Early in the morning, the dawn had not yet made up its mind to rise, I arrived in Bishkek,Kyrgyzstan. It had obviously been raining all night, and it continued to do so all day as well! It was Easter Sunday in Australia. Here, because of the Russian Orthodox church, Easter will be next weekend! This was great, I crawled into bed, determined to sleep most of the day away, feeling secure in the knowledge that life would go on with or without me!

It wasn’t until the next day, I felt human again, ready to explore the city centre. My Ultimate Adventure hostel is in walking distance of all the important aspects that Bishkek has to offer. The only thing I had not counted on, is that on Monday everything is closed! No art gallery, no museum, only the free parks full of sculptures. I walked around for as long as my body would allow, then found a rather expensive looking restaurant, five star for sure, crawled in a corner, ordered a fabulous cappuccino and national cake, and entertained myself with the free wifi for the rest of the wet afternoon.

I have decided to curb my sweet tooth, and from now on, no more cakes! Life has been a little too good lately, and I am determined to leave a few more kilos behind while travelling. Iran, with their fabulous sweets was an exception. Here the traditional dishes are all diary related, which I don’t want to eat too much of. I spend a whole day at the markets, looking at traditional dresses, wedding dresses, and local produce. A lot of horse hair is turned into felted products. Lovely and not at all over priced considering all is hand made.

I have to change my sort of pre planned trip, well, nothing is really pre planned, really, but I had imagined myself tracking through the mountains, hiking up snow capped peaks, sliding down the mountain sides. Well, the mountain passes are not open!! Not until the end of May or during June, when buses go to the lakes and tourists come! Should have been a dead give away that I am the only tourist in my guest house! So NO horse riding, staying overnight in yurts. No travelling with e nomads eating horse flesh around the campfire while drinking horse milik.

Such a shame, but not too worry, flexibility is my middle name! While I sort of planned my trip I was going to spend the first three months travelling through China, then cross into Kazakhstan, and travel down. Today I have decided that I will cancel Tajikistan, not because I don’t want to go there, but because the famous Pamir pass will be closed till July!! Instead I will study Russian for the next two weeks, booked accommodation at the language school, and fly to Osh on the 23th of April. Osh is on the border of Uzbekistan, where the weather is more pleasant and the snow will mostly be gone! Uzbekistan gives a forty day visa if one pays money, and so the month of May will be spend there.

One of the lovely Dutch women I met, told me that an Australian passport let me into over a 170 countries visa free! I laughed, thinking she was misinformed !! Today I googled it and she is quite right!! All those thousands of dollars I spend on visas, is no longer necessary! I can stay up to a year, visa free, in Georgia, so after Uzbekistan, that is where I will go for the month of June. Azerbijan gives e visas, so after a month I will go down there and go back to the north of Iran, Tabriz and may be Mashad. I might not have the energy to get to Tehran, it will be hot, but as I am flying out of Oman, I might have to! Why I never plan before hand is beyond my understanding, but I must admit, it is not really in my nature!

Bishkek is lovely in Spring time, but the broken up, uneven footpaths are hell to walk on. I walked more than four hours yesterday, and didn’t eat cake! Yes! This is how it will work! The buildings are not really remarkable, being, grey, square and Russian looking. But the trees are in flower, people dress colourful and the birds are singing. Spring is here!

People are friendly, but language is a barrier. After the overwhelming attention in Iran, this is is not a bad thing. The hundreds of selfies with unknown people, has come too near standstill. Only three new friends on Instagram, in a WEEK! Iran would have give me that within an hour!!

Trying NOT to compare the two completely different places. Although, the traffic here is AWESOME! Cars actually slam on their brakes for pedestrians AND red lights! There is a strong element of police presence, so maybe that has something to do with it!! Strong rules, which are being followed!! Life is cheap here, my daily expenditure far below my budget. Going to be even cheaper while studying and living at the language school. Sitting here in the sunshine, eating my traditional potato and bean soup! No cow, only chicken! Menu in Russian, so ordering with sound effects! Ah, life is so good!