We took a border to Kyrgyzstan that we had never taken before. It has been opened just a couple of weeks before for tourists. The officers were all friendly but at the passport control the officer did not understand that Deutschland means Germany 🙃 We tried to show him the Russian translation on our passport but he couldn’t read the small letters. Translating with Google Translate didn’t help as well. But apart from us, there was only one more man wanting to cross the border and this one man spoke German. After he ensured the border officer that we are from Germany, he was happy to let us pass 🥳 After crossing the border, I checked our new bushings in the front shock absorbers and discovered that one was broken again. After 2300 km. To be sure, we removed one front wheel and detached the shock absorber. With only one car jack it got quite tricky to put it in again but as experienced bush mechanics we did it 😁

Our plan was to take a small mountain pass to the Peak Lenin area but because we were not sure if the mountain pass was actually passable, and it would most likely would have been pretty offroady, and we  had this broken bushing, we changed our plan and tried to find a spare part in the next bigger town. We tried several car part shops and mechanics. They were nice and friendly, but we did not succeed. So we decided to drive to Osh (the second biggest city of Kyrgyzstan) 🤪

In between, we chilled a bit 🌞

And Racki managed to fix our phone holder 🥳

In Osh we parked at the Tess Hotel for free. It was a good city camp spot. And after some hours of trying, messaging, communicating and waiting for a couple of days, we got new bushings. Six Euro a piece. Doomed to die soon 🤯 In the night, it seemed like all the locals took a walk because it was much cooler than during the day. These little karts looked so funny 🤣

Right next to a typical UdSSR monument 😶

We decided to go back to Issyk Kul (the biggest lake in Kyrgyzstan, the fourth biggest mountain lake in the world) 😯 On the way there, we took a break at the Toktogul reservoir. We had been there a couple of times in the last year but now the locals had been building up some tourist stuff: yurt camp, umbrella rental, etc. 💸

They even had a prehistoric banana 🐉

But still we had a good time, helped two families to recover their cars after getting stucked, got some food gifted and finally helped to recover a local truck with the big off-road overlander truck of another German traveler couple. It was the first recovery of a truck for us and that made me even more happy to have a car instead of a truck… But the local truck driver was super relaxed and grateful. And I learned why there are quite many completely destroyed truck tyres on the sides of the roads: the truck drivers don’t have the tools to remove a flat one and so they keep going until it falls off on its own 👩‍🔧

At the Issyk Kul, we visited some sites we had not been before and took a swim in a super salty small lake. Perfect for non swimmers. It was not possible to sink in that one and it was very healthy 🪄

Another nice spot at the lake 🥳

Racki became a Macrame knitting machine and her creations got more and more beautiful ✨

There were some thunder storms and the mountains on two sides of the lake looked amazing 🎉

When I checked the new bushings and we investigated a noise Rosinante made only from now and then, we found oil leaking out of her engine 😯 In the end we found that the noise came from Rosinante’s bottom protection and the oil came out of the oil filter. We went to Karakol to have the filter changed and the mechanic needed almost an hour to remove the old one because the last mechanics had put it so strong on the engine 🤪

We went back to Dushanbe and had most of Rosinante’s oils and liquids changed. With our friends at the car service we arranged that Racki can order macrame cord via wildberries. We had tried to get some in Uzbekistan or Tajikistan but it was not possible. So we had to wait for about ten days for the stuff coming from China to Russia and then Tajikistan.

We went north of Dushanbe and through the tunnel of death. Coincidentally the song “Don’t worry, be happy” started playing on our radio when we entered it. It was funny. And they had started to fix and clean parts of the tunnel which made it less deadly. But still we could sometimes only see five meters ahead of Rosinante.

We made it to the Iskandarkul, a big mountain lake.

On iOverlander, we found the coordinates of a few climbing routes in one of the comments to a camp spot. There were only a handful of routes but still climbing was fun as always. But the mosquitos were crazy. We never had that many before and put on all the protection gear we had.

Most of the routes were pretty tough and the view from the one multi-pitch was nice. But I felt like there was building up some tension between Rackis and me.

We escaped the mosquitos and searched for a place at the lake with less trees in hopes that there we would face less of these angry monsters. On the way we found this ruin which never got finished. But we loved the tyre strategy they had used.

The camp spot we found was very nice. Close to the water, less mosquitos.

One day, we did a hike on the closest small mountain ridge and took this bridge. It was a very special and very creative one. Strong and solid. Made out of everything you can find in a forest.

During that time at the lake, my next song got released: encounter. Here is a list of music services on which you can listen to it.

One day other travelers from Germany joined us and we had a good time together.

After some days, we left the lake and had a look at the nice canyon and waterfall next to it.

The waterfall was the strongest one we had seen so far. When we continued our drive to our next destination, Racki and I talked about the tension I felt between us. I feel offended and like Rackis is pissed about something. I’d say we did pretty good/ healthy in how we talked about it. And after that I felt a lot of relief. It’s interesting how these dynamics between humans develop. I love Racki and the life we are living together. It feels just right to me. And I feel like the impermanence in relationships is just part of human life.

Our next stop was at another small climbing area. It was super hot, but directly at the climbing routes there were three big trees and so this place was just perfect for climbing and chilling in the summer heat.

The drought was omnipresent. The main river was completely dried out and locals had installed a whole lot of water pipes from the upper parts of the mountains into their village. Sometimes you could see more than twenty pipes at once.

After climbing, we went back to Dushanbe to pick up Racki’s macrame cords and visit our friends.

The best toilet decoration above the pissoir in a bar we visited.

Our friends showed us their home, car and gave us cute presents. It was interesting to talk with them about their future plans and their lives in Tajikistan.

After a couple of days with about 42 degrees in the city, we went off north again to a place we knew from months before. And of course we found another new donkey friend who came by when we had breakfast and tried speaking to the table to grab some food.

The next day, a nice couple from the Netherlands joined us and we had a day of very interesting talks about a lot of topics. Of course there were some of the ordinary travelers talks but a lot more interesting ones about life as well. I liked it a lot. And Mereltje even played a funny jazzy song for us on her ukulele which was super nice.