Varakhsha Settlement and Rabati Malik Sardoba

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Varakhsha Settlement

   Thirty kilometres or so west of Bukhara, beyond the last irrigated fields, the land turns to sand and salt crust at the edge of the Kyzylkum desert, and here a low mound of eroded mud brick rises from the flat ground. This is Varakhsha, once a flourishing town and the residence of the Bukhar Khudats, the pre-Islamic rulers of the Bukhara oasis. It thrived in the early medieval centuries, when the oasis extended further than it does today, and was abandoned around the eleventh century, probably as irrigation failed and the desert advanced.

   Read the complete Varakhsha Settlement write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Varakhsha Settlement is where the day begins. Next is Chasma-i Ayub Khazira.

2. 2. 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.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Chasma-i Ayub Khazira comes up about 66 km into the recorded legs. Next is Rabati Malik Sardoba.

3. 3. Rabati Malik Sardoba

   Halfway between Samarkand and Bukhara, the old caravan road crosses a stretch of steppe that is flat, dry and almost empty, and in the eleventh century someone decided that a traveller crossing it deserved a proper stopping place. Rabati Malik, the Rabat of the King, was built in the 1070s by a Karakhanid ruler named Shams al-Mulk Nasr, on one of the main branches of the Silk Road. The caravanserai itself is now mostly collapsed, and what remains is a tall brick entrance portal, ornamented with carved terracotta, standing alone in the plain like the front of a theatre set.

   Read the complete Rabati Malik Sardoba write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 120 km into the recorded legs you reach Rabati Malik Sardoba. Next is back through Chasma-i Ayub Khazira.

4. 4. back through Chasma-i Ayub Khazira

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Chasma-i Ayub Khazira write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Chasma-i Ayub Khazira, late in the day. Next is Varakhsha Settlement.

5. 5. Varakhsha Settlement

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Varakhsha Settlement write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Varakhsha Settlement. That is the ride.