Early the next morning we were woken by the Mischief guys packing up. They wanted to get back on the road to the next town so they could hopefully get some parts for their Polo. The clutch was slipping quite badly & they were concerned it wouldn’t last much longer. Whilst they went on ahead the rest of us took a bit longer to pack up.
Once we were all ready we had to make our way back up the hill to the track & back on the road. Surprisingly (or not) this took longer than we expected. Minty struggled to get up the first steep slope. After multiple attempts, John negotiated the first 10 feet of the hill to the next part back to the track. This part was partly solid rock with loose stones and varying sizes of gullies in between. It seemed this would take a bit more tackling so John pushed Minty as hard as he dared but a large sharp rock stuck firmly in the ground next to the loose stones & gullies made him stop. After working out which way to go Minty made it half way up the hill to the track. John stopped & waited for Adam & Ian with their little Micra. To show how mighty the Micra was & to put Minty to shame, Ian popped up the first bank which took John ages & then proceeded up the rest of it. We then lost sight of them.
After about 5 minutes they still hadn’t appeared so John walked back down the hill to find them. Adam was underneath the car trying to fix something with Ian going backwards & forwards to the boot collecting tools. The bolts had come out of the gearbox & they were trying to find something to replace them. Half an hour later they had & were keenly eating up the track to the road. We were back on the M41 for our second day of fabulous roads & scenery.
The Mischief guys were quite a way ahead by now. They had just completed the road around the massive lake whereas we were only just approaching. They were close to the town so were messaging us to let us know they were going to stop. Somehow had to catch up without being distracted by our surroundings.
We eventually made it around the lake & into the town the mischief guys had stopped at. The Polo was parked at the side of the road beside some shops so I took the opportunity to stock up on the usual necessities. Wandering up & down the only road in the town, street vendors were cooking up all sorts. Unsure of what was being cooked I decided to find the others to see if they wanted breakfast. Thankfully they had found a cafe on the other side of the road so I didn’t have to guess what to buy. Frank, Reinhold & Jokubas had already eaten so we walked in & were directed to a table. As none of us had a clue what was available or what we would be given we decided to play safe & asked for eggs. When the eggs arrived we were relieved to find they were omelettes.
With breakfast finished we all got back in the cars. The search for car parts was to continue as it seemed Bishkek was to be the best option. Our convoy hit the road again.
Somewhere in the mountain passes we overtook another car, closely followed by both teams. Not sure how but around the next bend we lost sight of the mischief guys at the back of the convoy. As their car was in a worse state than all the others, we pulled over & waited for them. They soon appeared & the good news was their polo was still in one piece (sort of); the bad news was they had been stopped by a local policeman for an illegal overtake. Apparently we had all overtaken the same car but they were stopped & fined. Oops!!
The landscape around us was opening up but we could see more mountains in front of us. In the rolling grasslands we started to see nomads & their animals in the summer grazing grounds. Many of the herds of sheep, cattle, goats & horses were being moved, perhaps further towards the lowlands in preparation for the winter. It was mesmerising to watch the herdsmen move their animals. Each group we came across would be upwards of 40 animals all being herded by 2 or 3 people. Children who appeared to be as young as 7 or 8 were riding horses keeping the animals together. I loved the way the animals were so relaxed around the traffic; totally unfazed. Even young foals at their mother’s foot would stand in the middle of the road, just watching us navigate around them.
Fairly frequently the herds wouldn’t move or clear the road so we were able to drive through. Bizarrely, it was the herdsmen telling us to beep Minty’s horn to make the animals move to the side of the road. That was weird & scary. If we had dared to beep a car horn in the UK at a horse or even cattle we would be reported & would probably end up with a criminal record. Here we were, in the middle of a herd of animals & we are being told to make as much noise as possible. When the animals failed to move we were told to beep the horn for longer!
It did make me wonder though. Back home, we will pass a horse & rider on the road with care & thoughtfulness. The risk being that many horses in the UK are not 100% on the road and do flee moving vehicles. And here we were; in a country slightly smaller than the UK with a population of around 6 million people, where vehicles are not two a penny continuously surrounded by horses, goats, and sheep making their way on the roads. These animals should be unnerved by us, but instead they couldn’t care less. What makes these animals so intrepid? What has made the same animals in the UK so wary of humans and the western world?
I never did answer these questions and I may never. Either way, the experience was refreshing.
