The WHS of “Khiva” is more properly titled the “Itchan Kala” (or Ichon Qala or Ichan-kala) which refers specifically to the old walled town of the Khiva Oasis. The town is very heavily restored and operates virtually as an open air museum in its own right. Indeed the main gate holds a ticket office where entrance fees and camera charges are paid. Locals do live inside and it is possible to “enter” from other gates – but you will not get into the museums without a ticket.

Many of the buildings inside the walls are museums and, when one has added the tourist shops, the carpet factories and the hotels (The Hotel Khiva is an old meddressa and worth a visit even if you are not staying), there is not a great deal else. There is an obligatory “genuine” Bactrian camel for being photographed with and there are sellers of furry Uzbek hats for being photographed with! Yet Khiva in my opinion transcends all this and is “worth the journey” for the chance to experience, an albeit restored, Central Asian walled city. We particularly liked wandering around in the quiet of the evening and sunset is very fine when taken from a high place such as the Islom Huja minaret.

Your ticket entitles you to a bewildering array of entrances but not amazingly to 1 major highlight, the viewing platform in/above the Ark, which should NOT be missed (at relatively small extra cost)as it gives the best view over the whole town. A guide is well worth having (and I don’t often say that!). Many of the museums are tired left-overs from Soviet days and can be given merely a very quick “once over”, but even these can hold surprises. In one history museum we found a room praising “Khorezm”, a mighty state in the 10th -14th centuries, and now split between Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan by Stalin’s arbitrary borders and just a province in Uzbekistan. Talking to the guide we began to get a feeling for his loyalty to the concept of “Khorezm” and through that for the tribalism and nationalisms within Uzbekistan and Central Asia (A bit further north the province of “Karakalpakstan” is autonomous within Uzbekistan –albeit totally environmentally ruined by the Aral Sea disaster)