Kyrgyzstan

Travel in Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyzstan is one of the most photogenic countries in the world. The following information and photos and travel diary below will help you organize a holiday in this beautiful nation outside the tourist circuits.
Kyrgyzstan is located in Central Asia, south of Kazakhstan. It was part of the Soviet Union, but for landscapes and for the population the proximity to China is evident. The Kyradzians have in fact oriental features, rather dark skin, and live between imposing mountains that break with the stretched plates of the Russian steppe.

The wonderful mountains are the protagonists of a travel itinerary in Kyrgyzstan, also because it is the state in the world further from the sea. Western tourists are still few, while Russian tourists and kazaki in summer are noted especially on the shores of Lake Issyk Kul. After years of closure and tension, the government is now focusing a lot about tourism and eliminated the need for visa for several nationalities, including the Italian one, so the number of vacationers could increase!

Travelers in Kyrgyzstan will meet a rather poor country, but with truly hospitable people (it is very difficult to refuse a cup of tea offered by a Kyrgyice!) And a capital (Bishkek) rapidly developed. A travel itinerary in Kyrgyzstan can be inserted enough easily into a longer holiday that also touches Uzbekistan, Tajikistan or Kazakhstan.

When to go to Kyrgyzstan

Unless you want to enjoy the slopes of one of Kyrgyzstan's ski resorts, summer is the right season: ideal temperatures and almost always present. In winter it is too cold, but also in half seasons the many streets closed for snow would limit your travel itinerary.

Main destinations

The capital Bishkek is surprisingly animated and modern, but it is usually used only as a passage point.
The great lake of Issyk Kul is the Kyrgyzo "sea", even if it is located a 1600 meters of altitude. It represents the most popular tourist area, with unique and different landscapes (from the Brullo Skazka Canyon to the verdant mountains) and here the city of Karakol is an ideal starting point for trekking exaltants.
The Song Kul lake, 3000 meters away, It is a jewel set in fantastic landscapes. Osh, in the south, is a characteristic city surrounded by memorable mountains. In general, in Kyrgyzstan there is an infinite choice between truly photogenic natural landscapes and with a rental car any dirt road can give adventures and emotions.

How to travel to Kyrgyzstan

Until 2014 it was almost impossible to rent a car without driver. Now you can, and it is not so difficult to drive in Kyrgyzstan, because outside the capital the traffic is really limited. Obviously the car to the Nolo must be a jeep, because the streets are mostly dirt. The Italian license is sufficient. A known problem, in these parts, is the corruption of the police, which could invent apologies to accuse you of some infringement and therefore ask you a bundle of about fifty euros. We did not happen to us: even the frontier policemen with Kazakhstan were kind and honest. The car in Nolo allows tourists to complete a travel itinerary in a few days that would otherwise request weeks, not to mention the possibility of entering splendid places outside the beaten routes.
If your goal is the trekking, you can instead Consider the use, much cheaper, public transport, taxis and hitchhiking (very widespread). In Kyrgyzstan, in fact, there are several wonderful treks of several days running through wonderful mountain ranges. The starting and arrival points of these itineraries are often in different valleys, so in this case for travelers it is convenient to have already returned the rental car.

Costs of a trip to Kyrgyzstan

The country is (per hour) very cheap. In the yurts, the typical fixed central tents of Central Asia, a mid-board night costs about 13 euros per person. Obviously it is a recently discussed recreation and the bathroom is no longer than a hole in the ground in the middle of the prairie, with two pieces of sheet metal around. Car rental is, in the case, the most expensive part of the journey (50-60 euros a day for a discreet jeep, and in any case dated at least fortnight). Public transport and taxi have really ragged prices for a Western tourist.
The flight depends very on the season: in the dearest periods you should not exceed 700 euros a/r from Italy, but you can go much better, around 400 Euro (there are no direct flights, you fly via Istanbul with Pegasus or Turkish or Via Mosca).

Dangers and Contracts

Kyrgyzstan seemed to us a very safe country. Obviously the dangers are bound more than anything else as trekking in lost places, mountaineering, horse riding. It is also necessary to pay attention to mountain ache, in Kyrgyzstan often exceed 3000 meters. Turning by car is relatively more dangerous than in the West, but the fact that there is less traffic simplifies life. The dated jeeps are a possible source of faults and contracts (among other things in summer they are all rented at all advance). Talking about the Russian would help a lot in certain circumstances and for example in case of trouble like the infamous police corruption (problem that we did not appear). We did not have any marks with the local population, indeed very kind, during our journey, although it seems that in the south of the country they are more likely to rob the tourists.

Practical information scattered

The local currency is the SOM (1 euro = 78 SOM in August 2018) which can be changed in the main cities more conveniently to the banks. You need to pay attention to the fact that in the center of Kyrgyzstan the beauty of nature is also due to the almost total absence of banks and atm. In our travel itinerary we happened to find ourselves short of money: in that case, after a bit of insistence bars or yurt have accepted the euro as payment, changingoceli. To eat it is almost always a few economic inn that invariably proposes mutton with vegetables. Gasoline costs about 40 cents/liter (envy). All hitchhiking is a normal way to travel: if you have a car to Nolo, you can take advantage of them to meet people; If you turn with public transport, you can find some cars that loads you. We have accompanied Kiirghizi and tourists.
To "Navigare" Use Google Maps, downloading the offline maps: better than any browser.

Travel Diary in Kyrgyzstan

For our trip In Kyrgyzstan we had booked the flight to Bishkek, opting for the convenient airport in Istanbul rather than in Moscow to avoid the visa problem. We also rented a jeep via the internet. For the rest, as always, I went to the adventure without other reservations.

We retired the car to Bishkek's Manas Airport and left towards Susamyr. We headed to Lake Song Kul (Kul wants to say lake). It was a long journey, almost all day, but through sensational landscapes. The rented car behaved very well.

Susamyr is a quiet village, where we got into a procession on a hill. Finding an ATM or a change was impossible for 200 kilometers, but we would solve in Cak, where we could have lunch with mutton and vegetables and hot tea - a classic for Kyrgyzstan.

An imperway dirt road finally brought us to Song Kul, goal of our first very intense day of travel in Kyrgyzstan. This lake at 3000 meters of altitude is surrounded by green meadows on which horses and uncontaminated mountains run.

The shepherds, here, stay in the yurts, the typical central Asia tents, which are easily mounted at the beginning of the summer season, when the snow melts. Among the yurts of the shepherds, some are used for use for the few travelers. For the rest, there are cows, horses and sheep.

The next morning we walked around, from tourists looking for typical experience, then we left on the most comfortable Jeep following beautiful dirt roads in the mountains. Continuing in our travel itinerary to Issyk Kul, we arrived in Kockor and, shortly thereafter, at Lake Orto Tokoy.

We walked towards the shore of the lake and met the camels, which we took a thousand photos because we did not expect to see them in Kyrgyzstan.

When we arrived on the enormous Issyk Kul lake we started traveling along the road that runs south. We soon took a dirt road frequented by Russian tourists to Kyzyl Tuu, with whom we arrived at the Salty Lake, or Solenoye Ozero, a salt lake. It was a very small Dead Kiirghizo Sea where you could swim and make sludge a few hundred meters from the Isdyk Kul.

On the Solenoye Ozero there are yurts where to eat lake fish. We then driven up to Bokonbaev, where we found an economic accommodation (as in all the rest of the holiday).
From Bokonbaev we took a dirt road that met in a green valley between the mountains; We visited an Islamic cemetery (the inhabitants of Kyrgyzstan are mostly Muslims, but in a bland way).

We therefore reached the "Birds of Prey Festival" organized here every year in August by the CBT, the Kyrgyzo tourism body. This festival shows travelers all the peculiarities of Kyrgyzstan traditions. Compared to the rest of the country, it was a tourist event, but very photogenic, with typically Kyrgizi games and food.

The games with horses, such as wrestling and Kokboru were particularly interesting. In the latter two teams of men on horseback arise a dead goat. Such sport is also widespread in other Central Asian countries (in Afghanistan with the best known Buzkashi) and watching a game was one of the most characteristic moments of our travel itinerary in Kyrgyzstan!

We left the Bokonbaev festival and headed to the Skazka Canyon, or Fairy this canyon for foreign travelers (these Anglophones slances on Lake Issyk Kul demonstrate the series of opening to tourism). We will lead you among the colorful skazka pinnacles, and it was wonderful!

We left the Skazka Canyon in the late afternoon and went to Karakol, an interesting destination for his pet market.

The next morning we then woke up to dawn to admire thousands of shepherds with lada or flocked vans that sold, bought or exchanged cows, sheep, bulls, goats, and horses. The Karakol animal market is truly spectacular, which takes place every Sunday.
we continued our itinerary by going to Altyn Arashan, a tiny mountain resort in a valley above Karakol.
we parked the jeep in a safe place and In Marshrutka (the Kyrgypt bus), we headed to Ak-Suu and from there we walked in the rain up to Altyn Arashan.

The walk takes about five hours, but in the last section we were accompanied by a 4x4 Soviet truck, among the few means capable of getting away in those conditions.
Altyn Arashan is about 2500 meters away: there are few Yurte And wooden houses, but also spa puddles, in which weighed up. In the spa and in the few guesthouses the few tourists stop, generally passionate about hiking or mountaineering.

The next day the sun returned to shine, as you expect a trip to Kyrgyzstan in summer. Among the various trekking itineraries more days, we obviously had to opt for something shorter, because in the evening we wanted to return to Karakol. We went there so along the beautiful Altyn Arashan valley, between rivers, waterfalls, horses running free and glaciers in the background. What a wonderful excursion!

Returned to Altyn Arashan, we descended to Ak Suu on two disobedient horses, the most painful moment of our travel itinerary, especially for the intimate parts on the disconnected path, but it was fun!
Ak Suu immediately found the Marshrutka 350 with which We returned to Karakol and our jeep, with which we drove to the Karkara valley, where there is a border place (open only in summer) between Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. The road was an adventurous dirt road in green bucolic landscapes.

In a few hours we arrived at the customs, a blocking place in the middle of nowhere: the policemen of Kyrgyzstan and those of Kazakhstan to check us without making too many problems and from there ... Our travel itinerary continued in Kazakhstan !

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