After a lovely few hours in Tashkent as described in my prior blog posts, I returned to the train station for my 18 hour train ride into Kazakhstan and to Almaty. I picked up my bag from the luggage storage in the basement, bought a bottle of water, and boarded the Kazakhstan Temir Zholy train.
We left on time at 16:15, and thankfully the air conditioning was working well, because it was now 37 degrees outside!
I bought two tickets to assure myself of a private cabin. I was quite impressed with it--very clean and modern. Much more comfortable than the platzkart!
There is a sink below the table, and I think that is a smart design.
Here is the bed made up (I gave myself a second pillow from the upper bunk).
You can see the hallway is also clean and tidy.
The list of stops plays on the hallway ticker . . .
. . . and the schedule is on the wall. I think we mostly ran on schedule, although I was definitely asleep for some of these stops!
One car away is the dining car. I have not traveled an overnight train before with a dining car, and so I was excited about this.
I needed Google translate for the menu . . .
. . . but I managed to order dinner, which included a nice salad . . .
. . . and breakfast in the morning.
Unfortunately, I anticipated being able to change my Uzbek som to Kazakh tenge at the border, and this was not possible whatsoever. We did stop on both sides of the border for border guards to board and check passports, all of which went smoothly enough, but no one came on to change money and we were not allowed off. I did get off during our stop in Shymkent and I was able to take out some Kazakh cash at an ATM, which was good, because the dining car did not accept Uzbek som nor credit card nor did the lady seem keen on my US dollars. Kazakhstan is actually largely cashless (apparently 98% of financial transactions are cashless), but most payments are done via e-wallets (something like 70%) and not credit cards, and the e-wallet apps are not accesible to short-term visitors.
From what I saw from the train, Kazakhstan is as empty as you would think for a country with very low population density (actually, very similar to Canada). These are photos I took in the evening . . .
. . . and these in the morning.
I paid $175 Canadian for the train trip. Unfortunately, it can be cheaper to fly from Tashkent to Almaty (plus it is only about a 90 minutes flight), but I was very glad I chose the train and it was a great experience.
We arrived on time at 10:15 this morning at the Almaty 2 station.
