Welcome to Kyrgyzstan!
Today, you will be arriving in Kyrgyzstan for your impactful vacation and you will be picked up from the airport by your guide and driver. We will take you to your hotel, inform you about the plan for tomorrow and you have the evening off to get acclimatised and rest well.
After breakfast, we will get our city vibes on sightseeing in Bishkek, the capital city of Kyrgyzstan. Of course, you will get to see the highlights of this interesting city that was established in 1825 as part of the Silk Road and is known for its mix of Soviet-era architecture and modern buildings. We will take a look at the vibrant market and have our lunch at a local park where we will also help to keep the park clean.
After the picnic lunch, we will visit a nursing home and brighten up the day for the elderly residents with our company and some items that we have bought at the market (food, clothes or other items).
Your dinner tonight is included and of course we will take you to a nice local restaurant so you can get your first taste of Kyrgyz cuisine.
Today, we are leaving the city and heading into the Chon-Kemin Valley. Along the way, we will help a local family to prepare our lunch that we enjoy together with them. In September, we will visit a school and leave the children with some useful gifts that we have bought yesterday at the market in Bishkek.
We will also visit the Burana Tower, a battlement built at the peak of the Great Silk Road. After dinner in Chon-Kemin village, we will invite some villagers to converse in English with us and have a lovely exchange of culture and language.
This day is filled with nature as we head to the city of Karakol along the northern shore of Lake Issyk-Kul. As you get your first glimpses of the outstretched and varied landscape of Kyrgyzstan, we will stop at the 'Stone Garden', an open-air temple left by the Scythians and Huns, dating from the 9th and 8th centuries BC and the 3rd and 4th centuries AD.
We will then drive to the Grigorievskoe gorge, take a lovely walk along the riverside and have an outdoors picnic lunch. After dinner at Karakol city, you will have some free time to discover the city at your leisure. But you might want to go to bed a bit earlier tonight.....
If you guys are up for it, this morning we will visit the Karakol cattle market at around 5am in the morning. Jikes! But yeah, if you want to truly connect to the local lifestyle, visiting a bustling local cattle market in the early mornings is the way to do it! We do this not just to see how the villagers buy and sell livestock from each other, but also to buy a lamb to gift to the local farming family we will visit later today. Breakfast will be at the hotel after we visit the market - so please make sure to bring a snack with you if you need to eat something when we go to the market.
After breakfast, we will drive to the countryside to visit a farmer's house and participate in their daily activities at the farm, such as feeding their livestock and other daily chores. We will make and enjoy our lunch together with the family so you will learn how to make another national dish.
The evening will be spend at Karakol city.
Please note: the cattle market is crowded and can be either dusty or muddy depending on the weather. So please be mindful of the clothes and shoes that you wear today. If you do not wish to visit the cattle market and purchase a lamb for the farming family, we will buy some meat at a local store for them instead as a gift for receiving us in their home today. We prefer to present them with the lamb to grow their livestock as opposed to a one-time gift, but the choice is yours.
We will start our day, after breakfast, with a tour of Karakol that includes a visit to the Dungan mosque, a Chinese-style building used for worship by Muslims, the Holy Trinity Cathedral, an old Russian Orthodox church made of wood and the local ethnographic museum.
Leaving the city, our next stop is the Jeti Oguz gorge which translates as 'Seven Bulls'. This picturesque canyon gets its name from the reddish sandy formations covered with coniferous forests of the Tien Shan. Walking through the gorge, you wil see the famous 'Broken Heart' and 'Seven Bulls' rocks. More beautiful views are waiting for you at the Skazka canyon which consists of multi-colored petrified clay. You can go for short walks here of up to 5 km.
After these gorgeous gorges, we will drive on to the village of Kyzyl-Tuu, famous for the manufacturing of yurts - traditional nomad's houses. Tonight, we will cook for our hosts at the local guest house and invite some elderly residents of the village to dine with us.
We know, 'yurting' is not a word, but we think it should be 😊 because today is all about yurts, the traditional easy to build houses of the nomad people of Kyrgyzstan of which there are some still living the nomadic lifestyle. After breakfast at our guest house, we will learn how the traditional felt decorations are made that are used to cover and decorate yurts. You will also get to try making some felt products yourself.
Once you've got the hang of how to decorate a yurt, it's time to actually make one and see if you could survive as an actual nomad in the vast plains of Kyrgyzstan. In the evening we can discuss our yurting skills, or slight lack thereof lol, in a nice cultural and language exchange with the villagers.
Leaving Kyzul-Tuu, we head for the Boom gorge, where we will take a walk in the Kok-Moinok canyon. Red sandy rocks formed as a result of wind and rain make up this canyon and provide for beautifully coloured photo opportunities every step you take. Lunch today is either a picnic lunch or at a local cafe along the way.
At Kochkor village we will be treated to a wonderful folklore show performed by a local music group. They will show us some traditional dances and songs that really make you feel part of the history of the region and country. As an extra special thank the musicians for their performance, we will cook dinner for them and enjoy it with them. This also gives you the opportunity to engage with them in conversation and learn more about their culture and lifestyle.
This lake deserves your special attention, so we will drive there without long stops along the way. The lake is located at an altitude of 3016 meters above sea level and is 'off-grid', meaning there is no wifi or mobile connections. It is the perfect place to really reconnect to nature and reflect on the wonder that life on this planet is. People here only live in yurts, so there are no villages and only yurt camps.
In order to help preserve this marvellous lake, we will take some time to collect any trash on the shore of the lake we can find and/or we will collect garbage in and surrounding the yurt camp. Removing garbage from the area also helps to preserve the many rare birds from the south that come to the lake in the summer time.
We will spend the night at a yurt camp. Please note that yurts regularly house 4 people so you may be sharing your yurt with other people in your group. Booking a yurt for only 2 people might be possible if you prefer this depending on availability as there are only around 3-4 yurt camps in this area.
After our breakfast, we will take the road through 33 Parrot pass, the most picturesque pass in the country. It will be possible to hike to the Naryn waterfall there if you wish. Along our way back to Bishkek city there will be an opportunity for you to buy some souvenirs at a local artisan shop. It is preferable to buy your souvenirs at a local shop instead of in the city so we can support the local craftsmen. Depending on our arrival time, you will be able to spend some time visiting your favourites Bishkek spots once more before we head to our farewell dinner at a local restaurant.
Time to go home unfortunately. We will drop you off at the airport in time for your flight and say our goodbyes. We hope you have thoroughly enjoyed the beauty of Kyrgyzstan and thank you so much for participating in our activities to make the local people smile and keeping our natural environment clean.
