"The best scenic road in Kyrgyzstan"

Friday 28 August 2026 

Argh it was too hot last night! It was like a sauna in our yurt for the first couple of hours - so hot that we had to open the door and hope a curious horse didn’t wander in.  However, we both woke up feeling better than usual, so perhaps an overheat in a yurt was what we needed.

I ate a normal amount for breakfast for a change.  And JC enjoyed small sugary doughnut-like objects with his meal.  Over breakfast we compared driving licenses and I was fascinated by how standardised they are - the Krygyz version above with the British below.

We left Tash Rabat and its yurt camp/valley for a 7 hour drive to Kazarman.

Jusup was kind and took us the pretty, but very slow and bendy, route to sate JC's landscape needs.  This was the 109 km long 3M-13, Kara Koo Ashoo, dubbed the "best scenic road in Kyrgyzstan". It also appears on the 'Dangerous Road' website - probably because you have to know what you're doing to drive this. The road is closed from October through to March and the website helpfully adds "It’s not the best road if you’re prone to car sickness".  Fortunately my travel sickness stayed off (I think Tuesday was actually a stomach bug plus travel nausea) and we enjoyed the huge vistas open to us. 

There were so many wondrous views we couldn’t stop and snap each one.  The air was warm, the breeze light and it was glorious. 

The Chinese are building a railway in the area and the amount of dust everywhere was high.  It looked like a moonscape.  JC wandered off to take a picture of the lunar-like river and fortunately returned to the car before an approaching official reached us.  We drove off rapidly.  Jusup made the most of the dust for some drive-by advertising for the company, Pamir Guides (I highly recommend). 

As this road was so high and exposed, there were the inevitable snow markers.  Jusup and Timur were no longer bemused by my random requests to stop for photos - JC's were always due to the amazing views.  It's important to calibrate these things (I am 1.64 m tall).  

We passed numerous ancestral cemeteries but never really got a decent picture of them.  They look like miniature cities from a distance: rural graveyards combining Islamic, Soviet, and pre-Islamic nomadic traditions. 

We stopped for lunch by the Naryn River, Kyrgyzstan’s largest.  Definitely a picnic with an epic view.  We were there long enough for JC to be bitten a few times by a passing mossie - no idea how they missed me.

We continued driving up winding roads over passes, and crept down the other sides careful not to over heat the brakes.  We stopped a couple of times to give the car a break and to shake out the engine filters which were full of road dust. 

We were on an another untarmaced road (which I started to dub "authentic") but it was making me nervous about having another puncture.  The Krygyz very helpfully mark a road’s length with marker posts, so I was able to count down the km to Kazarman.  I was conscious we didn’t have a spare tyre, so the nearer we got to Kazarman, the shorter distance we’d need to be rescued if we had another puncture. However, the views continued to be awesome.

Crossing the River Naryn again.   

We made it to Kazarman at 1745 and found the tyre shop was still open.  Opening hours seem to be as long as the store keeper is around to keep them open.  And, by the amount of business he had coming through, he was wise to keep longer hours but it was probably exhausting working long days.  With the roads here, a tyre replacement garage would have a lot of business.  Fortunately they had a spare tyre our size.  It didn't have much tread on it but it was far more air tight than our duff version.  

As we entered Kazarman, we saw the usual mounds of hay in fields/lofts/roofs.  As the summer is so short, they must make provisions for their animals: most houses we passed had a stash of hay in their field or under their eaves. 

All repaired, we had supper in town.  It was fried aubergines again for me but, by the time I’d removed the batter (which would have caused a riot with my still delicate guts), it wasn’t a huge meal.  

Kazarman is not a huge happening place.  Like Kochkor, it's an intersection between routes, where people pass through to stock up on provisions, and then pass on.  Kazarman did have an airport - but fancy missing the Kara Koo Ashoo road and fly here!

As I'd requested, we ended up in a homestay in Kazarman rather than yurt, which had been on the original  programme.  Since we were camping the next day, I really wanted somewhere to shower (my last shower was Monday afternoon, JC’s was Sunday morning) and a little bit of comfort.  Our hotel offered this in buckets.  We had an en-suite room - goodness, not only an indoor toilet but next to us! -  charging points, a double bed, towels and aircon. We both smelt like a yurt: an earthy mix of wool rugs, felt, wood and charcoal smoke added to an accumulation of 6 days on a dusty happy trail.

Tash Rabat and marmot spotting

Thursday 27 August 2026

We awoke to ice again on the ground.  But the sun soon warmed us and the fleeces were off after breakfast.

We loaded up and headed northwest.  Timur kindly relinquished the passenger seat so I could sit in the front, to help minimise travel sickness.  We had over 140 km of off-road first thing and I wanted to survive it in better shape than last.

The scenery was spectacular as ever.  We stopped briefly at this small canyon, Ulken Kuljabash Canyon, and were amused watching the group by the river as one of the guys stripped down to his underwear and went for a swim.

We crossed the flood plain of the River Aksay.

We tried to photograph marmots which were all over the place, but they are super jumpy and scuttle down their holes as soon as they sense danger.   I did see some camels in the distance.  They do not bolt when scared.  In fact, does anything scare a camel?

The rough roads finally took their toll and we had a puncture.  30 minutes later, spare wheel fitted, we were driving again.

To treat themselves after the exertion, the guys opted for lunch in a restaurant.  Well, eatery I suppose, where initially the only veggie dish they could offer was chips until they remembered they could serve fried veg with rice.  It wasn’t bad and I only found three pieces of meat in it.  

I snapped this photo whilst waiting for food as a classic Kyrgyz scene - mountains, Lada and someone squatting.  I then realised it was Jusup.  He always squatted when he stopped.  And, unlike JC and I who would eat standing, he and Timur always sat/squatted to eat because they were Muslims.  

We stopped at Koshoy Korgon, a ruined ancient fortress.  There is very little to see except partially standing sandstone walls.

They had a little museum and Jusup located the caretaker who opened it up for us.  I don't think he saw many visitors.  My highlight was an old map of the world by Mahmud al-Kashgari an 11th-century scholar  from Kashgar.  His book, the Dīwān Lughāt al-Turk ("Compendium of the languages of the Turks") included the first known map of the areas inhabited by Turkic peoples.  It's a lovely T in O map.

We ended the day at Tash Rabat.  This was a Silk Road caravanserai and by all accounts in good condition.  We were disappointed, therefore, to find it being refurbished with a tin roof covering.  It scuppered JC's plan to fly his drone over.

Fortunately we were allowed inside (despite the no entry signs) and we explored this amazing building consisting of 31 rooms.  

They let JC bring his tripod in and he probably spent an hour taking shots.  Well, 30 minutes taking shots and 30 minutes waiting for people to disappear out of view.

Tonight was our last yurt camp.  I'm missing the lake view but I had horses.

Authentic as they are, after five nights in yurts the novelty was wearing off - and I was missing showering.  Each yurt camp was different - this one had a fancy dining set up, a building rather than a shed/yurt, and we had a light in our yurt with a remote control switch (fancy).  However this felt more commercial, and we missed the authenticity of the earlier yurt camps with their dodgy mattresses, herding families and visiting chickens.  It was dark from about 1900 and, once you’ve eaten, there was nothing to do but sleep.  It was also very cold.  But, as usual, they lit the burner for us, and like Köl Suu, they had coal.  

Köl Suu

Wednesday 26 August 2026 

I slept over 11 hours last night which wasn't surprising. I didn’t wake up perky - I think the high altitude takes it out of you (we were now sleeping at 3200 m) - but I was well enough to eat an egg and a rice cake for breakfast.

We set off for Köl (pronounced Kel) Suu lake which I thought I could manage as it was 7 km each way and only a 300 m ascent (at 3200 m ahem).  The valley was beautiful. It was all you’d expect from a remote Krygyz region: crystal clear waters cascading down, cattle and yak grazing, sheep munching grass, blue skies, snow capped mountains made a perfect scene. When we asked Timur and Jusup which was their favourite walk on our trip, they said the Köl Suu walk.  I can see why.

Occasionally a group of tourists on horseback trotted past but we mainly had the trail to ourselves.

I was very grateful to be on terra firma today.  I managed the walk, although my ability to ascend was curtailed by my lack of energy and altitude.  Timur and Yusup made the most of our slow speed to lie down.  [Ed: JC the photographer was holding up proceedings was as much as Ruth the not-so-fast walker].

It was certainly worth reaching the lake, at 3520 m above MSL, and I was glad I'd pushed myself.  Kol Suu is 17 km long and pretty narrow.  Lake number 5 for us.  For info, in Kyrgyz, Kul = lake and Suu = water.  But I'm counting all Kuls and Suus as one and the same.

We stayed at the north end, basically because the mountains reached down to the lake side and there were no routes around.

There were boat trips here which kind of took the edge off the peaceful remote lake. Again I avoided, not just because they were £30 each, but because I was trying to keep my breakfast where it should be.

We lunched in the sun by the lake which was a delight, and I managed two rice cakes and a banana.  JC took the drone for a spin.  I love this overhead shot of us (I'm the blob sitting to the top of the image).

 

The walk down was easy and we yak spotted again.  JC flew the drone over the river getting some amazing shots.  

Timur and Yusup had a chill-out on some rocks, only appearing as we passed underneath them.

Once back, JC declared he wanted to head out again for sunset shots.  He wasn't surprised when I declined to join him, and instead I had a much needed rest in the yurt.  The yurt camps are improving on the accommodation/toilet block front but the views are less spectacular.

JC got some wonderful shots as you'd expect.

I managed to eat supper and, just as we were finishing, a cry went up that there was a car stuck in the river. So Jusup and Timur rushed out to help.  It was dark so some cars drove down to light the scene, and Jusup, who was the type of guy that would help anyone, waded into the icy water.  Some horse riders went in too.  Eventually it was pulled out by an amphib vehicle.  Although seemingly mad to drive across a river at night, the young chap was on a mercy mission to rescue a tourist who had broken their leg.