About Gulom
About Me – Your Driver and Travel Organizer on the Silk Road
Hello and welcome to My Silk Way Trips! My name is Gulom, and I am based in the historic city of Samarkand, Uzbekistan — one of the most legendary crossroads of the ancient Silk Road. I am a professional driver and travel organizer specializing in comfortable private journeys across Uzbekistan and Central Asia. My mission is simple: to help travelers explore this fascinating region safely, smoothly, and authentically while feeling relaxed and well taken care of throughout their journey.
Unlike a traditional tour guide, my role focuses on what many travelers value most — reliable transportation, thoughtful travel planning, and local support from someone who truly understands the region. With years of experience driving international guests, I organize personalized routes and provide private transportation connecting the great Silk Road cities and remote destinations that are often difficult to reach independently.
I offer travel services throughout Uzbekistan, including Samarkand, Tashkent, Bukhara, Khiva, Nukus, Shakhrisabz, Kokand, and the southern historical region of Termez. Each journey is carefully planned according to your schedule, interests, and travel style. Whether you want a cultural discovery tour, a relaxed scenic journey, or a multi-country adventure, I help design an itinerary that fits your expectations while ensuring efficient logistics and comfortable travel.
One of my specialties is long-distance travel across Central Asia. I regularly organize and drive cross-border routes, including trips between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Mountain roads, border procedures, and regional travel details can be challenging for visitors, but my experience allows travelers to move confidently and stress-free. I assist with planning routes, timing border crossings, and coordinating transportation so your journey remains smooth from start to finish.
Traveling by private car offers freedom and flexibility that group tours cannot provide. You can stop for photos, visit local markets, explore small villages, or enjoy unexpected discoveries along the way. Many of the most memorable Silk Road experiences happen between cities — in landscapes, roadside cafés, and authentic local encounters — and I make sure you have the time and comfort to enjoy them.
Safety, punctuality, and hospitality are my top priorities. Uzbek culture is famous for welcoming guests warmly, and I try to reflect this tradition in every trip I organize. My vehicle is clean, comfortable, and suitable for long journeys, allowing travelers to relax while discovering the region’s history and natural beauty. I work with trusted local partners, hotels, and guides when professional guiding services are needed, so you receive a complete and well-organized travel experience.
Over the years, I have met travelers from many different countries and cultures. Each journey is unique, and I enjoy helping visitors experience Central Asia not only through famous monuments but also through everyday life — local food, traditions, landscapes, and genuine human connections. My goal is to make your trip feel easy, personal, and memorable.
The Silk Road has connected people and civilizations for thousands of years, and today it continues to inspire travelers seeking history, culture, and adventure. Whether you are planning a classic Uzbekistan itinerary or a broader Central Asian journey, I am here to help you travel comfortably and confidently.
I look forward to welcoming you to Uzbekistan and driving you along the unforgettable roads of the Silk Road.
Reviews
★★★★
Punctual and friendly. Tries to communicate in English. Good knowledge about tourist places in Tashkent and Samarkand for other places it is so so. There was a chaos from Samarkand to Bukhara travel - somehow got managed but was stressful. Overall okay experience.
★★★★★
"My family and I spent a couple of days with Gulom in the Fergana Valley and had the chance to enjoy some fascinating conversations. Gulom is a reliable guide and a very pleasant person.
Over the following days, we also had the opportunity to meet his wonderful family and have dinner at his home in a truly genuine and warm atmosphere... A really unique experience that I highly recommend to everyone."
We spent a very meaningful few days with Marco and his family, they became media heroes in the Rishton district.
★★★★★
Gulom is the best. Both experience with him and his help during the trip were kind, warm and precise. We are very happy. VODKA TIME!!
We had a wonderful day with Luca and his friends, they are nature lovers.
★★★★
Gulom was friendly and eager to help. We arranged a car transfer with him and 4 train tickets. The car transfer and three of the tickets were arranged well. The last train ticket was not booked quickly/ correctly and instead of a daytime train we had to take a later train arriving in the dark, not what we wanted. This change was not communicated until we were handed the tickets in Uzbekistan. We were also not informed of an additional $20 admin fee above what was agreed until asked for the payment on arrival in Uzbekistan. Both these aspects were disappointing
David was very attentive and organized.
★★★★★
Golum and his team are excellent and safe drivers, who provide a lot of information on the history, the people, the agricultural and industrial processes, the daily life and the cultural aspects of their marvelous country.
All of them speak various languages, Golum besides English also very fluently German. He invited us to a family celebration where we were welcome like relatives.
Golum and his brother Ilxom helped us when I had a severe accident on the penultimate day of our trip in Samarkand.
Going with Golum is equivalent to leaning back and enjoying your journey.
Thank you!
Petra and Gesila were very cheerful girls
They appreciated animals
I was surprised that Petra liked donkeys
Welcome again
★★★★★
Gulom was very eager to help and provided a wonderful trip experience in Uzbekistan. He was keen to offer several activities to ensure I had a good trip and communicated very well in the lead up to our booking, giving me faith in his enthusiasm for the journey.
J
★★
To be totally honest, Gulom is not a bad driver: he gets you to places on time and on time.
However, it made me go through two somewhat uncomfortable situations during the transfers:
1) When he picked me up at the airport, he made me pay for parking the vehicle. I find this unacceptable; the price included all expenses.
2) When we arrived in Samarkand, he told me he had to take his car to the garage because it had broken down and I had to pay for the appointment we had arranged. When he told me he had to take the car to the garage, he asked if I had any money, and that euros would also be fine. A completely awkward situation.
Regarding the price and payment of services, I am obliged to point out the following:
1) The 10% deposit I had already paid to IndyGuide was not deducted from the total price. Other guides do deduct this.
2) 2) When I paid him in cash, I gave him an extra 8 euros. He later demanded 80,000 som, equivalent to about 5-6 euros, for a shower service he had paid for. An honest person wouldn't ask me for that amount in som after I had given him an additional 8 euros.
3) He hosted me at his home for the modest price of $55 USD, including transportation to Samarkand from his village. I strongly recommend not accepting this offer, as you can find a good hotel in Samarkand for that price. His bathroom is a traditional type and does not have a shower.
4) His car broke down, which is understandable. However, he couldn't give me the tour in Samarkand as we had arranged, and he never deducted this from the price.
Finally, I must say that yes, he completed the transfers on time. However, there are more optimal options on this platform.
★★★★★
Gulom is a reliable and professional driver.
He arranged a customized trip for us from Bukhara to Aydar Lake and then to Samarkand. Throughout the journey, he was punctual, flexible, and drove very safely.
We especially appreciated that he showed us ancient rock carvings in the Navoiy region along the way.
It was a long journey, but we felt comfortable and safe the entire time.
I strongly recommend him to anyone planning a trip in Uzbekistan!
★★★★
Nous avons fait plusieurs transferts et excursions avec Gulom. Toujours disponible et sympa il vous expliquera mille choses sur son pays et son histoire. À l'écoute, toujours prêt à aider et rendre service. On recommande vivement.
Merci Gulom!
★★★★★
Gulom was a knowledgable and perfectly pleasant guide. He was resourceful and listened to my requests. We spent a few days walking around the Nurota mountains.
★★★★★
Gulom picked us up on time and for a very reasonable price. He drove well and I felt safe in his car. Thanks for the lift Gulom!
★★★★
Gulom was on time, polite, and friendly. However, his English is minimal, and during the tour I expected him to share some information about the places along the route or about his country in general. This was clearly lacking.
★
The afternoon before the tour, Gulom let us know he was in another city and would be sending his brother who would "speak through Google Translate". This came as a total surprise to us as we had booked a tour, not a transfer. He said a guide would cost $90 according to tour notes that I was never given and that I hadn't reserved a guide.
When I challenged him saying I had booked a tour, not a transfer, he eventually agreed to return for the other city that night so we could start the tour, but I was afraid that would be unsafe since he wouldn't be able to get much sleep before our day-long tour that included 6 hours of driving.
Thank goodness for Indy Guide, we were able to find another guide on very short notice to do the tour instead and cancelled Gulom.
Be warned that what might not get what you bargain for.
★
Through Indyguide, it was agreed a guided trip to visit Gijduon, Sarmishsay petroglyphs, Nurota city and some of the villages in the Nurota Mountain including a morning hike on the second day. Some of the stops to visit additional interesting sites were proposed by the guide and he assure there was plenty time to do everything. At the end, we had a written agreed itinerary I recorded in Indyguide and used to pay the deposit.
This was not the cheaper tour offered not the most expensive and I read reviews all over Indiguide and about Indyguide. All the agreement was done in euros and to be paid when we meet in Bukhara. Once I paid the deposit, I asked for confirmation that we could pay in euros and it was confirmed we can indeed pay in euros. Mainly to know how much money we needed to change in the Uzbek bank I to sums.
We have a number of issues:
1. 2 days before the tour, the guide wanted to meet us and proceed to text us a number of times requesting early payments. We confirmed the payment of the remaining money will be done once we meet to start the tour.
2. The evening before the tour started, he texted us requesting the payment of 255 euros to be done exclusively in 100euros notes. Being this not possible as we were already in Bukhara and you have to specially request those in physical banks and not in cash machines. We had the money mainly in 50euros notes and planned to give the remaining money in sums.
3. Once the tour started, we were asked to put 300k sums towards the gas at a gas station.
4. The whole trip the guide tried to avoid stops even some he personally suggested when agreeing the trip. The insistence was such that to pacify the atmosphere we agree to a couple of them. We have to resist on the hike that was initially agreed to early the second day and he expected to change for a late afternoon (34 degree) hike and skip all villages visits agreed for that afternoon. Once of the middle of nowhere he wanted to push us to finish the tour after breakfast the second day instead of after lunch. Not the best conditions to negotiate with anyone as you can imagine.
5. This was supposed to be a guided tour, but this person drove us all the way to the petroglyphs of Sarmishsay to point at one petroglyphs up half way if a hill and say: “petroglyph there, you have 20 minutes. I wait here”. Every stop was exactly the same, here is this so go and see it for yourself. He drove in silence for hours, only talking when a way to shorten the trip came to his mind.
6. The tour ended the second day after a short 2h hike, when it was supposed to finish after the lunch. He made the village guide to cut the tour short, and at 11AM we were pretty much forced to depart for our hotel in Samarkand.
All in all, a very tense and unpleasant experience that we should have maybe cut even before we started. This felt like a scam and looking at it now, I can see this was a scam from the guide himself trying all the time to shorten the agreed tour, skipping places and give us the bare minimum.
The so-called guide name is Gulom, he is from Samarkhand.
I hope this review help people avoiding this scammer.
Good luck and enjoy Uzbekistan
★★★★★
Thanks to Gulom, our trip in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan was amazing. Great welcome and kind guides and drivers that brought us across two countries and who made our experience unique. Thanks again!
★★★★★
We first made a one day tour in Samarkand and after that an four day round trip in Tadjikistan
(Seven Lakes-Dushanbe-Khujand-Tashkent). Gulom was very reliable and answered all the questions very quickly as we were planning the trip. He's a very good driver, always arrived in time and we had a very safe feeling with him througout the whole trip. We had a russian speaking friend with us wich helped the communication. All in all, we had an unforgettable trip, enjoyed the dinner with Gulom's family and experienced beautiful views and interesting sights in Tadjikistan. I can warmly recommend Gulom as a driver.
★★★★★
Everything went as expected
★★★★★
Like many other tourists, we had chosen to see the cities of the Silk Road, Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkand and end our trip in Tashkent. We were looking for a driver who could provide transportation and immediately after we wrote our wishes on Indy Guide we received 5 offers from drivers or tour operators. Most of them offered tours in a specific area but could not offer transportation for the entire route and we saw it as an advantage to get a comprehensive offer. It turned out that Gulom was the one who could do it all. He organizes the tour and also sometimes take the work as a driver himself. He is not afraid of anything and accepted the challenge, and also at a good price. It turned out that we had made a good choice. In addition to intercity transfer, he was also able to suggest small interesting stops on the way where we saw things that are not in the guidebook. For example, he arranged a picnic in a mountain area, that we had not discovered, where you can see petroglyphs from the stone age. It was very interesting and made the time of driving feel much shorter. Gulom can answer most of the strange questions tourists ask and he has an exquisite sense of humor. Gulom always arrives at the agreed time, preferably a little earlier, and everything is as agreed. Gulom does everything to make the trip through Uzbekistan something you will never forget and we can definitely recommend him both as tour operator and driver.
I met Mr. Palle and his wife in Bukhara and said goodbye in Tashkent.
I miss them again, they gladly accepted all my offers
Thank you for everything
★★★★★
Everything went great overall, Gulom organized the trip and a driver for us and invited us for a great dinner at his house!
★★★★★
Gulom came to fetch us from the guesthouse on time. He arranged a driver to pick me up from the Tajikistan border. Although the driver couldn't speak English but he is very helpful. He help me with the money exchange and SIM card before embarked on a 3 days tour from Penjikent to Dushanbe. He duly followed the itinerary. Overall I'm satisfied with his service.
★★★★★
My friend and I were travelling to Uzbekistan, and we wanted to hire a driver for a one-day trip to Jade Lake near Tashkent. We were fortunate to meet Gulom, who assisted us in finding a driver for the trip. Although there was a slight misunderstanding during our conversation at the very beginning, everything worked out well in the end. Overall, it was a good trip and we enjoyed it. The price was also very reasonable.
★★★★★
Gulom was an excellent organiser and guide. He was approachable and helpful in organising our travel arrangements in Uzbekistan.
Gulom impressed us with his enthusiasm and knowledge which he freely shared and the meal at his home was a highlight we will long treasure.
Highly recommended, thanks Gulom.
★★★★★
I had a wonderful trip from Samarkand to Tajikistan with my driver and guide, Gulon. From the very beginning, he was professional, friendly, and incredibly attentive to my needs. He’s not only a very skilled and careful driver, but also someone who genuinely cares about his guest’s experience.
Gulon is full of enthusiasm and positive energy, which made every moment of the journey enjoyable. He always made sure I was comfortable and took the time to adapt the trip to my pace and interests.
Some of the most memorable parts of the trip were the beautiful hikes and adventures in the mountains and valleys of Tajikistan.
Thanks to Gulom, my journey felt safe, smooth, and truly special. I highly recommend Gulon to anyone looking for an unforgettable and well-organized trip in Central Asia!
★★★★★
Overall it is a good trip.
★★★★★
My plan was complex and long distance and Gulom did it all with good nature and a mind towards safety, especially in terms of the weather. He knew drivers in other areas too, for connections, which was really helpful. Plus, he kept in mind my interests and brought photographs to show me and arranged an interview with someone whose story would be helpful. I really appreciated his work.
★★★★★
Very kind person; everything was perfect
★★★★★
Gulom is very friendly and I feel lucky to have had him as our guide. He was very mindful of my vegetarian diet and took us to places that offered vegetarian options.
Not just for our scheduled destinations, but even after we parted ways, he kept following up and asking if I needed any help.
The best part was him inviting us to his home in Samarkand got a home cooked native lunch.
I hope more tourists find their way to Gulom and his every smiling face 😊
★★★★★
Our holiday with Gulom was great, he's a very good driver, kind and available for changes in the path and custom stops.
He showed us wonderful places, and the last day he invited us to meet his beautiful family.
I would definitely reccomend him!
Thanks Gulom :)
★★★★
Every thing ok. Gulom was very professional and kind.
★★★★
Don't have to leave me a review after misunderstanding and cancellation. I didn't ask to be pick up this morning and he still shows up. I appreciate the effort but he doesn't have to leave me a review since the tour was cancelled
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