I bring some updates from different countries:
- Romanian 4th season will premiere next September. They have followed the Emperor's Route across Turkey, Georgia, Jordan and Israel. Filming took place from May to July. Originally it was planned to visit Azerbaijan too, but it is not confirmed why they finally skipped it form the route. Maybe due to covid or to war situation with Armenia?
- French 15th season has been selecting the contestants and the uzbek national news agency reported that the show will film 4 episodes next September visiting Nukus, Khiva, Bukhara, Samarkand, Tashkent, Kokand and Namangan. It is unknown which countries will also be visited, but I guess we can confirm that the route followed is inspired by the legendary Silk route. If I had to bet, I would choose Kyrgyzstan for sure and probably Kazakhstan as the next steps, but we will see. Tomorrow filming begins in Kyrgyzstan, where they will be travelling until 2 September filming 2 episodes. Then, they will cross Uzbekistan filming 4 stages before flying to Jordan and Dubai, where the route will end as it was originally planned last season before they were forced to change the route when all the pandemic crazyness began.
- Italian 9th season is also getting ready for production this Autumn (it is said that they will film between September and October) and they will do in a new channel, Sky Italy, after 8 season in the public broadcaster RaiDue changing the show's name from Pechino Express to Pekin Express. It is confirmed that the route will cross the Middle East, and reports say that it will be though Israel, Jordan and Dubai.
- Czech broadcaster TV Nova is preparing its first season under the title of Asijský Expres. The casting process is now open. They plan to follow the Dragon Route (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand), filming will depend on the Covid situation in SE Asia.
- Greek channels Ant1 and Star seem to be fighting to get the rights to air the first season in the Hellenic Republic. National media said that the idea is to air the show in the second half of the season, Spring 2022 maybe?