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Published: October 18th 2006
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Kyrgyz man on a donkey
This, believe it or not is quite a normal sight. We have spent the last 3 weeks loving Kyrgyzstan. We are now back in Osh, where we wrote the last blog, after a trip covering some of the most beautiful spots in this country.
Osh is the southern capital and is heavily influenced by the large Uzbek population who live here. Ramadan has been an interesting time to be here, with the Mosques busy and people observing the fasting.
Kyrgyzstan attracts a small but growing number of travellers, and we soon hooked up with a few like-minded people to explore.
Our first stop was the appropriately named Arslanbob (see below). This small Uzbek village in the heart of the Fergana Valley, was 3 eventful bus journeys away from Osh, passing through Jalalabad, and Bazaar Korgan. One of the bus conductors regailed us with stories of his prize-fighting days and also his 3/4 wives. He only later pointed out to us monogamous westerners that his father had had 21!!! He was a great character and a perfect example of the friendly outward going Kyrgyzs we were to meet along the way. In Kyrgyzstan "homestays" are a common form of accommodation with local people offering space in their houses to
tourists for a small fee. In Arslanbob we quickly settled in to our homestay with our larger than life host Israel and his many children. The house was lovely and was set in a small orchard with the best apples we have ever tasted.
We set out the next day as a group of 6 on a 3-day trek to the Holy Lake, an alpine lake in the mountains. The first day was a gruelling uphill walk made worse by the poor maps and equally bad navigation. We decided to camp the first night just short of our desired destination - the Holy Rock. Little did we know that this would be the furthest most of us would get. During the day one of our group had started to feel poorly and took to his rather chilly bed, and then one by one over the next few hours others began showing similar symptoms. Carrie secumbed the next day - forcing a day of rest, and I followed suit the following day. Whilst the countryside was lovely and the views over the mountains and walnut forest spectacular, being ill at 3000m is no fun. We aborted the walk and struggled
...... Issyk-Kul Lake
Bit chilly round the proverbials home.
We convalesced at Israel's house, having to fight off his offers of food, but drinking vast amounts of tea. When we finally overcame the bug we had been in Arslanbob for nearly a week.
Next stop was to head for the Capital - Bishkek. This involved a 8hr shared taxi ride through the mountainous central region of the country. We passed nomadic yurts, hillside beekeepers and people living in ex-soviet railway carriages, and we got our first taste of snow!!!
Bishkek in the north of the country has a competely different feel, it has a large Russian population and in fact you are more likely to hear Russian than Kyrgyz spoken on the streets. Despite its large imposing soviet architecture it has a surprisingly european feel to it, with broad tree-lined avenues, parks and fashionable places to eat. However there is not a lot to hold the traveller and especially not us as we had a taste for more mountains.
We travelled east to the second largest alpine lake in the world Issyk-kul, to the town of Karakol. Here we did two separate things. Firstly we went to stay in a yurt owned by a
Kyrgyz man names Bukyt on the southern shore of the lake. We were made to feel very welcome and his hospitality was typically Kyrgyz. The yurt was snug and warm, although apparently the last yurt still standing in the whole of Kyrgyzstan as all the others had been packed up for winter. We were beginning to realise that we'd reached Kyrgyzstan just as winter was setting in.
The next day Bukyt took us to see a friend of his in the next town. Talgar is an eagle hunter (meaning he hunts using an eagle) and introduced us to Tamara his 3-year old golden eagle. This age old tradition is relatively rare now so we were lucky to get this chance. Tamara has a record of 5 rabbits and 8 foxes in three years which are good stats, however her owner cannot wait for her to be 5 years old when she will be strong enough to take her first wolf!!
We retraced our steps back to Karakol and prepared ourselves for a 4-day trek in the Tian Shan mountains. We had heard lots of stories of terrible weather and freezing cold nights but also of fantastic views. We
waited for a clear day and set off with a fellow Brit (Daniel), all armed with our woolies. The first day was a pleasant walk up the Karakol valley along a river, followed by a steep climb up into the snowline. That night we were lucky to find a log cabin to stay in, complete with a fireplace. The night was cold and in the morning we woke to find fresh snow had fallen - about a foot and a half of it!! We wrapped our feet in plastic bags, put on all our clothes and started the climb up to Ala-Kol lake. At this point we realised that the trekking season had indeed ended as the paths were now nearly impossible to follow.
As we got higher the views got better, we were blessed with another fine day and by about 4pm we had made it to the top of the valley and to the lake. When we stopped walking, it was absolutely freezing, so we quickly put up our tents on the snow, cooked and then went to bed and tried to sleep. At 3500m with a clear sky the temperatures must have been around -5 degrees.
Ala-Kol Lake
View from the pass - worth every knee -deep in snow step. We slept sporadically and were up early to get warm. When we woke we found our shoes had frozen rigid and were nearly impossible to squeeze into. In addition our socks, gloves and shoelaces were also frozen which made for an unpleasant start to the day.
We set off along the bank of lake climbing all the time towards the pass at 3860m. The views of the surrounding mountains and the lake were spectacular. The increasing altitude made it harder as we approached the top. We finally reached the pass in time for lunch which we had certainly earned. As we ate our sandwiches we contemplated our next move, a vertical drop off that had become known to us as the "Great Ice Wall of Death". This 300m wall of ice and snow was our only route into the next valley. After buoying ourselves up there was nothing else to do but to step over the edge. Our tentative first steps found us waist deep in fresh snow but we soon realised that we were perfectly safe as we could not have fallen even if we had wanted to. The descent was a great experience and before we knew
it we were in the bottom of the valley following the river through the snow.
The rest of the trek was a bit of an anti-climax with a simple descent to the small village of Altyn Arashan. Night fell before we had reached our destination so we camped under and enormous pine and cooked dinner by moonlight.
The follwoing day we had a simple walk down to the village and to the hot springs. We soaked away all our aches and pains in the pools before completing the final leg of the walk back to civilisation. We made use of a passing donkey and cart, returning from the hills with a load of firewood. It had been quite a walk and fair play to Daniel who had done the whole thing in a pair of fake Nikes and a couple of vests!!
We took a day to recover before heading back to Bishkek and then on to Osh.
We obviously don't know what your ideas about Central Asia are, but Kyrgyzstan has been a surprising treat for us. We hadn't planned to come here but had heard good things about it en route. We had no
pre-conceptions but the scenery and in particular the mountains have surpassed all out expectations. We are sure that Central Asia is soon to become a tourist hotspot and just hope that Kyrgyzstan can continue to maintain its levels and commitment to sustainable community based tourism.
We have only 2 countries to go until we fly home so our minds are slowly turning to our return however with both Pakistan and India on the horizon we still have plenty in store.
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