Postcard from Bishkek

The first time I saw the Orto Tokoi Reservoir, we were driving from Balykchy at the Western end of Lake Issyk Kul towards Naryn.  It was a gentle climb through what appeared to be a barren semi desert landscape – sand and rocky outcrops with multi-coloured slopes on the distant hills and just the occasional […]

About a year ago I got a frantic phone call from a friend of mine … a local, – that is, although he is not Kyrgyz, he was born and grew up here … asking me if I could tell him how to get to Kol Suu, (pronounced Kol Suu, but it is sometime written […]

  There are almost 2000 lakes in the Kyrgyz Republic, with a combined area of 6836 sq km. Most of them are small mountain lakes, located at altitudes between 2500 and 4000 meters above sea level and were formed as a result of glaciations.  The largest lake, of course is Lake Issyk Kul, followed by […]

Reservoirs form an important part of the Kyrgyz landscape. The most notable of Kyrgyzstan’s thirty odd reservoirs is the vast Toktogul reservoir. The dam at the head of this man-made lake was constructed in 1974 in the Ketmen Tube valley, as one of a series across the Naryn River, (the Naryn-Syr Darya cascade – The […]

Today is World Water Monitoring Day, and water has been very much in the news quite a lot recently. World Water Monitoring Day was established by America’s Clean Water Foundation in 2003 as part of a program to encourage public awareness and involvement in protecting water resources around the world, encouraging and empowering citizens to […]

I got “hi-jacked” this last weekend, on my monthly trip up to Naryn.  There was nothing sinister about it, but we ended up doing something that was not in the plan. These trips to Naryn, apart from being work – the regular check on how things are going up at the guesthouse – they are […]

In the North-Eastern corner of Kyrgyzstan, two ridges of the Tien Shan converge and some peaks rise to over 6000m.  The Enilchek glacier snakes down from the clouds, nestling at the foot of Khan Tengri (“Prince of Spirits” or “Rider of the Sky” – 6995m) on the borders with Kazakhstan in the North and Peak […]

Issyk Kul is Kyrgyzstan’s largest Lake and at about 180 km long by 70 km wide and 668 meters deep at the deepest point, (the average depth is about 300 meters), it is the world’s second largest mountain lake – and the fifth deepest lake in the world. The lake has been held in high […]

Son Kul is a mountain lake in the Central Tian Shan range, virtually in the centre of Kyrgyzstan. One translation of the name is “The Last Lake”.