The palace complex, built in 1871, occupied a total area of four acres with a foundation three metres thick. It was constructed with a high portal, a highly decorated large entrance arch, and four minarets. Surrounded by a carved stone wall, the palace consisted of seven courtyards and one hundred and nineteen rooms. The inscription above the main gate reads: "Great Seyed Mohammad Khudayar Khan".

Kokand’s most impressive mosque, built by Umar Khan in 1812, is centred on a 22m minaret and includes a colourful 100m-long aivan (portico) supported by 98 red-wood columns brought from India. The entire complex has reverted to its former Soviet guise as a museum of applied art, with one room housing a collection of suzani and ceramics from the region. A small workshop on-site makes delicious pistachio-flavoured halva (fudge-like sweet).

The Bolsheviks closed the 1799 Narbutabey Medressa, but it opened after independence only to have Karimov shut it down again in 2008. Visitors can visit the mosque (with its original ceiling), which Stalin reopened to win wartime support from Muslim subjects, as well the non-working medressa (now named the Mir Medressa).

Colourful Bazaar of Kokand

Afternoon transfer to Koand Train station for ride back to Tashkent