Tashkent

Tashkent is the largest city of Central Asia and the hub of modern Uzbekistan. Rebuilt after the 1966 earthquake, it combines broad avenues and parks with older quarters around the Hast-Imam complex, whose library keeps the 7th-century Uthman Quran, one of the oldest in the world.

Under the blue dome of Chorsu Bazaar spices, bread and dried fruit pile up as they have for centuries, and the metro stations are decorated like palaces. From Tashkent the Afrosiyob high-speed train reaches Samarkand in about two hours.