, the sky turns the wispy clouds a bright pink and purple. Everyone’s still asleep and the desert is quiet other than the waking kitchen staff. I enjoy the fleeting moment of my favourite time of day. All of sudden a herd of camels come running over the dunes towards the yurts with their owner in hot pursuit on his motorbike. They’ll be our mode of transportation for the this morning. A white one with big eyes and a mouth that looks to be turned up in a smile approaches me and “poses” for some photos.
I attempt to take a shower but the drip of cold water that comes out of the shower head makes it difficult to wash anything so I do the best I can before getting ready for our camel trek. Half of us hike through the dunes while the other half hop on camels to make our way to the lake. My camel, Isambek, plods along while Amar leads him singing traditional Bedouin songs. Isambek has two humps and is very comfy to ride with my butt between them. His fur is thick, like a plush carpet and my hand sinks deep into it before I reach his skin. His graceful walk is lulling me to sleep until he starts heading downhill and then my head is snapped from side to side and I have to take a grip on to his front hump to keep my balance.
We spend the afternoon at the lake swimming and relaxing on the sun beds. It’s our first relaxing day of the trip which is much needed. We have a 4 hour drive tomorrow to Samarkand so back to the yurt to organize and repack our backpacks. While packing, we chat. I’ve really been loving our conversations about anything and everything.
So many beautiful moments we shared, so many good conversations we had …. and even most important the “one and only” fan 🪭 we shared ☀️ …. you made our trip even more valuable than it already was, thank you for all the beautiful memories ☀️
Lots of memories and thank you for sharing your fan! I couldn’t have made it through the trip without you. Can’t tell you how much I appreciated all the conversations and how much I’m missing them now.