Our Last Club Adventure - Days 13-15 - Samarkand

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Breakfast and few more hugs from our host family in Mitan and we were off to Samarkand.  It was a short drive and two hours later we were in the city storing our bags at the next hotel.  Our guide Fera met us and we started off on a lovely full day tour of the city in the rain...our first truly rainy day in months.  Our first stop was the astonomical observatory dating back to the 1400's.

Next was the tomb of St. Daniel.  From the old testament...Daniel and the Lions...and his remains are buried here in Samarkand.  Interesting.  There were many Jewish people at the site.

One of the oldest living trees in the world estimated to be at least 2500 years old.

Cave dwellings.

A massive mausoleum complex with beautiful tiled tombs and monuments.  Stunning.

A modern Muslin cemetery.

 For our second day we took off on foot to visit the ensemble.

The masterpiece of Samarkand and just as I remembered it six years ago.  We spent a couple of hours in all three of the madrasas.

Our last stop was the tomb of Amir Timir, father of Uzbekistan.  On the way we stopped to visit the ligers.

We ended our day at a lovely restuarant having a grand meal. 

The next morning five of our group was suffering from food poisoning...mayonnaise was believed to be the agent...and poor Carol at that visit the local hospital for a few hours.  By the end of the day we were all on the mend an resting up for our last leg tomorrow morning.