Tadjikistan

Tadjikistan is a mountainous landlocked country that saw very few visitors during the 20th century when it was a Soviet Republic, and even less when independence in 1991 led to a disastrous civil war that finally ended in 1997. Since then travellers have begun to return, tracing parts of the route Marco Polo took across the Pamir Plateau on his way to the court of Kublai Khan.

The scenery here is magnificent with Ismoil Somoni peak at 7,495 m the highest in the country (and the former Soviet Union). The country has been continuously inhabited for over 4,000 years from when Aryan nomads settled and the Tadjik language is a variant of Persian.