Kashgar

The city has traditionally been embroiled in the term 'the great game', coined by British intelligence officer, explorer and writer Arthur Conolly to describe tensions between the British and Russian Empires over Central Asia in the 19th century.

It is no wonder the place has been given a Bond-like espionage tag, being Chinese but so close to the borders of Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, with Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Russia not a million miles away.

And so we involved ourselves in our own great games, as we negotiated over camping equipment, made clandestine meetings with the local money changer, and fought hard with several so-called travel companies for the best price to transport us to the Irkeshtam Pass to cross the Kyrgyz border.

In the end I joined forces with two Bulgarians who were crossing on the same day, and booked a minibus thus reducing the price for all four of us, and we had heard the bus was a troublesome 22-hour journey to Osh. We had agreed to set off at 6am to avoid the lunchtime rush.

We got through the Chinese side easily and were put on Chinese trucks for the five miles of no man's land as walking is not permitted.

We had not realised that the border shut between 11am and 2pm. The Bulgars were left at the Chinese side for this period but Pauline and I were already moving with our friendly driver, who had motorcycles as his load and agreed to take us all the way to Osh for nothing.

Then it all went very very strange.