Central Asia tours: combining Uzbekistan with Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan

Every afternoon at 14:41 a Talgo train leaves Tashkent for Almaty and pulls in at 08:51 the next morning. You fall asleep in Uzbekistan and wake up under the mountains of Kazakhstan. That one overnight train sums up how easy it has become to combine Uzbekistan with its neighbours. Here is how we put together a Central Asia tour from Tashkent: what each country adds, how you cross, when to go and how many days you need.

Central Asia tours: what each neighbour adds

Uzbekistan gives you the Silk Road cities: Samarkand, Bukhara, Khiva and Tashkent. The neighbours give you mountains, and each in its own way.

• Tajikistan is the closest. From Samarkand you are at the border with Panjakent in the Zarafshan valley, the gateway to the Fann Mountains, the Seven Lakes and Lake Iskanderkul. Sarazm, a UNESCO site, is right by the crossing. In the north, Khujand is a short drive from Tashkent.
• Kyrgyzstan is the country of high pastures and yurt camps. Song-Kul lies above 3,000 metres, and in summer yurt camps stand along its shores. Bishkek is an hour and ten minutes from Tashkent by air.
• Kazakhstan means Almaty, a city at the foot of the Tien Shan. You can reach it on the overnight train or with a flight of about an hour and a half.

Why the caravan routes linked these places in the first place is in our article on Silk Road tours in Uzbekistan.

Entry rules: Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan

Every country has its own rules, and they depend on your passport. For Uzbekistan, start with our guide do you need a visa for Uzbekistan. One detail matters for a combined trip: if you travel on an Uzbek e-visa and plan to leave and come back, apply for a double- or multiple-entry e-visa, not a single-entry one.

For British passports, to take a common example, the rules in 2026 are:

• Kazakhstan: no visa for up to 30 days per visit, and no more than 90 days in any 180. Your hotel registers you.
• Kyrgyzstan: no visa for up to 30 days in each 60-day period. Kyrgyzstan also has an official e-visa portal for other passports and longer stays.
• Tajikistan: a visa is required. You apply online for an e-visa, and processing takes at least two weeks. The Pamirs (Gorno-Badakhshan) need a separate permit on top of the visa. Many other passports enter Tajikistan visa-free, so check yours first.

Before we book anything, we check every passport in the group against the current rules of each country on the route.

How to cross: border posts, trains and flights

These are the crossings we use with travellers:

Route	How	Good for
Samarkand → Panjakent (Tajikistan)	Road, Jartepa–Sarazm crossing	Fann Mountains, Seven Lakes, Iskanderkul
Tashkent → Khujand (Tajikistan)	Road, Oybek–Fotekhobod crossing	Khujand, Istaravshan
Andijan → Osh (Kyrgyzstan)	Road, Dustlik–Dostuk crossing	Southern Kyrgyzstan after the Fergana Valley
Tashkent → Almaty (Kazakhstan)	Talgo train, daily, about 18 hours overnight	Almaty without an extra flight
Tashkent → Almaty, Bishkek, Dushanbe	Flights, about 1 h 30 min, 1 h 10 min and 1 h	Saving a day

The Talgo has run daily since December 2025. Flights to Almaty, Bishkek and Dushanbe go several times a week with Uzbekistan Airways, Centrum Air and the neighbours' own airlines. Border formalities take time, so on a crossing day we plan nothing tight. On the other side you change to a local car and driver.

Best time to visit Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan

Here the two halves of the trip pull in different directions. The cities of Uzbekistan are at their best in spring and autumn; July and August in Bukhara and Khiva are hot. The mountains open only in summer. In the Fann Mountains the trekking season is from June to September. In Kyrgyzstan the high pastures and yurt camps work from late June to early or mid-September, and Song-Kul is still under snow through May.

So the months that suit both are June and September. In June we do the Uzbek cities first, before the heat, and finish in the mountains. In September we go the other way: mountains first, before the cold, then the cities as they cool down. More about the seasons in Uzbekistan is in our article on the best time to visit.

The best order also depends on your flights. A ticket into one city and out of another, say into Tashkent and out of Bishkek, saves you a day of backtracking.

Central Asia itineraries: 14 to 21 days

14 days: Uzbekistan and Tajikistan

Days	Where
1–2	Tashkent
3–4	Bukhara, by fast train
5–6	Samarkand
7	Jartepa crossing, Sarazm, Panjakent
8–9	The Seven Lakes
10	Iskanderkul
11–12	Istaravshan and Khujand
13	Oybek crossing, back to Tashkent
14	Departure

15 days: Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan

Days	Where
1	Tashkent
2–3	Samarkand
4–5	Bukhara
6–7	Khiva, by fast train from Bukhara
8	Back to Tashkent by air or train
9	Flight to Bishkek
10–14	The Kyrgyz mountains: Song-Kul and Issyk-Kul
15	Departure from Bishkek

The fast train to Khiva does not run every day, so we fix those days first; the details are in our article on trains in Uzbekistan.

21 days: four countries

Days	Where
1–2	Almaty
3	Overnight Talgo to Tashkent
4	Tashkent
5–6	Bukhara
7–8	Samarkand
9–11	Panjakent, the Seven Lakes, Iskanderkul, Khujand
12	Oybek crossing, back to Tashkent
13	Flight to Bishkek
14–20	Kyrgyzstan: Song-Kul, Issyk-Kul, Bishkek
21	Departure from Bishkek

Our tours that cross the border

Some of our routes already include a neighbour:

• The 12-day Tajikistan & Silk Road tour: Bukhara and Samarkand, then across at Panjakent into the Fann Mountains, with hiking days at the Seven Lakes, Kulikalon and Iskanderkul, ending in Dushanbe.
• The 5-day Mystic Asia tour: from Samarkand through Jartepa to Panjakent and the Seven Lakes, then Istaravshan and Khujand, and back to Tashkent through Oybek.
• The 4-day Seven Lakes jeep expedition from Samarkand, all the way to the seventh lake.
• The 23-day Silk Road tour through all five countries, from Ashgabat to Astana, including Bishkek and Almaty.

Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan in a shorter trip we put together individually. Tell us your dates and interests in the tour finder.

In short

• Tajikistan is the easiest add-on: Jartepa from Samarkand, Oybek from Tashkent.
• Kyrgyzstan is an hour and ten minutes by air from Tashkent, or by road through Dustlik to Osh; the mountains are for late June to mid-September.
• Kazakhstan: the daily Talgo Tashkent–Almaty takes about 18 hours overnight, a flight about an hour and a half.
• June and September suit both the cities and the mountains.
• Check visas for every passport and every country, and take a multiple-entry Uzbek e-visa if you need one.