We left Sary-Tash in the not-too-late morning, to make our way to the Kyrgyz/Tajik border – 44km from town.

Initially we were following the Alay-Valley, until we hit the mountain range and made our way up towards the Kyzyl-Art-Pass. Well before the top of the pass we arrived at the Kyrgyz border post, where we went through customs and got stamped out of the country.

We continued along the Pamir Highway, going up until we reached the highest point of the pass at 4280m above sea level, which also marks the actual border between the two countries.

Given we had just crossed into Tajikistan, we now had to officially enter the country … and surely the Tajik border post was just a few kilometers away.

While the Kyrgyz border post was fairly well equipped with computers and passport reader (incl. connection to the government network), procedures on the Tajik side were fairly manual. Nevertheless with documentation in order, getting out of the one and into the other country was a mere matter of time.

We were soon back on the Pamir Highway proceeding further into Tajikistan with Lake Karakul being our lunch break destination around 50km from the border post (or around 100km from Sary-Tash).