We’d come to Central Asia to ride the Pamir Highway and had dreamed of an endless summer, testing out and refining our gear to get everything just right. In the end, we were so busy renovating the flat, seeing relatives and inventing bogus itineraries for visas, we barely had a chance to try our new bikes before leaving.

The 300km from Samarkand to Dushanbe was our first proper shakedown!

The new bikes were great: the disk brakes helped with the hundreds of swerving minivans and our oversize tyres had us floating nicely over potholes as we inched towards the Tajik border.

Bikes fine, but I’d seemingly misplaced our remaining Uzbek currency. We scrambled enough change to share a Pepsi when pulling over for some shade, but the  restaurant owner was having none of it. She brought over a free plate of french fries and melon! And refused payment, even when our cash was located: “you are our guests!”

Later that afternoon we crossed the border into Tajikistan. The flat plains immediately gave way to an imposing ridge of dusty mountains and the traffic thinned out completely. For company we had just a few electric trikes, the odd donkey and a rotating cast of young boys in Ronaldo shirts each equally keen to race the heavily laden cycle tourers.

We sorted sim cards the next morning at the Panjakent bazaar, then headed for the hills. It was really a new world: miles of dusty brown, then shocks of green wherever a village was perched

We’d planned on camping, but the roadside was far too steep. After a long day of climbing,  we were tired. Just as we were losing hope of flat land, we were flagged down by a man gesturing that we sleep on his family’s land. With dusk drawing in, we didn’t need much persuading!

A little girl supervised as we put up our tent, pointing out cracks in the dry earth we could use for our pegs. We played along, giving her and her siblings little jobs. We explained we had plenty of food, but before we knew it, a plate of biscuits, tea, kefir and bread was presented. We were overwhelmed by their generosity.

Once the tent was up, blankets were spread out for the family and a few curious neighbours. We offered our camping chairs to the elders, but these were deemed hilariously uncomfortable!

Conversation was eased by the grandfather who’d worked for a Soviet goldmine and spoke a little English. He said the whole hillside would soon de-camp to the valley for winter.

Around 5am the cows were walked out to pasture and we were brought hot milk as we packed up our tent.

We’d set out to test the bikes before our “real” ride.  Our real ride had already begun!