CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
From Ziyodin Shaharchasi it runs 228 km to Ziyodin Shaharchasi; allow about 3 h 51 of riding. On the way it passes Rabati Malik Caravanserai, Chasma-i Ayub Khazira and back through Rabati Malik Caravanserai. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Halfway along the old road from Samarkand to Bukhara, where the Zeravshan valley widens into irrigated plain, there is a ruined town called Dabusiya. The Sogdians founded it, and it grew into a staging post on the Silk Road, where caravans paused for water, fodder and trade. The Arabs reached it in the early eighth century and the town held out and changed hands as the region went through conquest and conversion. By the Middle Ages it was a modest brick town with a citadel, a mosque and workshops. The Mongols and later shifts in the river sealed its decline.
Read the complete Dabusiya Settlement write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Dabusiya Settlement is where the day begins. Next is Rabati Malik Caravanserai.
Only the portal of Rabati Malik is left standing, but what a portal it is: a tall brick façade with a great arch, framed by fluted columns and decorated with intricate brick patterns, rising beside the road between Bukhara and Samarkand in the steppe of central Uzbekistan. It was built in the eleventh century by the Karakhanid rulers as a royal caravanserai, a fortified palace and rest stop on the Silk Road, and travellers once found shelter, water and protection here behind its massive walls. The rest of the building was destroyed over the centuries, but archaeologists have traced its plan, and the portal itself has been restored. Across the road, a sardoba, a domed brick reservoir, collected water for the caravans and is still in good condition.
Read the complete Rabati Malik Caravanserai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Rabati Malik Caravanserai comes up 68 km in. Next is Chasma-i Ayub Khazira.
North of Bukhara, the green irrigated oasis of the Zarafshan river spreads out in a patchwork of cotton fields, orchards, mulberry trees and villages, and the point named Chasma-i Ayub Khazira lies in this landscape, near the village of Khazara, between Vobkent and Gijduvon. Chashma-i Ayub, the spring of Job, is a name given to several holy springs in Central Asia, linked to the legend that the prophet Job struck the ground with his staff and water gushed forth in a time of drought. The most famous is in Bukhara itself, a mausoleum over a spring, and this site near Khazara may be another shrine of the same tradition, listed as part of the Silk Roads corridor of the Zarafshan valley.
Read the complete Chasma-i Ayub Khazira write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
136 km in you reach Chasma-i Ayub Khazira. Next is back through Rabati Malik Caravanserai.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Rabati Malik Caravanserai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Rabati Malik Caravanserai, late in the day. Next is Dabusiya Settlement.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Dabusiya Settlement write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Dabusiya Settlement. That is the ride.
Dabusiya Settlement → Rabati Malik Caravanserai is 73 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Rabati Malik Caravanserai → Chasma-i Ayub Khazira is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Chasma-i Ayub Khazira → back through Rabati Malik Caravanserai is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Rabati Malik Caravanserai → Dabusiya Settlement is 73 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.