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Cyclists killed in Tajikistan described ‘dream’ trip
DUSHANBE, Tajikistan, July 31, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Cyclists from Europe and
the US who were killed in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group in
Tajikistan had described their trip as a “dream come true”.
The victims were Jay Austin and Lauren Munoz from the US, Rene Wokke from
the Netherlands and Markus Hummel from Switzerland, according to Tajik
authorities.
Each of the travellers had a blog to document journeys that took them to
the Pamir Highway, a Soviet-era road stretching across 2,000 kilometres
(1,240 miles) which runs near the border with Afghanistan and has spectacular
views.
The Americans explained on their blog SimplyCycling that they had “decided
to quit our jobs and bike around the world”.
The pair had travelled through Africa and Europe before flying to
Kazakhstan in May.
The posts on the site and on their Instagram account broke off as they
ventured into mountainous Tajikistan, the poorest of the former Soviet
states.
“Tajikistan is a tough place to cycle. It is cold and windy and mountainous
and, most of all, very, very high,” Austin wrote a week ago.
“Really glad I did it. No need to ever do it again,” he said of crossing a
Tajik mountain pass at a height of 4,655 metres with thin air and
intermittent snow.
Austin had been featured in the Washington Post in 2015 as one of those
following a “tiny house” trend and downsizing his daily life to essentials.
– ‘Beautiful, kind people’ –
On Sunday, a car mowed into the group of seven cyclists, two of whom were
injured while another was left unscathed.
The riders were attacked by a gang armed with knives and guns in a highly
unusual incident that Tajikistan has said was organised by a member of an
opposition Islamist party.
Dutch victim Wokke, a 56-year-old psychologist, was cycling with his
partner Kim Postma, a 58-year-old hospital administrator, who was injured in
the incident.
The website of Dutch newspaper NRC said the couple were travelling from
Bangkok to Tehran and chose to go through Tajikistan to avoid the dangers of
Afghanistan.
Wokke was a very experienced traveller and had visited more than 130
countries, according to his brother, Erik.
The pair, from Amsterdam, had left Thailand in February and planned to
arrive in Tehran in September before flying back to the Netherlands.
Wokke and Postma described the Pamir Highway on their blog as “the ultimate
challenge of this trip”.
Victim Markus Hummel also kept an online record of the journey with Swiss
national Marie-Claire Diemand who was injured in the attack.
In a blog entry entitled “A dream comes true”, they explained that they
were travelling along the Silk Road from Xi’an in China to Kyrgyzstan.
“Since we are already on the road, we definitely don’t want to miss the
Pamir Highway in Tajikistan,” the pair said.
Their last entry was on July 25 when the whole group was staying in the
Tajik town of Khorugh, after adventures including their tent filling with
drifts of sand.
They said that, on the highway, “we enjoy the silence, the dreamlike
landscape and look at the Pamir River and the Afghan side of the valley all
day long.”
Friends and well-wishers posted messages of condolences on the American
victims’ SimplyCyling Instagram page.
One, Robert Renner, wrote: “My condolences to the family and friends of Jay
and Lauren.”
Another, Angela Wuerth, wrote: “I’m so sad that something so tragic could
happen to such beautiful, kind people.”
BSS/AFP/MRI/2244 hrs