More Mausoleums

We skip the dawn shoot because it’s raining again, albeit not as dramatically as the previous day. I got some stick over dinner from the non-Brits for my use of the BBC Weather App, but they then have to acknowledge it provided the most accurate forecast for the morning, so there!

It is amazing how quickly things dry out here. Even by the previous evening there was little evidence of the biblical conditions at lunchtime, and now even with further rain overnight there’s only the occasional puddle. The excellent draining provided for roads, paths and car parks has quietly done its work and retuned things to normal.

First stop of the day is the Shah-i-Zinda Necropolis, a mausoleum complex built on a hillside reached by a very steep stone staircase. While the individual buildings are not on the same scale as the Amur Timur mausoleum, there are a few with very beautiful decoration, and there’s the added dimension of shooting the spaces between the buildings, especially if you can find a gap with no people, or just locals in local dress.

The necropolis explored, we return to Registan Square, and this time enter the square to explore the buildings. Both interiors and exteriors provide a rich source of targets, and I also get a further opportunity to engage in some casual model stealing, with a young lady trying on another of the long-trained dresses, this time in a rich dark green which is again a great match for the buildings’ tiles.

On the way out of the square our attention is stolen by a fairground barker, and we spend 5 minutes watching an impressive performance by a young fakir/strongman/gymnast, whose primary skill appears to be lying on sharp stones while people stand on him.

It’s worth mentioning at this point the Uzbek Tourist Police. This is a distinct branch of the police force, whose primary role is to ensure the safety and security of visitors to the main tourist locations. They are deliberately visible, both in person and through clearly-marked cameras. The upshot is a feeling of absolute personal security when wandering around tourist centres, and a clear point of contact for any services. We discover a card left by a previous user of an ATM, and less than 100m away is the obvious place to hand it in. It’s also the Tourist Police who give me a chance to use my carefully-practiced "Wa’alaikum Assalam", most interactions being rather less formal!

We short-cut what would have been a long walk to lunch by taking an electric cart ride through the park. After lunch we get back to the road via a market and I find the perfect t-shirt for the trip, embroidered with the names and best known attractions at the four cities we are visiting. That’s a significant improvement on the wipe-out in Mongolia.

We take a short diversion to Konigil Village, a "heritage village" where they practice a number of crafts including the making of "silk paper" (it’s actually made from the bark of mulberry trees). After that we return to the centre.

When we get back to the complex including Amur Timur’s Mausoleum the buildings are bathed in beautiful golden afternoon light, and we can do proper justice to buildings we previously only saw under dark clouds, or through bucketing rain.

We then wander around the site to the small but wonderful Ak-Saray (White Palace) Mausoleum. We have this jewel to ourselves. The warden is well-organised for photographic visitors, including a thick mat on the floor directly under the apex of the roof, and a small shield he can hold up to help manage flare from beams of sunlight reaching the sides of a wide-angle lens. Unfortunately his well-meaning efforts prove unable to match the lighting conditions we encounter, and we have to press my well-documented width and opacity into service, acting as possibly the largest lens hood in history, but it’s very effective.

A longs day’s shooting complete, it’s back to the first restaurant for a well-deserved and now fully-illuminated dinner!