Not a whole lot to say about today’s ride. It was in the flat desert with limited visibility and into a headwind, not much else to say about it. The desert was sandy but marram grass or something like it had been planted alongside the road to prevent the sand from blowing out into it.  
This morning we saw our first Bactrian camels, the shaggy-furred two humped cousin if the single humped camels we’d seen in Iran and Pakistan. Spotting them provided a bit of excitement in an otherwise uneventful morning.

  
We passed nothing most of the day. At lunch we took shelter under the large solar panels of a cell tower and ate instant noodles.

  
  
More desolate desert riding after lunch and eventually we came across a police checkpost that signalled the return of civilisation. After the checkpost a long avenue lined with trees where serious irrigation attempted to repel the desert. A petrol station was the first shop we passed since yesterday and we bought cold drinks and tested outside a while.

  
We pulled into Niya, another surprisingly large and well developed town and found a noodle place for dinner. In the vanishing light we rolled out of town into the irrigated belt which surrounded the town. We pulled off the main road onto a dirt track until we found a disused field to set up camp.