Almati Overnight

July 27, Almaty

I have been quite busy since I last posted.  I arrived in Almaty late in the afternoon after a five hour ride in from the Chinese border in a shared taxi. They dropped me off at a hotel where the guidebook said I would find a $10 to $30 room depending on whether it had a bath or whatever. I took a look, but went in anyway. The nice young ladies, both of whom spoke English (which was a sure confirmation that there were no $10 to $30 rooms there) said hello and then "The information in the guidebook is old. The minimum room is $100." And that was true for the other three hotels I checked, too. This is due to a combination of some serious inflation over the past few years (and of course, some dollar problems) and my use of a four year old guidebook. At any rate, Almaty was a very quiet town, so I woke up the next morning and found a mini-bus for Bishkek, Kyrgyrstan. But, ahhhh—got some laundry done.