Uzbekistan: The Golden Road to Samarkand (Specialist-led Tour)

Take an overnight flight from London (regional connections available) with Uzbekistan Airways.

Arrive in Tashkent and transfer to your hotel. After an introductory lecture and welcome lunch, take a city tour to see the highlights of Tashkent, including Kukeldash madrasa, the Museum of Applied Arts, Muyie Mubarak library, Tillya Sheikh mosque and some of the impressive Soviet-era metro stations. In the afternoon, fly to Nukus.

Meals: breakfast, lunch

Enjoy a morning tour of the Karakalpakstan State Museum of Art, which houses the spectacular collection of Igor Savitsky, who secreted away thousands of Russian avant-garde and post-avant-garde paintings during the Stalinist period. Besides this extensive art collection (second only to St Petersburg), he also collected thousands of Uzbek artefacts, textiles and jewellery. Tour the museum with a local specialist. En route to Khiva, stop at Chilpak to see the fourthcentury Zoroastrian Tower of Silence.

Meals: breakfast, dinner

Take a full-day tour of the old walled city of Khiva, capital of Khorezm between the 16th and 20th centuries, and one of the most remote of the Silk Road cities. Visit the Kunya Ark fortress, the original residence of the Khiva khans; the beautifully decorated Tash Hauli (stone palace); the Friday Mosque; madrasas which now house museum collections; and a UNESCO-listed silk carpet workshop.

Meals: breakfast

Embark on a full-day drive to Bukhara (seven to eight hours) through the Kyzylkum desert, stopping at the Amu Darya River, known as the Oxus River in the ancient world.

Meals: breakfast, lunch

Take a full-day walking tour of Bukhara, visiting the trade domes and bazaars. See the Lyab-i-Hauz pool, the Chor Minor, and the Poi-Kalyan complex of minarets and madrasa, dating from the 12th to the 16th century, and gain insight into the city’s rich history.

Meals: breakfast

Visit the Persian Samanid brick mausoleum, the Bolo Hauz mosque and the Sitora-i Mokhi-Khosa. Later explore the Balyand mosque, a jewel of 16thcentury architecture, and the treasures of the city’s Jewish quarter.

Meals: breakfast

Drive to Vabkent, and continue to Gijduvan, to see such architectural marvels as the 15th-century Ulugbek Madrasah built in tribute to the Sufi scholar Abdul Khaliq Ghijduwani. After lunch, continue driving to Samarkand via Rabati Malik Caravanserai.

Meals: breakfast, lunch

Drive to the ancient deserted site of Afrosiyob on the outskirts of Samarkand. Continue to the observatory of Ulugbek, Timur’s astronomer grandson, and see the Bibi Khanum mosque, built by Timur for his favourite wife. End at the magnificent Gur-Emir mausoleum, where Timur is buried beneath its fluted domes.

Meals: breakfast

Drive to Shahrisabz, birthplace of Timur, who commissioned an enormous palace here, the ornamented audience chamber of which remains.

Meals: breakfast

Visit the Shah-i-Zinda necropolis and the Samarkand Museum of History, Culture and Art. In the afternoon, travel by rail to Tashkent. Enjoy a farewell dinner.

Meals: breakfast, dinner

Transfer to the airport; fly to London.

Meals: breakfast