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Near the town of Cholpon Ata lies some ancient petroglyphs right next to the runway of former airport built during Soviet times and is apparently not operating. Not really that fascinating but since were there we stopped by to look. Then drove to a resort complex on the shores of Issyk Kol lake called Raduga in the small village of Sary-Oi, it is off season and the weather is crap, cloudy and rain in the forecast, it seems like we're the only people in the resort. We stayed the night here and was served plov and salads for dinner but can't ask for a second serving coz their food is quite limited which pissed off a number of people but we are far away from the town we cant really get out to eat out. The place is huge and the accomodation is alright, they have all the amenities of a modern resort, It rained that night and as we prepare to leave for the outskirts of Bishkek i have a feeling it will be a wet camping at the Ala archa gorge where we are going next. We had lunch in the outskirts of Bishkek then casually drove into
Kazakhstan and back, because we can! There is a strip of land that is just between two bridges in the Kyrgyz side so we briefly stopped there and some people changed money for souvenirs, Chris pissed on Kazakh soil and Thomas had an ice cream. We decided it will be too wet to camp so we booked into Lake Issyk Kol hotel for the night in Bishkek. An old Soviet style accomodation, it is amazing how it still exists, old phones and furnitures, an ancient elevator, old style plumbing it actually feels like going back in time. We went to town for dinner but we could not get in to the indian restaurant we hoped to eat at so we ended up in a crap Lebanese restaurant, when we got back a few people including me had one too many drinks of vodka in the truck, got wasted but thankfully no bad hangover. The next day we tried again to camp at Ala Archa gorge but it was raining in the mountain when we got there and is too foggy to even see the scenery so we went back to the old Soviet hotel. oh yeah we also visited a
place called Barana.
Anyway the next day we checked in to our hotel in the middle of the city called Asia Mountains and it is superb! It is raining in Bishkek which really sucks, nothing really interesting to do except internetting, and when the sky clears up you can see the gorgeous mountains surrounding the city, had a walk around the city but did not take lots of photo. Went to a department store called ZUM and bought a Kyrgyzstan shirt souvenir for my nephew Jacob and me. The night before we hoped to watch the match between Man United and Chelsea but we could not find a bar that shows the match, the American Pub/Metro Bar and grill place we went for dinner one night did not offer it so the group got separated and me Claire and Toni ended up in a place called New York Pizza which was great, and for the 2nd consecutive night had a T bone steak, not the best but good enough to satisfy my craving for western food, too much sashylik made me crave for anything but. Tomorrow we leave the city and try to get as close to the
Chinese border which we shall cross in a couple of days. we will stop again at Kochkor then bush camp the next night.
Bishkek (Бишкек) is the capital of Kyrgyzstan. It has population of approximately 900,000 (2005). Originally founded in 1878 as the Russian fortress of Pishpek (Пишпек), between 1926 and 1991 it was known as Frunze (Фрунзе), after the Bolshevik military leader Mikhail Frunze. The name is thought to derive from a Kyrgyz word for a churn used to make fermented mare's milk (kumis), the Kyrgyz national drink.
Bishkek, at 42°52′29″N, 74°36′44″E, is situated at about 800 m altitude just off the northern fringe of the Ala-Too range, an extension of the Tien Shan mountain range, which rises up to 4,800 m and provides a spectacular backdrop to the city. North of the city, a fertile and gently undulating steppe extends far north into neighboring Kazakhstan. The Chui river drains most of the area. Bishkek is connected to the Turkestan-Siberia Railway by a spur.
Bishkek is a city of wide boulevards and marble-faced public buildings combined with numerous Soviet-style apartment blocks surrounding interior courtyards and, especially outside the city center, thousands of smaller, often privately
built houses. It is laid out on a grid pattern, with most streets flanked on both sides by narrow irrigation channels that water the innumerable trees which provide shade in the hot summers.
Following the breakup of the Soviet Union, Kyrgyzstan achieved independence in 1991, and the city was renamed Bishkek. Today, it is a vibrant, rapidly modernizing city, with many restaurants and cafes and lots of second-hand European and Japanese cars and minibuses crowding its streets. It is also the country's financial center, with all of the country's 21 commercial banks featuring offices in the city. During the Soviet era the city was home to a large number of industrial plants, but most have been shut down or operate today on a much reduced scale. Bishkek was also home to a major Soviet military pilot training school; one of its students, Hosni Mubarak, later became president of Egypt.
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