Uzbekistan tours from Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam: flights, visas and the road of Xuanzang

From Bangkok. Uzbekistan Airways and Centrum Air fly nonstop between Suvarnabhumi and Tashkent, with several flights a week in the winter timetable of 2026/27. The flight to Tashkent takes about 7 hours, the way back a little over 6 hours.

From Singapore. As of October 2026 there is no nonstop flight from Changi, so you fly with one connection. The easiest is via Kuala Lumpur, where Uzbekistan Airways flies nonstop to Tashkent four times a week, in about 8 hours; Bangkok works too.

From Vietnam. There are no nonstop flights from Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City as of October 2026. Connect in Bangkok or Kuala Lumpur, or further west in Delhi, Istanbul or Dubai. On some dates Uzbekistan Airways also flies to Tashkent from Cam Ranh, the airport of Nha Trang, in about 7 h 30 min. More routes are in our guide to flights to Uzbekistan.

Tashkent is on UTC+5 all year: two hours behind Bangkok, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, three hours behind Singapore. Whatever time you land, we meet you with a car to your hotel.

By the first centuries AD, under the Kushan kings, there were Buddhist monasteries in the south of today’s Uzbekistan, centuries before Xuanzang came. What survives near Termez are excavated sites, not working temples, and we visit them as archaeology and history.

Fayaz Tepe. A monastery founded in the 1st century AD in the dunes west of the city: a temple around a courtyard, the monks’ cells and a stupa, now inside a protective dome that you look into through a glass window. The alabaster Buddha found here in 1968 is in the State Museum of History of Uzbekistan in Tashkent, which reopened in July 2026, so the trip can begin in the capital.

Kara Tepe. Next door, a three-peaked hill where in the first centuries AD monks cut sanctuaries into the slopes. Japanese archaeologists began to dig here with Uzbek colleagues in 1998. The site needs a pass, which we apply for 40 days in advance, so tell us early.

The Zurmala stupa. Built in the 1st–2nd centuries from about 1.2 million mud bricks, it still stands around 13 metres tall, and it was the first Buddhist building identified in Central Asia.

In Samarkand, the Afrasiyab museum keeps the Ambassadors’ Painting of about 648–651. One scene shows an embassy from Tang China bringing silk and a string of silkworm cocoons to the ruler of Samarkand: ask your guide to show it to you first. Everything about the south is in our guide to Termez.

Thailand and Vietnam weave silk too, and Uzbek silk will feel both familiar and new. A single cocoon holds close to a kilometre of filament. In the Fergana Valley the worms spin between mid-April and mid-May, and at the Yodgorlik factory in Margilan you follow the thread from a basin of hot water to a loom where it becomes ikat, the cloth with patterns that look slightly out of focus. The blur is deliberate: the pattern is dyed into the threads before weaving. How to plan the visit is in our article on Margilan silk.

Our four-day Fergana Valley crafts tour covers Margilan with the potters of Rishtan. If you have less time, in Samarkand we can book you a visit to a silk workshop.

Uzbekistan has four real seasons, and the air is dry. For guests from Singapore, Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City the most comfortable weeks are from late March to mid-May and from mid-September to the end of October: warm, sunny days and cool evenings. Average temperatures in Tashkent:

Even in spring and autumn the nights are colder than anything at home, so pack a warm jacket. In July and August the afternoons reach about 35 °C in Tashkent and more in Bukhara and Termez; it is dry heat, and we start the days early.

Thailand. Songkran falls on Tuesday to Thursday, 13–15 April 2027. Take Monday 12 and Friday 16 April off, and you have nine days, from Saturday 10 to Sunday 18 April, in one of our best months. The long weekends of 1–4 May and 23–25 October 2027 also fall in good weather.

Singapore. The March school holidays, from 13 to 21 March 2027, end on Navruz, our spring new year, on 21 March: afternoons are about 16 °C, so bring a jacket. The September school holidays, from 4 to 12 September 2027, give nine days at the start of our autumn: still warm in the afternoon, cooler at night. Deepavali on Thursday 28 October 2027 makes a long weekend at the end of our autumn season. The June holidays, from 29 May to 27 June, are the start of our summer heat.

Tết and Chinese New Year. Vietnam’s Tết holiday for public employees runs from 4 to 10 February 2027, and Singapore marks Chinese New Year on 6–7 February, with Monday 8 February as a holiday in lieu. That is our winter: about 9–10 °C in the afternoon and around zero at night. You will need a coat, a hat and gloves, but the monuments are quiet, and we plan more time indoors, in museums and workshops. Vietnam’s National Day break of 2–5 September 2027 comes in warm, dry weather. Month by month: spring, autumn, February and the weather by month.

You book the international flight, and we arrange everything on the ground: hotels, train and domestic flight tickets, guides and transfers, timed to the days you land and fly home.

The Buddhist Silk Road, 7 days. The State Museum of History in Tashkent, three days among the monasteries of Termez, then Samarkand and the Afrasiyab paintings, with an optional extension to Bukhara: our Buddhist Silk Road tour.

In the footsteps of Xuanzang, 8 days. Tashkent, Samarkand and Afrasiyab, the road south through Shahrisabz and the mountains of the Iron Gate, and the monasteries of Termez: In the Footsteps of Xuanzang.

The classic week, 8 days. Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva on our 8-day classic tour; how we lay out such a trip is in Uzbekistan in 7 days and Uzbekistan in 10 days.

A short trip. For a long weekend with a day or two of leave, Tashkent and Samarkand: the Afrosiyob high-speed train covers the distance in about 2 h 10 min, see Tashkent to Samarkand. In Samarkand, save an evening for the Registan with its evening lights.

Your guide speaks your language, and that is included in the price of our tours: tell us when you book which language you prefer. Not sure which route fits? Try our tour finder.

Rice and noodles are on the Uzbek table too, cooked in their own way. Plov is rice cooked in a cauldron with meat, carrots and onions, a midday dish; lagman is hand-pulled noodles with meat and vegetables. Every meal comes with non, the round bread from the clay tandir oven, and green tea poured into small bowls. What to order is in our guide to Uzbek cuisine.

The cooking is built around meat, mostly lamb and beef, so vegetarians need to ask; our guide to eating vegetarian in Uzbekistan has the words to order with. Most meat here is halal; for the details, and for prayer times on the road, see our Malaysia and Indonesia guide. Tell us about your food requirements when you book, and we take them into account when we plan the meals. Drink bottled water, which is sold everywhere.