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November 19, 2017

How to Get from Almaty to Bishkek

Woke up late and headed to breakfast down the road from the hostel at a local Kazakh for Almaty for some coffee and snacks, bus station coffee is usually shitty. Got Uber to take me to Sairan bus station to get a bus to Bishkek.

At Sairan bus station no one spoke English, everyone understood Bishkek and pointed me a minivan, the driver said 3000 Kazakhstani Tenge, I agreed. i was the first one. then came another tourist she also agreed to go, later she asked me if I would rather share a taxi with her and get to Bishkek Sooner. I told her once we agree with someone on a ride and fare we should not go back on our word. Besides I was playing it safe. 

Unlike Yerevan to Tbilisi where I had to wait 3 hours for the van to go, this van filled  up fast and we were on our way.

Important Tip - Use the bathroom at your hotel before going to the bus station

Bishkek

Above the minivan and the driver. we drive for almost 2 hours and stopped at a shitty rest stop. Armenia and Georgia has clean rest stops, Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan are dirty, glad it was only a 3 hour drive.

Finally we arrived at the border, first you will need to get an exit stamp on your passport from Kazakhstan side, that was somewhat quick. Then you need to walk through no Man's land to the Kyrgyz side. 2 pictures below.

BishkekBishkek

At the Kyrgyz side of the border control a Army officer took my passport and asked me to wait, I was a little nervous, but he was back in 2 minutes, handed me and 2 others their passport, opened a side pathway door and we left.

I turned on my gopro and was about to film when a Army soldier approached me,  and told me not to. I quickly put my Gropro away. We walked 100 meters and were approached by several cab drivers.

Kyrgyzstan

Then I waited for a good half an hour by the road side (above picture) with others riding from the van, finally the driver showed up and were on our way to Bishkek.

My Kyrgyzstan post link http://www.arvinder.com/2017/11/things-to-do-in-bishkek-kyrgyzstan.html 


1 comment :

  1. I don’t know if I’ll have the chance to visit this place, right now I’m focusing on visiting as many European cities as possible. Almaty is an amazing place in itself but I’ll enjoy all its history and heritage from afar for now. The GoPro camera seems to cause a lot of issues and that’s why I do my own research before visiting a new city, I don’t want to pay gigantic fines, I’m sure not all locals are as helpful as that soldier.

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