We brought Ueli and Roger to the start of their hike and said goodbye. Peter and I wanted to go back to Khorog that day. Once in Khorog we went to the place behind the bazaar where the shared minibuses usually leave for Khorog. We were pretty late and many cars had already left. There was only one minibus left that was still looking for 2 passengers to fill up the car (they usually wait until the car is full, otherwise the drivers cancel the trip). However two of the passengers had arranged a detour to Bulunkul, where we had already been a few days ago, with the driver. We didn't have much choice as this was the only car left and we wanted to get to Khorog as fast as possible. So finally we left. Luckily the minibus couldn't get to Bulunkul in the end because the road was flooded and only a 4-wheel-drive could have managed the road. One hour before Khorog the two guys, that had arranged the detour to Bulunkul, suddenly had the idea to stop for a bath in the hot springs that were on the way. Peter and I however were not fond of this idea. It was getting dark, we were sitting in the car for hours already and all we wanted was just to arrive in Khorog, have dinner and sleep. Also we had heard nothing good about the place. After some discussions we luckily continued straight to Khorog. When we arrived there, it was already dark. We tried to get some cash at the ATMs to pay for the flight back to Dushanbe, but the ATMs were all inside the banks that were already closed at that time. So we just walked to the homestay, where Altynbek had already announced our arrival. There we had dinner (soup with meatballs, for a change) together with a nice couple from the Netherlands. They were heading back to Dushanbe the next day as well and had two seats left in their car. They offered us a lift, but when their driver heard that he made a quite a scene and claimed that he would get problems at the police checkpoints. Yeah sure, that guy just knew that he would get his money anyways, so better to have the car not too full. Anyways, we were still planning to catch the flight to Dushanbe the next day. So we didn't care too much.
The next morning we got up early, had breakfast, went to the bank, got enough cash and went to the airport to buy the tickets. Our hope was to fly out on the same day. When we arrived at the ticket office a guy who was walking by said 'No tickets today' and just disappeared without further comment behind a door. There we stood and felt pretty stupid. What should that mean now? Was there no flight today? Or no seats left? And what about the tickets for the flight tomorrow? Well, we went outside where some other men sent us back and forth. Finally we found out that everybody was waiting for the flight from Dushanbe to arrive, which was not certain to come because of the weather conditions. Only once the flight would have arrived, we could have got tickets for the other day. All that was too uncertain for us as we wanted to get back to our bicycles as fast as possible (we told the hotel that we would come back in 10 days time). So we went to the bazaar where the jeeps to Dushanbe usually left and found a jeep very quickly that was about to leave to Dushanbe. Only two more passengers were missing. There was not much of a choice as it was late again, so we jumped in, the locals said a prayer and off we went.
I don't even want to think about this jeep trip again. This was definitely one of the most horrible 17 hours that I have ever spent in my life. We were 9 people in the jeep, Peter and me squeezed with another girl on the rear bench, without the possibility to get out unless the people on the middle bench in front of us got out. They didn't do that very often. The girl next to us threw up into a plastic bag during the whole journey. It was dusty, hot and we couldn't open the window. Leg room was so little that we could hardly move our legs. We ran out of water and we didn't dare to drink the water from the rivers like the locals did. Moreover the soldiers at a military checkpoint made some trouble because of our passports. They wanted to see our original passports (we only gave them the copies) and asked for the OVIR registration (that we did have).
We left Khorog around 10 am, stopped for lunch and dinner and arrived in Dushanbe at around 5 am. Getting off the jeep was such a relief! We had called the homestay before that was recommended by Altynbek and they were waiting for us. We just had a shower and then fell into our beds.
Later in Samarkand we heard other stories from travellers. A driver fell asleep and the jeep crashed into one of the concrete blocks. It prevented the jeep from falling 20 m into the river.
