Most Inspirational Moment
A lot to choose from, but the desert fortresses were much better than I'd expected (monumental in a desert landscape) and the silence and brilliant skies and solitude of the yurt camp were to be savoured. The blue tiled architecture is fantastic against a blue sky - the photographers in our group had a field day. There's a lot of history here and very little evidence of the nastier sides of the regime picked up on in pre-holiday reading (no soldiers/tanks etc).
Thoughts on Group Leader
I think we may have been both lucky and unlucky here. Our leader had excellent knowledge (mentioned by name in the Lonely Planet guide) but wasn't used to leading groups - she'd been given the gig at the last moment and was struggling with it a bit e.g. there was never a welcome meeting as she felt uncomfortable with holding one, but that meant she never really found out the temperature of the group and what it wanted. As a group we needed more advice on places to eat and she didn't seem to acknolwedge that lunch existed! Pretty clear she wasn't one of the usual leaders though so probably (?) not representative. It didn't spoil the holiday but was a frustration for some.
Advice for Potential Travellers
Veggies really should stock up on supplies or reconsider Uzbekistan, it is a concept that doesn't really compute! Otherwise, just the usual safety stuff - no one on our trip was affected by tummy troubles, but we were all taking sensible precuations, and take plenty of entertainment for the long road trips.