As much as we would have probably liked to sleep till midday, we had lots of things to do in Almaty (AKA Alma – Ata) before we could start to enjoy ourselves. After our somewhat traumatic 23 hour crossing from China, I was totally amazed what a decent sleep, a hot shower, and a stunning view can do to improve your outlook. The sun streamed through our window at about 7 am and I crawled out of bed for a loo visit. Bleary-eyed I peeked out our window to see a bustling market overlooked by the tall snowy peaks of Kazakhstan mountains surrounding the city. Brilliant blue sky topped it all off. As cheap as it was, the Turkestan Hotel (in Russian – Гостиница Туркестан) met all our criteria…clean, comfortable, and well located. The view and friendly staff were an added bonus. We finally hauled ourselves out of bed by 10 and ticked off the first priority – organizing money for a couple of days. The next task was to get ourselves to Stantours (the then experts at helping travelers get visas to the rest of Central Asia). We had to pay for our Uzbek letters of invitation and our … Continue reading Lots of Things to Do In Almaty