Kokand
Kokand (also Khoqand, Quqon or Qo'qon) is a city on the southwestern edge of the Ferghana Valley in Uzbekistan. Population was about 200,000 as of 1999.
Understand
Kokand is a trading city on the Silk Road, at a junction where a route going north to Tashkent branches off the main trail from Samarkand through the Ferghana Valley and over a pass to Kashgar. It has existed for at least a thousand years.
The city's glory days were 1709-1876 when it ruled the Kokand Kanate, which included parts of what are now four countries. The Russians put an end to that. Yakub Beg, who was born near Kokand and started his career in the Khan's army, built a kingdom around Kashgar and ruled much of what is now Xinjiang in the late 19th century, but Chinese forces ended that.
Get in
By train
Uzbek Railways operates daily trains from Tashkent, additionally there are 1-2 services per week from Moscow.
- 🌍 Kokand railway station.
By bus
- 🌍 Bus Station.
See
At one time, Kokand had over 300 mosques; some of those survive.
- 🌍 Palace of Khudayar Khan. Only nineteen of the palace's original 113 rooms survive; they are now a museum.
- 🌍 Khamza Museum. dedicated to Kokand’s Soviet poet and hero Hamza Hakimzade Niyazi.
- 🌍 Khamza House Museum.
- 🌍 Mukimi Museum.
- 🌍 Jummi Mosque. The Jummi Mosque, built 1800-1812, is large enough to hold 10,000 worshippers.
- 🌍 Amin Bag Madrassah. Built in 1830 and restored in 1913, the madrassah was closed under the Soviets and reopened in 1991. A carved wooden gate leads to the main courtyard with colored tiled walls
- 🌍 Dasturkhanci Madrassah.
- 🌍 Narbutabey Madrassah.
- 🌍 Modar-I-Khan Mausoleum.
- 🌍 Dakhma-i-Shakhon.
Buy
- 🌍 Kokand Bazaar.
- 🌍 Rishton Ceramics Factory, in the town of Rishton (Half-way between Kokand and Ferghana). The Rishton factory is famed for its blue and green ceramics. Decorative plates, tea-sets with floral design are sold to visitors. However such items are not hand-made. Modern machinery is used in the production process.
Sleep
- 🌍 Hotel Istiqlol, ☏ +998 91 140 80 00.
- 🌍 Hotel Khan, 31, Istiqlol Kuchasi.
- 🌍 Kokand City Hotel, Imam Ismail Buchari Kuchasi (near Nabiyev Cinema), ☏ +998 95 400 40 81.
- 🌍 Dangara Hotel, Tashkent Street 70 (Opposite Dangara bus stop.), ☏ +998 73 503 80 04. Comfortable Motel located 5 km from the city center. Outdoor swimming pool and sauna $46 per night (2016).