Bukhara Day Trip by Train

Your driver picks you up at your hotel and takes you to the station for the morning high-speed train to Bukhara (about 1 hour 30 minutes). Your guide meets you on the platform in Bukhara.

Begin at the heart of the old town: the pool of Lyab-i Hauz with the Nadir Divan-Begi madrasa, then the covered trading domes, where jewellers and money-changers once worked, and the Magoki Attori Mosque, half buried in the ground over the centuries.

The Kalyan Minaret, about 46 m tall and almost 900 years old, with the great Kalyan Mosque and the blue domes of the Mir-i-Arab Madrasa around one square: the most famous view in Bukhara.

Time for lunch at a local restaurant, at your own expense; your guide will happily suggest a favourite.

The massive walls of the Ark, the fortress where the emirs of Bukhara lived and ruled, and across the square the Bolo Hauz Mosque with its tall painted wooden columns.

In the park, the 10th-century Samanid Mausoleum, a small masterpiece of patterned brick, then the four turquoise-capped towers of Chor Minor, tucked away in the old lanes. Free time for the bazaars and craft shops if the train allows.

Your guide takes you to the station for the evening train; your driver meets you in Samarkand and drives you to your hotel.