We had a lazy morning packing up and then headed to the Tashkent train station. Our sweet Yandex driver spoke barely any English but we managed to communicate that we were from Texas. He searched on YouTube and played “Texas music” for us in his car. He was able to say “rock n’ roll” and we all smiled and laughed as we listened to a music showcase from Emo’s in Austin. It actually did make me a little homesick.

We got to the busy train station and onto our train. We had hoped to take the bullet train but it was sold out when we booked tickets a couple of days ago, so instead we had a sleeper room on the slower older train.

What we lacked in speed we made up for in vibes. We had our own little cabin with little beds. We all locked in with our media: Millie watched Inside Out (an instant favorite), Nick watched Andor, and I caught up on my podcasts while falling in an out of sleep.

4 hours later we arrived in Samarkand. We got another car that abruptly dropped us off a 30 minute walk from the hotel. We knew it was Uzbek Independence Day, but we didn’t now how big of a deal this was. All the central streets were closed off for traffic. We lugged our backpacks into the center of town.

Samarkand was nicer than we expected it to be. We walked along tree lined streets, past fancy shops, and eventually arrived at our hotel.

The big event explained why it was hard to find a hotel here. We are staying in a well-located but kinda weird place.

We ventured back out into the crowds as the sun was setting, in search of dinner. We went to a busy place overlooking the square with hopes of watching the celebration, but were seated inside and away from the fun. We had an okay dinner and then walked back. We weren’t allowed into the official event but enjoyed the energy of the city and listening to the opera coming from the park.

This felt like a uniquely Uzbek experience and we’re excited to see more of Samarkand tomorrow.