Fairy Canyon and camels

Wednesday 19 August 2026

First up is a photo of the towel in our guesthouse, which, for some reason, I feel the need to share...

We had a lovely breakfast on the veranda of the guesthouse.  It had a bountiful orchard which we raided for apple, peach and apricot.  There is nothing quite like a freshly picked apricot with breakfast (except two apricots maybe).  

We drove east to Skazla Valley, commonly known as Fairy Canyon.  It is an amazing canyon of weathered sandstone outcrops and cliffs.  Reminded us of the geoparks we visited in China last year.

The most impressive feature was the Great Wall which we photographed from a great vantage point.

Getting down was harder as it was a steep ridge with a thin layer of skiddy sand.  Timur is keen on photos/social media etc so was always taking photos of us - we now appear on his instagram.  I actually quite liked this as he captured images of us we don't usually get, such as this one of me trying not to fall off a narrow sandstone ridge.

JC launched his drone and took some nice shots (you can just see Issy-Kul in the background).

Visitors could roam freely and with no restrictions.  I was not convinced this was for the best as continued footfall will add to the erosion.  Some nations would fence it all off except a viewing platform. China would lay concrete pathways and steps everywhere.  There is certainly a balance between accessibility and protection.  

We were hurried along as the guys wanted to leave by midday and then, as we left, Timur and Jusup spotted an archery challenge so spent 10 minutes aiming, and sometimes hitting, bullseye.  JC wasn't as proficient - understandably so!

King JC and his helpers ;-)

Back in the local restaurant it was omelette and rice for lunch again (I had it yesterday lunchtime too).  There were no other veggie options except salad or cheese pizza.  Yesterday's omelette came with a garnish of wavy ketchup too so it must be a Kyrgyz thing.

We stopped at Orto Tokoy Reservoir for a break and found a herd of camels.  We surmised these were owned camel, eg not wild.  They were very smelly and had attracted vast swarms of the local fly population.  I asked Timur if they ate camel. “No, too important” he replied - of course, stupid question.  

Their cute tails pendulumed beautifully https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ng-MXV3LKbE.

Timur taking a photo of JC taking a photo of a camel.

We stayed at a guesthouse in Kochkor staying in a basic room. I had thought yesterday’s guesthouse wasn’t fancy but it had en-suite with a chair and table in the room.  Today there was just a room - no pictures, no mirror, no furniture except a bed and two bedside tables and obviously, no en-suite (hark at me the fancy traveller).  Fortunately the establishment had a washing machine they allowed us to use so we did a load which was a treat.

We had a short stroll before supper and found the Lenin statue.

Most towns have one and this one features in the guide book as a highlight of Kochkor.  That gives an indication of how exciting some of these towns were - really handy hubs to sleep, buy food and fuel, but nothing you'd want to write home about.

Finally, we were at our most easterly point of our tour today, 77 degrees 21 minutes East.  Stay tuned for the most westerly and southerly.

First of many lakes - Issy Kul

Tuesday 18 August 2026

We set off on our big road tour of Kyrgyzstan today.  There are only two train lines in Kyrgyzstan, and they don’t intersect, so road or air are the only ways to get around.  My conservative estimate is that we drove over 2,000 km in 3 weeks which doesn't sound a lot, but about 20% of it was off road on mountain passes (very slow and windy ... also nausea inducing).  Hopefully the map gives a rough indication of our route.  Sorry I forgot the scale bar but, of course, north is up.

We headed towards Burana Tower.  As I read the guide book to gen up on its history, I discovered that in 1941 Stalin had forcibly relocated Germans from the Volga region.  Some ended up in this area of Kyrgyzstan and named local villages after home.  And we were bizarrely just about to drive through one - Luxembourg.  Home sweet home.

Burana tower is one of a handful of ancient monuments in Kyrgyzstan, what’s left of a minaret of Balasagun.  11th century Uyghur poet Yusuf Balasagun was born here and gave the town its name (after the minaret was initially established in 10th century).  For interest, he also features on the 1000 Som note. 

As for most things built a millennia ago, it has been damaged by the elements, earthquake and local builders.  It now stands at 24 m, just over half its original height of 46 m.  I also found my one and only survey point of the whole trip, and even this wasn't a government/survey one but a local site one.  

Surrounding it is a collection of balbals, or Kurgan stelae.  Balbals are gravestones but of a kind I haven’t seen before - an image of the dead person but no inscription to provide their name of dates of existence.

We popped up inside the tower.  The internal stair case was unlit and only one person-width wide.  Unfortunately there was there was no way of knowing if it was free until 1/3rd way up or down, so traffic jams ensued.  Fortunately JC had a powerful torch in his camera bag (ever ready for darkness that man) which helped navigate.  

We drove towards Lake Issy-Kul passing through the narrow Boom Gorge.  This was a Silk Road route through the mountains and nestled closely in the bottom are the road, river and railway.  

Many of the roads here were being upgraded but it didn't appear to be in a systematic way - there would be a couple of km tarmac'ed and then the next 10 km still dirt track.  And then, suddenly, there would be a few km of tarmac'ed road again.  To control the traffic flow they didn't use cones much, instead a line of stones marked out which side of the road was out of bounds.  Sometimes you'd just come around the corner on a road/dual carriageway to find a dumper truck unloading stones blocking both carriageways.

Excitingly, for a Ruth, we spotted freshly cooked sweetcorn by the side of the road.  It wasn't yet sweetcorn season so I didn't see this again, but I was glad to find a (the?) corn seller.

We stayed in a guesthouse by Issy-Kul (Kul means lake).  Issy-Kul is the second largest high alpine/saline lake in the world, the eighth-deepest and eleventh-largest by volume.  It was formed by a split/depression in the western end of the extensive Tian Shen mountain range.  The mountains we could see out of our room were the southern split, the Terskey Ala-Too range.

We had time to wander down to the lake for a stroll.  Yusup and Timur swam whilst we explored the shoreline.  I slightly regretted not bringing bathing stuff but hey ho.  I also get very cold too quickly anyway. 

Not sure why there was a crutch here.

Supper out was nice except the only thing on the menu I could eat was, you've guessed it, fried aubergine with tomatoes in chilli sauce.  The aubergine is battered before it’s fried and they use the same bottled sweet chilli sauce.  This was my third dose of this dish and although it'll sustain me it’s not memorable, or rather it is memorable but not for the right reasons ;-).

Ala Archa National Park

Monday 17 August 2026 

Today we visited Ala Archa National Park.  It’s close to Bishkek so was an easy day-run.  We had intended to walk to the waterfall, 4 km with 700 m ascent from where the National Park bus dropped us, but Timur persuaded to hop in the cable car for the first 2 km (few hundred metres ascent).  This turned out to be advice worth listening to.

We took an hour to walk up to the Aksay waterfall which was freezing as it was fed by glacial run off.

We then had what our tour delightfully named a “picnic in the nature” which was the first of many.  I ate the Turkish Air gluten free roll I’d saved from our flight, with the usual dried fruit, nuts and bananas.  

Thanks to Timur’s insistence that we used the cable car, we had spare time and energy to push on further up into the mountains.

Timur's hat broke so he adapted a sun protection from a spare shirt.

We walked/scrambled 2.4 km and ascended 700 metres to 3340 m. The sign had said it should take 2:30 which showed how hard it was!  It was exhausting in the heat at +3000 m but we persevered and reached Razeka Station in 2 hours.  We were pleased at our fitness/stamina.

Razeka Station is a ‘base camp’ for climbing further into the mountains.  There was a small bar, full of slightly crazed-looking dancers, where we bought tea.

We popped over the ridge to see the valley behind which was awesome.

Suddenly, a casualty appeared. We initially thought it was a practice run, but he appeared to have broken a foot/leg.  We were reminded of the danger of walking in the mountains by a rock face at base camp which memorialised some who have died.

We headed down which was a different kind of hard to ascending.  Slipping was our major concern as much of the path was loose scree and dust.  We took our time and descended with me only slipping twice and JC, who had smartly donned walking boots as opposed to my walking trainers, had limpet-like grip and stayed upright.

Great views.  The dust is building work - they appear to be extending the cable car and building a 'resort' up here.  Progress apparently.

We weren’t down and back in the car until 1900, then it was back to Bishkek and supper with our tour operator to discuss the plans ahead. Back at the hotel for 21:30, packing and sleep.

Kyrgyzstan - and we're off

Saturday 15 September 2026

In JC's quest to travel the Silk Road, Krygyzstan was on the list.  For those who aren't au fait with the geography of Central Asia (including me), it's a small land-locked country sitting south of the large Kazakstan, north and west of China and east of Uzbekistan/Tajikistan.  It is a nomadic country and the average height is 2750 m above Mean Sea Level.

We were up and out by 0630 to catch train from Brentford to Gatwick.  It was a straight forward check in and we were soon airside for breakfast and a leisurely Guardian read.  Poor guy looks tired already!

We changed planes in Istanbul and had a 3.5 hour break between flights which meant time for Turkish tea and snacks.

We left Istanbul 2030 local (1830 BST) and landed in Bishkek, Krygyzstan, at 0430 local (0130 BST).  I’d managed a couple of hours sleep so wasn’t feeling too dead.  A very simple passport control, baggage collection and we were collected by our driver, Yusup and Madina.  They dropped us at our hotel and we were grateful for another couple of hours sleep before heading out to explore Bishkek. 

Sunday 16 September 2026

Bishkek is not currently (will ever be?) the highlight of any Central Asia tour.  It is a standard ex-communist city.  There appeared no old part to the city and we visited the Victory Arch, built to resemble a yurt frame, with its eternal flame.

We then walked to Bishkek Central Mosque.  Again all relatively new and apparently styled on the Blue Mosque in Istanbul.

It was very hot.  Hotter than the UK, in the high 30’s.  Unlike the UK, though, this was normal.  Bishkek is 800 m above mean sea level but we knew the temperatures would be lower for most of our trip due to the altitudes we’d be at.

We watched the changing of the guards.  The high leg walk reminded me of Athens guards, although no pom poms were in sight here.  They then stand rigid for two hours until the next pair relieve them.  When is it stupidly hot (not today) they are relieved after an hour.  Above them is a large Kyrgyz flag which I couldn’t capture without crossing a busy road.  If you hang in there with the blogs you'll see this again on 04 September.

We explored the State History museum.  JC found the Bronze Age and similar antiquities his vibe, whilst I preferred the more modern stuff (18th century onwards).  I liked the little epics on display.

Post independence from Russia in 1991, Kyrgyzstan had to create a new flag and here are the suggestions. The symbol in the centre of the chosen flag represents the lattice pattern across the top of a yurt where there is an opening to allow sun in/smoke out.

For lunch, JC continued his ongoing campaign to eat lagman (beef and noodles) at any opportunity and I had the first of many fried aubergine, tomatoes and rice dishes.  Kyrgyzstan is another destination I am not visiting for its cuisine.  Our guide, Timur, is struggling to understand how anyone can survive life without meat.  The diet here is meat centric, with beef and lamb being the most common.  Pork is rarely on the menu as many Kyrgyz are Muslim.  Our lunch started with a shot of the National drink, milk with salt.  We haven’t quite got our taste buds into that one yet (notwithstanding being unsure how safe it was for us to drink) but salt in drinks is common.

Timur asked about our jobs.  JC’s he could understand as weather is everywhere.  But trying to explain what a coastline, tides and waves are to someone who has never seen the sea was more challenging.  We explored the local market where Timur proudly announced “you can get anything” - anything except postcards it seems.  But he seemed right on most other things.  I didn’t take photos as I’ve taken numerous of these type of markets before: alleyways devoted to the sale of shoes, electronics, spice stalls, kitchen tool corners etc.  We had fresh pear juice from a vending machine which was delicious but were less taken with the dried hard cheese balls Timur was keen for us to try.

I was stopped by a man curious about the wires in my ears, my hearing aids.  He wanted to know how many channels they had (numerous) and how much they cost (lots).  I’ve never been asked that before by a complete stranger.

Back at the hotel we enjoyed the mountain view from our room.

JC caught up on sleep whilst I did the usual Ruth thing of reorganising the packing.  We split our stuff when we travel so that should one bag go AWOL we each had enough clothes/other stuff in the other one to survive.  But once both bags were safe, I swap it all around.  We shall be on the road a lot this trip so one bag shall be for our day-to-day use.  JC’s rucksack, stuffed with the sleeping bags, thermarest and thermals, can stay unused until needed.

Dinner out was aubergine, tomatoes and rice for me, again.  JC tried horsemeat for the first time and quite liked it, although not as much as beef. Timur discovered two more un-Krygyz things about me.  I drive a SEAT which he’s never heard of and I’m left handed (not common in Muslim quarters).  So what with that, being a veggie and mapping the coastline, he’s finding me a bit weird.  

The hotel is offering wine for 1800 KGS. Initially I thought it was stupidly heavy wine (I was tired), then realised it was Krygyz Som, the currency.  Certainly not a steal at ~£15 a bottle.