After passing through the strange, muddy, high altitude wasteland of the Tajikistan border post, not far from Karakul, we zigzagged our way down to Kyrgyzstan. As soon as we emerged from the Kyrgyz border we suddenly found ourselves on the set of Lord of the Rings. Amari was gunning it down an incredibly straight road that had emerged from the Tajik mountains and onto an undulating green plain. However, he wasn’t taking the Chaps to Isengard, we were on our way to Sary Mogul. Nestled on a grassy strip between the opposing 7000m+ peaks of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan we settled in and organised a horse trek up to a yurt camp near the base camp of Lenin’s peak.
Brokeback mountain: We’ll say да to anything
The next day, after possibly the worst excuse for a breakfast you can imagine, we strode outside to meet our noble beasts. None of us had any experience with horses and Jeroen was suddenly very keen to ride a less threatening looking donkey instead. We took it upon ourselves to name our horses, to create a bond between man and horse that would be unbreakable in the fervour of battle:
Moose (Mine) ★★★★☆
Moose was not destined to be the leader of this fellowship. He loved to follow in the middle of the pack. He had an incredible and unalterable desire to walk slightly to the left but when you gave him the signal he had a turn of pace that would catapult you safely to your destination.
Clive (Brendan’s) ★★★★★
Ye old faithful. Clive wasn’t the most flash of our steeds. He didn’t have the shiniest coat, the fastest walk or the most accurate placement of hoof. But his solid trot, his modest yet beguiling temperament and his enormous member endeared him to Brendan immediately.
Ranatz (Drazen’s)★★★☆☆
Ranatz (which apparently means “Good Luck” in Croatian, although I’m yet to find any proof of that being true) was a beauty to look at. Shiny chestnut brown (as opposed to our black horses), Ranatz stood out from the get go. However, he and Drazen had an unstable relationship. Ranatz’s insatiable thirst at every single stream combined with his stubbornness created a frosty, uneasy dynamic between the pair. In the end, they were just two animals who were trying to assert a level of control upon the other, a tug of war for dominance that I think Drazen eventually won.
Lebron (Jeroen’s) ★☆☆☆☆
He’s unpredictable. The maverick of the group. While all the others got off to a great start, the pairing of Jereon and Lebron started terribly. Lebron just didn’t connect with Jeroen and decided to walk extremely slowly as a protest. I mean we all get it, no one wants a giant Dutch bloke on their back for 25km do they? So, after our guide had seen that Lebron’s slow walking protest wasn’t stopping, he approached me and Moose and asked me to swap with Jeroen. Moose didn’t even get a say in the matter. I had to get onto Lebron and Jeroen got on the sweet-tempered Moose. This is where Lebron decided to lose all the lethargy of the last hour, powering his way to the front of the pack. For the briefest of moments I thought, ‘This is perfect, I am the horse whisperer’. Then I realised that while Lebron that lost his slowness, he had kept the unfortunate trait of being an irrepressible bastard. He didn’t like stopping in the slightest, he didn’t like me turning him to go the correct direction and he didn’t like being even remotely close to the rest of the fellowship. I discovered this antisocial streak when he reared onto his back legs as we stopped for lunch. That’s two things he didn’t want to do in one go, stopping and being around other horses. Thankfully I’m told he is working through his exhaustive list of social defects with a counsellor.
As we continued up the plain, eventually reaching the rolling foothills of the enormous Tajik mountains, we encountered groups of wild horses that our guide had to chase off to stop our horses going mad. By “our horses” I mean Lebron. Who else?
Yurt camp
25km in six hours is too much for your first horse riding session. Now we know this. Never again. We surfaced from the sea of green hills, every inch of our lower bodies aching and chafing as we encouraged our horses forward to the sweet release that we hoped we would feel getting off the saddle. I was finally ridded of Lebron, and even though my legs weren’t keen on working properly and the cries of anguish from Brendan’s creaking knees shook me to my core, I knew we would all recover with a bit of food and rest.
We found our yurt and put our stuff away, wrapping ourselves up to prepare for the incoming cold night. After a decent dinner and some cards, Drazen had to take a taxi back down to lower altitudes because he felt rough, so it was just the three musketeers left. We shuffled off to our yurt and were met with a strangely unwelcome surprise. It was too hot. They had stoked the stove with so much fuel that it was glowing orange in the darkness of the yurt. With the thickness of the layered insulation, it was akin to a sauna in there, so as I’m sure you understand, we all had to strip off. I’m not trying to explain myself to you, dear reader. I’m just saying that there need be no judgement on the comment that three exceptionally good-looking men, after a day of untempered mountainous romanticism, got almost entirely naked and very sweaty in a confined space together. It didn’t help though. Neither did opening the door. All in all, it was a very uncomfortable sweaty night at 3500m above sea level.
We awoke unenthusiastic for our ride back down to Sary Mogul. The intense freedom among the Middle Earth scenery we had experienced on the first half of the first day was being overshadowed by the burning pain of the chafe and the ache of the joints. Brendan was also suffering from an unusual sunburn that was solely on the back of his hands from holding the reins of Clive. The fingers were still white as the day is long, but the back of those hands were a fiery red.
Final thoughts
Despite the pain of 50km of riding in two days, the lack of sleep and the trauma of having to see Jeroen strip down once again (after the hot springs), we all had a brilliant time riding through the wide expanses of southern Kyrgyzstan.
