Nurata and Aydarkul

Between Samarkand and Bukhara the road can be taken quickly, or it can be given a night. Nurata is a small town on the southern edge of the Kyzylkum, known for one thing above all: a spring that rises at the foot of a ruined fortress and fills a clear pool where fish have been fed and left alone for centuries. The fish are held to be sacred, and the pool sits beside a mosque, so the atmosphere is quiet rather than busy. The fortress above is attributed by legend to Alexander, and the climb up gives the view over the town and the desert beyond.

An hour or so further north the desert opens out and, quite suddenly, becomes a lake. Aydarkul is long and shallow and hardly visited, with reeds at its edge and birds on the water, and a handful of yurt camps stand on the sand nearby. The programme here is simple. A camel ride in the late afternoon, when the light goes gold and long; dinner by the fire; a night under a sky with nothing in front of it. Morning on Aydarkul comes early and is worth being awake for.

We use this stretch of country as a pause between two cities that ask a great deal of the eyes. The camps are plain by design, felt, carpets and lamplight rather than corridors and keys, and we will tell you honestly which are best kept and when the nights turn cold. The drive, the camp and the camel are arranged in advance and need no thought from you. Nurata and Aydarkul are a two-day route of their own between Samarkand and Bukhara, and a night on the Grand Journey across Uzbekistan and on Uzbekistan in Depth; any of them can be extended with a second night if you would rather stay still.