Registration in Uzbekistan - old system [archive]

[mcclelk]

Hi,
I am going to be cycling across Uzbekistan this summer and I have a few questions about registration/accomodation.
1. Do you need to register/have accommodation every day in the Fergana valley?
2. Is there any registered accommodation in Jizzakh or between the Oybek border and Samarkand?
3. Is there any accomodation between Bukhara and Khiva/Urgench because this leg will pose the biggest problem if I need to register every 72 hours?
4. Will yurt camps (e.g. the one in Ayaz Qala) be able to register me?
I love this site and would really appreciate the help!

[steven]

1. Once every 3 days is enough.
2. Probably yes.
3. I would not worry about it too much. You can say you are cycling and that there was no accommodation available. It is a valid argument. In general, my opinion (disclaimer: this is just my opinion, I take no responsibility for whatever happens to you) is that it is good to make an effort to take accommodation here and there, but if you miss a few, you can explain them away. Couchsurfing is risky (for your host mostly) but camping and cycling is understood. Show a bunch of slips at the border, mostly they just check the last ones, and you're off.
4. Good question, I will have to check. I think so though.

[andyoxus]

I cycled across Uzbekistan this summer, though not Fergana (I continued to the Pamir Highway). A guy called James Finnerty was a couple of months ahead of me and did go via Fergana; he kept an interesting, quite detailed blog. The most relevant entry is probably this one:

https://jamesftravel.wordpress.com/2014 ... 898-total/

Regarding your questions:

1. James is pretty adamant that registration is needed for every day in Fergana
2. See the blog post above
3. The ride from Khiva to Bukhara took me four days (mid-June - way too hot), and we didn't find anywhere to register. However, when we explained our issue to the place we were staying in Bukhara, they "helped us out" and covered the one day we were missing to obey the 72-hour rule. As Steve says, you should be able to explain away missing registration, but peace of mind is worth quite a lot. We exited at the Denau/Tursunzoda border and they didn't even look at our slips or baggage. But I heard two separate well-verified stories of people being put under house arrest trying to exit Uzbekistan at that border for having undocumented medication. Absolutely insane. If I went back, I'd make damn sure my paperwork was in order.

Andy

[steven]

Thanks Andy, I was not aware of the Ferghana rule.

[mcsmoggle]

I had a similar experience of not having my slips checked when exiting at the Dashogas/Shavat border crossing, entering at the Farab crossing and maybe Tashkent airport too, the other 6 in my group didn't think theirs were scrutinized either. However, all the advice states to carry your registration slips with you so I wouldn't want to risk too many gaps - some hotels may help out by providing extra slips but I wouldn't count on this.

[steven]

Definitely don't ask hotels to fill in extra dates! Lots of things can go wrong with that, I remember 2 guys got reported by the hotel staff trying that, ended up in custody and later deported.

[andyoxus]

By the way, since we needed quite a lot of time in Uzbekistan, and we weren't sure within a week or two when we'd arrive, we tried to apply for a 3-month visa in London, which the embassy web-site implied was available. However, at the embassy we were told that a 3-month visa wouldn't be possible, but that since we were travelling by bicycle we could have a 30-day visa valid for a 60-day window (much like some Kazakh visas), something that we didn't know existed:

[Lucie et Pierre]

Hi !
We just spent three weeks cycling in ouzbekistan from Boukhara to Andijan, crossing Ferghana valley.
We registered in hotels two times in Boukhara and Samarkand, and nobody never asked us any card of registration, neither at police checkpoints, nore at the border in osh.
At the beginning, we went to the ovir of Navoy to ask how to register if we camp. The officier said us that we could not register if we had no adress but that was ok. We had his phone number in case of problem but we didn't need it.
That is our experience !
Lucie

[steven]

Great to hear it, I also found border police quite relaxed when I last visited Uzbekistan (April-May 2015). I have to continue to write on the website that people should be careful, since not everyone has the same experience. But for now, border police and cyclists seem to get along great.

[Jasper en Mette]

Hi There,

We are planning to travel through Uzbekistan for a week or two. with our own-European-camperbus.hotel
Supposedly, registering at least every 3 night is needed to avoid trouble.
We are on a tight budget so we don't want to sleep in hotels all the time.
Is it easy to find OVIR offices on the road by yourself or is it a real hassle to do this? we don't speak Russian so i guess that won't help either..
Will the cheaper hostels also register you?
Any comments and suggestions are welcome!

Regards,

Jasper and Mette