Bishkek
pop 900, 000 / elev 800m Bishkek feels green – but not just because of the trees.
pop 900, 000 / elev 800m Bishkek feels green – but not just because of the trees.
Osh is Kyrgyzstan’s second-biggest city and the administrative centre of the huge, populous province that engulfs the Fergana Valley on the Kyrgyzstan side.
From the standpoint of landscape, the Bishkek–Osh road is a sequence of superlatives, taking the traveller over two 3000m-plus passes, through the yawning Suusamyr Valley, around the immense Toktogul reservoir, down the deep Naryn River gorge and...
Lake Issyk-Köl (also Ysyk-Köl) is basically a huge dent, filled with water, between the Küngey (Sunny) Alatau to the north and the Terskey (Dark) Alatau to the south, which together form the northern arm of the Tian Shan.
Karakol is a peaceful, low-rise town with backstreets full of Russian gingerbread cottages, shaded by rows of huge white poplars.
Barskoön village was an army staging point in the days of Soviet–Chinese border skirmishes, and the small adjacent settlement of Tamga is built around a former military sanatorium, now open year-round to all.
Crossing the Irkeshtam Pass (9am-noon & 2pm-3.
Torugart is one of Asia’s most unpredictable border posts.
At-Bashy is off the Naryn–Torugart road, 6km by an easterly access road, 4km by a westerly one, and truly the far end of populated Kyrgyzstan.
Just off the road from Naryn to Torugart, sandwiched between the At-Bashy and Naryn Tau Ranges is the town of At-Bashy.
Kazarman is the kind of town that begs to be bypassed.
If you’re planning to travel directly between the Fergana Valley and the Bishkek–Torugart road, it’s possible to cut right across central Kyrgyzstan between Jalal-Abad and Naryn instead of going around via Bishkek.
Naryn makes a convenient base for visits to both Song-Köl and the Tash Rabat caravanserai and from here it is possible to strike westward to Jalal-Abad via Kazarman.
Alpine lake Song-Köl (Son-Kul), at 3016m, is one of the loveliest spots in central Kyrgyzstan.
The little alpine, tree-lined, town of Kochkor (Kochkorka in Russian) is the kind of place where everyone seems to know everyone else.
Subscribe now and receive a 20% discount on your next guidebook purchase
© 2013 Lonely Planet. All rights reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced without our written permission.