Testimonials

I am writing to express my heartfelt appreciation for the exceptional service and assistance provided by your employee Marat Askarov during my recent experience in booking train travel to Uzbekistan different cities for me and my family members.
The level of professionalism, efficiency, and customer care demonstrated by Marat truly made a positive impact on my travel arrangement.
As a oversees client me and my family coming Uzbekistan as tourist on June 16 2023, I had several queries and concerns regarding train booking and overall travel process. However, Marat went above and beyond in addressing my inquiries and providing timely and accurate information. Their prompt responses, attention to detail, and willingness to assist throughout the booking process were truly commendable.
The exceptional service I received from Marat not only fascinated my travel planning but also left a lasting impression of Uzbekistan as a welcoming and customer oriented destination. Please extend my gratitude and appreciation to Marat for his outstanding performance and commitment to excellence.
I would not hesitate to recommend your train services to my fellow’s travelers or to choose your services again in the future. My one more friend is also planning to visit next month from Dubai, definitely I will advise him to make the booking with you.

Firstly, I would like to say I am very happy with the services and tour which had been provided by Advantour.
One point; Kyrgistan was for me after all too short, I would suggest an evening flight or a second night at the hotel. As well, I was with the breakfast in Sofia Int. (Bishkek) not so happy. They shall provide more fresh food/bread options.
All guides and driver were reliable, helpful, knowledgeable and very kind!
Big Plus with the hotels:
- Mercure Almaty: excellent breakfast!
- Mirhaba Bukhara: Beautiful rooms, a good breakfast and an excellent location.
Turkmenistan, border entering & exit was quite interesting, to be frankly. But it went well.
Thank you very much as well for all the informations, specially about bordering Turkmenistan.

Thank you for the organization, Uzbekistan is a great place with amazing people, we really enjoy that!
Everything was fine, Khurshid was very available and helped us many times, accommodations were what we were expecting. The whole group is happy.
If I may, just a couple of points of improvement:
- bread experience at the yurt camp: it was definitely not worth 120€, since we didn’t participate to any masterclass but we just saw the lady putting the bread in the oven. Definitely overpriced, it was the only bad point of the journey.
- camel experience was good.
- you handled the missed lunch issue very well, thank you!
- 2-hours trekking experience on the mountains was ok but not for the price proposed in the program: it was 30€ per person, luckily we agreed for a different price before starting, which was adeguate for the experience. Again, experience itself is good and enjoyable, but official price (30€ per person) is too high.
- timing for the two days in the desert and on the mountains can be better managed: we saved half a day doing the trekking in the afternoon, and that’s the good equilibrium I guess. Maybe you can take this suggestion for your next trips.
Again, we are satisfied with this trip and we thank you for your organization!

I want to thank you very much for organising a wonderful tour which I thoroughly enjoyed. Akhror our guide was very knowledgable, had good English , and looked after us very well. All the arrangements for hotels, flights, trains, vehicles etc worked seamlessly. I am particularly grateful to you for the very speedy and helpful replies to every email I sent. The other guests on the tour from Australia, USA, Brazil and Malaysia were a very friendly and interesting bunch.
I would like to offer one bit of feedback or suggestion (which I know was shared by all our group), but this is in no way a criticism. On several days we had 4-6 hours of sightseeing (sometimes on very hot days) followed by 2-3 hours of resting before any evening travel or activity. I think we all felt that 2-3 hrs of sightseeing followed by about an hour to sit down, drink and eat lunch, followed then by the remainder of the sightseeing, would have worked very well. None of the group minded at all to pay for their own lunch.
I hope I will have the chance to travel with Advantour again in the future, possibly to Turkmenistan or the Caucasus, but I’m not sure I will live long enough for Afghanistan to become a comfortable and safe tourist destination!

We had a wonderful experience traveling 18 days from the Fergana Valley to Nukus.
I have already highly recommended Advantour to two persons beginning to plan travel to your country.
I would like to first call out Kurban, our driver for 10 days. He was a careful driver, always on time, and welcomed us each day. I only wish we could carry on a conversation with him. Having a new van with plenty of room and power to go over passes was an unexpected joy.
I am sure you will not be surprised that our top guide was Mukhsuma in Bukhara. She had deep knowledge of Bukhara and quickly picked up that Steve had taught Middle Eastern history for 30 years.
My guide in Turkmenistan, Sirdar, would be my second favorite guide. We just hit it off from the start and had long conversations. I had not realized that as a tourist in Turkmenistan I needed a guide/minder to accompany me on flights. I had the right guide.
Vadim in Tashkent, Rahman in Fergana, and Saida in Khiva were also good guides and each enhanced our trip.
I was unhappy with Farah in Samarkand. She was distracted with many phone calls including facetime with her boyfriend. Our day was delayed as she shopped for meat for dinner. Though Gail went with her for what was going to be only a couple of minutes, it was 20 minutes before she came back as she went to a second "store" for meat. She wanted to sit in the shade and give us long background talks often covering background that we all knew. I would no use her again as she was unprofessional.
There were a few hic-cups along the way. We did not have the fast-speed train to Samarkand and Farah had come to the station to meet the fast train. Even with less time to see Samarkand on our first day, we were still able to see Samarkand in the time available. Our driver was given the wrong hotel in Khiva. I should have checked our information. This got quickly sorted out.
The border crossing to Turkmenistan went easier than expected. There was no charge for the mini-bus that drove me to the Turkmenistan border post. The covid test I was given was quite fast. I did have to wait for Sirdar, my guide, to arrive in the customs area before I could get my visa. He claimed he was waiting in the parking lot, but another guide said he was not there. In the end it took 90 minutes to enter Turkmenistan.
At the border, one person crossing at the same time as me, had her only slightly torn $100 bill rejected. I was able to make and exchange so she could enter the country. I did not exchange any money in Turkmenistan and Sirdar paid all my expenses--little more than two lunches. When we settled he gave me the black market rate. In the hotel, I ordered a drink in the lounge and a small packet of nuts. At the official exhcange rate this would cost $35. I said I would forego the purchase. As no one was in the lounge, the bar tender lowered the price to $10 and still made a profit when he covered my purchase with local currency and later converted the dollars to Manat. Not sure you can give your tourists advance information on the black market rate.
Along the way I learned, but cannot confirm, that tourists can leave Turkmenistan at the border post near Nukus, but cannot enter. The border post on the road to Bukhara, uses a Covid test that takes a long time to get results.
Thanks for your help and support.

I am writing to you to provide some feedback and to highlight the two most impressive experiences we had with my wife, visiting your country from the 28th of April till the 12th of May. We visited Muynak, Nukus, Khiva, Bukhara, Nurata mountains, Samarkand, and Tashkent.
The first impressive thing is the magnificent country, of which you should be very proud. The landscape, the culture, the people and the food all have impressed us.
The second was Sevara's performance!!! My job as an auditor and consultant of medical services offers me an advantage in the evaluation of services and assessment of people's performance. Sevara was right from the start of our collaboration simply flawless. Not only this, but she was responding very fast and at any time I was messaging her. She organized perfectly all aspects of our tour (a detailed report I have sent to her, in order to further improve your already high-quality services). I can firmly confirm that in my opinion Sevara's performance was outstanding and I am sure that you know you have a real diamond working for Advantour.
I wish I will come back to Central Asia and surely I will choose your agency asking certainly Sevara to organize our tour.

I personally loved your country and do miss being there.
My comments are as follows:
- Itinerary
Perfect, felt that there was enough time to see everything.
The only thing might be that the arrival time in Khiva was very late, perhaps a slightly earlier flight might be move convenient, but appreciate that it is not dependent on your agency.
- Hotels
The Wyndham was perfect, great location.
All hotels were perfectly located, maybe the hotel in Khiva was the least good in terms of breakfast and the room. There was a lot of wind.
- Guides
All guides were excellent.
The guide in Samarkand was probably the friendliest.
The one place we didn’t get to visit was the Chor-Minor Madrasah in Bukhara, are you aware of a reason for this? I realised it after we had left the city.
- Transport
Excellent. The guide who picked us up at the Airport in Tashkent and took us back to the airport on our last day, as well as picking us up at the train station when arriving from Samarkand was particularly friend and very polite. He made me feel welcomed.
Finally, I would like to comment on the dinner after the show in Bukhara. Unfortunately the service at the Old Bukhara was terrible. It took them an hour to bring the soup and then another 30 minutes to bring the main dish. I also asked for wine but got tired of asking. I considered leaving the restaurant and looking for somewhere else to go.
All in all, it was a great trip, everything worked like clockwork. I would certainly recommend your agency to friends and colleagues.
Currently considering doing a trip to Azerbaijan next year. Also interested in Tajikistan (pity we couldn’t make it this time) and Kazakhastan, but I had a chance to see more of Tashkent which I really enjoyed.

First of all the tour was a great success, for the first running of the itinerary everything more or less went well. When things needed rearranging it was taken care of on the spot, this was mostly moving sight-seeing around to make it more practical on the ground.
Chris & Zaheed are an excellent team and it is great to have them working together, would be preferrable to always have Zaheed with our groups – the pax all loved him.
The coach drivers were all very good, Feruz who was our driver for the majority (Nukus to Samarkand) is excellent and I would request him on future tours.
There were issues with the drivers from the Fergana Valley back to Tashkent – more on that below.
Another issue was currency exchange, the exchange at the Lotte hotel is closed in the weekend and with the pax all arriving Friday night this was a problem. Can we get the hotel to open the exchange on a Saturday for us? Otherwise we should reconfigure future tours to have the first day as a week day to make currency exchange possible. We lost an hour on the first and only full day in Tashkent trying to exchange at another hotel.
Will be ideal to have more time in Samarkand for free time and add an extra day at the end in Tashkent to make the ending of the tour a smoother experience.

A huge thank you for such a wonderful trip to Uzbekistan. The sites we visited were beyond everything I imagined. We couldn't have done this trip without your help and the great service provided by Advantour.
The drivers were all very professional, friendly and always on time.
The guides in every city were friendly and amazing teachers! It has been like taking a crash course on Central Asian history, art and civilization. While I was a History and Literature major back in college, my education on Central Asia was minimal.
We enjoyed every single hotel we stayed at. They were all very unique and special with beautiful Uzbek touches. The staff at Rabat Hotel in Samarkand was specially kind and helpful. They shared a lot of information about the special house and its history. I will always remember them!
I have been sharing impressions and photos with family and friends. Several of them have expressed an interest in visiting Uzbekistan. I will be sure to refer them to you and Advantour!

Again, thank you for such a memorable trip!

In general, it all went very well. Thank you for organising last minute. The guides were all knowledgeable and engaging, and the drivers professional. I was happy with all your partner service providers. The hotels were all comfortable - particularly the Navruz hotel in Tashkent. The only issue was the Sharq train - this was a bit of a challenging experience. The travel time to Samarkand was about double that of the Afrasiyob train, which was not ideal, given that I didn't arrive into Samarkand until nearly midnight, and had and earlier start the next day. The whole feel of the train was worn-out, completely different to that of the Afrasiyob. The land border crossing at Oybek was also a bit painful, but nothing you can do about that, obviously.
I'll definitely use Advantour again next time in Central Asia or the Caucasus! I was impressed how smoothly everything flowed.

You had asked me to write an email about the specific problems and difficulties we faced during our travels in Uzbekistan in the context of my disability issues.

Firstly, although I do use a wheelchair I can walk and climb stairs to some extent (with painkillers) and so others who may have more serious disabilities may need even more care.
So let me list out the problems we faced – although most times we were able to resolve them:
1. The first problem we had was while booking our international flights because Uzbekistan Airways told us that they had no provision for carrying the wheelchair free of cost. However, after Delhi contacted Tashkent, the problem was solved.
2. However, at several airports there is neither an aerobridge nor an ambi for people with disabilities. I should have been warned. At Bishkek I was taken aback when I found that they had arranged for four men to lift me with the wheelchair and they barely managed. The wheelchair is 23 kgs and I am, well you know obese.
One time I climbed down and another time in Termez I climbed up. This would not be possible for many people with disability and they must be warned of the possibility of being carried down.
3. Need for a car that has a boot large enough to fit the wheelchair. In fact it was Suhrab who found a way of dismantling a part of the wheelchair so that it could fit. This meant extra work of dismantling and putting it back.
4. For most of the tour people were more than willing to help us but at one point the guide refused to help and the driver was not there and it was bit of a problem. Also, I think the driver or the guide have to forewarned and their consent taken about the extra work this entails.
5. While the hotels we stayed in were comfortable we had three problems:
(a) The one in Samarkand had too many steps at the entrance (more than ten or so) and the lift accommodates only one person and the wheelchair does not fit; and we were put up on the fourth or third floor.
(b) Even when we were on the ground floor the bathrooms had bath tubs which is very difficult to negotiate. I needed a shower rather than a bath tub. I did not mention it because I thought it would be too many things for you to manage. This was a major problem because there is no outlet from the floor (as in India ) so when I managed to have a bath sitting on the potty the bathroom got flooded! And Sebastian took an hour to ensure the flood was controlled.
(c) The problem of not having a restaurant or one which serves food at night. This meant we did not have transport to take us to some place to eat. Most dinners were quite sad because we could not move out.
6. The only serious complaint I have is with our four days in Samarkand when our driver did not speak a word of English. It was okay as long as the guide was there but the night we wanted to go our on our own and perhaps have a meal together somewhere we could not. We usually invited our driver and guide to eat with us but at night it would have been nice to go out on our own and this driver was insistent on some restaurant and also he promised to send his English speaking son but he did not. That was a bit of a disappointment for us.

Here is some feedback.

Hotels:
The best was Praga where everything worked, the bathroom was clean, the staff were helpful, and the breakfast was very good.
At the bottom was Erkin Palace in Khiva where the bathroom was strangely laid out and the shower water was only a trickle - we asked the staff to check but the answer was that it is normal. If it is due to the fact that Khiva is somewhere in the desert, a warning should be posted to travellers beforehand. The other 2 hotels Bibikhanum in Bukhara and Asia in Samarkand were average and functional with good locations.

Guides:
Vadim in Tashkent was very knowledgeable with general history and economics, proud of his country, aware of global issues, and very helpful.
Ms. Saida in Khiva recited and delved into the minor aspects of history which at times was hard to follow. Because she is from Urgench and not Khiva, and not being a muslim, she seemed a little detached from the area and was not able to convey the significance of local mosques.
Dilya in Bukhara was very lively and helpful in pointing out interesting locations and social aspects of the old town in addition to its history.
Dilnoza in Samarkand was cosmopolitan and knowledgeable about the bigger aspects of the city plus Uzbekistan and was able to raise the understanding of the country.
The differing ethnicity and backgrounds of the guides added immensely to the enjoyable understanding of the "mixing bowl" of Uzbekistan.

Itinerary:
The only short-coming would be the day trip to Gijduvan. The pottery was not exceptional and did nothing to add to the beauty or history of the country.
The 6-hour train ride from Khiva to Bukhara in the old-model train cabin was a small surprise - some warning would be appropriate for some travellers.

Tour organization:
It was well organized and delivered on its "relaxed" approach - everything was delivered as promised, including timely transportation in minivans. Making the loop from Khiva to Bukhara to Samarkand was also well conceived.

Overall:
This tour greatly advanced my understanding of Central Asia's histories and peoples, and left me with very positive views of Uzbekistan.