The air is crisp and cool this time of year in Almaty, 10-15 degrees during the day and 5-10 in the evening. It is quite refreshing to be in this weather, after hot and humid Dubai.

The day before my flight was quite the scramble. When i was double checking with Ducati Almaty on the status of spare parts for my bike, I realised that there had been some miscommunication, and the parts i had ordered two months ago had not yet arrived. They were stuck in Italy, as Ducati took 6 weeks to ship these out (must be nice to take the entire August off as a company), and had not yet made it past Italian customs, who were strictly screening parts due to sanctions / the war.

This wasn’t acceptable to me, so I decided to grab the parts myself from the local dealer in Dubai, to ensure that I could get my bike and hit the road with no delays. No refunds from Ducati unfortunately, so anyone after a spare chain, air filter or windshield in Almaty, please let me know!

After arriving late yesterday evening (after a 4 hour delayed flight!), today was spent going back and forth between Ducati, and various shops in Almaty to ensure that I had everything I needed to get started. Almaty, the fourth Ducati dealer I’ve visited on this journey (prev. Phuket, Chengdu, Urumqi).

I ended up purchasing a new helmet (an LS2 Stream II), since I’ve had a few more drops than I’d like in my current one, and a new pair of gloves. After two months riding with my previous gloves, I developed dermatitis on my pointer fingers (which has since receded), and I suspect this was partly due to the gloves I used. In between shops, I had a quick haircut (it’s been a few weeks since my last, and probably won’t have many opportunities for the next few weeks!).

The helmet shop owner also had a parrot in the corner

Lunch was shakshuka (i have a feeling that the Russians love this), and dinner was Besh Barbar (horse meat noodles - quite tasty). almaty alfresco dining probably the best besh barbar I’ve had to date

In the evening, I checked back in on my bike at Ducati. They had yet to finish their work on it, because there were a few more issues that they had discovered:

• the leak on the forks was due to issues with the bushings (rather than the seals), and this was time consuming to repair
• the bolt securing the rear suspension had a missing nut! The existing bolt had bent from the force, so it was stuck
• a few other missing bolts here and there

Missing rear suspension nut! -10 points to Ducati’s build quality

Something is missing… In the end, they informed me that they’d have the bike ready around lunch time tomorrow, so my trip will need to wait until then!

I think Almaty is an extremely underrated city:

• It seems safe
• It is quite walkable and the streets are pretty
• People are lively, and relatively friendly
• Decent food, restaurants and hospitality
• The Tien Shan mountains offer an incredible backdrop

Probably not as vibey as Tbilisi, but quite a nice place to be I think.

Rush hour under the gaze of Tien Shan

Tomorrow; Kegen/Karakol

Some stats:

• 45g coffee consumed
• No fuel added
• No kms added
• 3 unique interactions
• told i looked local once