Into Karakalpakstan for the day: the Savitsky Museum in Nukus — the world's second-largest collection of Russian avant-garde art — with the ancient Chilpik tower of silence and the Mizdakhan necropolis on the way.
Estimated price — availability and the final quote are confirmed by our team. No payment is taken on this page.
Private tour — price per person depends on group size:
| 1 traveler | $140 / person |
| 2 travelers | $85 / person |
| 3 travelers | $65 / person |
| 4 travelers | $55 / person |
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West of Khiva lies Karakalpakstan, a different Uzbekistan — flatter, emptier, and home to one of the most surprising art collections in the world.
The Savitsky Museum in Nukus holds the second-largest collection of Russian and Soviet avant-garde art anywhere, saved from destruction under Stalin by Igor Savitsky and hidden in this far corner of the country. Around it, the day takes in the Chilpik dakhma — a two-thousand-year-old Zoroastrian tower of silence on a hill above the Amu Darya — and the vast Mizdakhan necropolis, a city of the dead layered over many centuries.
It is a long day out of Khiva and back, about 180 km each way, and a complete change of subject from the Silk Road monuments — art, faith and the Karakalpak land.
Pickup and the drive west across Karakalpakstan towards the Amu Darya and Nukus.
A ring of ancient mud-brick wall on a hill above the Amu Darya: Chilpik is a Zoroastrian dakhma, roughly two thousand years old, where the dead were once left exposed to the sky. A short climb gives sweeping views over the delta.
The Savitsky Museum: the second-largest collection of Russian and Soviet avant-garde art in the world, gathered and protected by Igor Savitsky far from Moscow's reach, alongside Karakalpak folk art and archaeology. Give it time — this is the highlight.
A break for lunch in Nukus before starting back.
A hillside covered in tombs and mausoleums spanning many centuries, beside the ruins of the ancient Gyaur-Kala fortress — one of the oldest and most atmospheric burial grounds in Central Asia.
The return across Karakalpakstan, arriving in Khiva in the evening.
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The same museum plus the Aral Sea ship graveyard at Moynaq.
