Travel Guide Lac Issyk Kul

In the north-east of the country, what has become the country's first tourist attraction: Lake Issy Kul, the second largest Alpine lake in the world after the Titicaca Lake in Bolivia. Do not succumb to the temptation to do the night road: the journey to the lake via Balakchy is a real wonder. After leaving the Chouy Valley, the road gremlin in the gorges of Boamanskoïé to reach Balakchy where the road divides into two to serve the north and south shores. The Issyk Kul is a huge lake 180 km long and 70 km wide, surrounded by mountain ranges whose snow-capped peaks exceed 4 000 m. Issyk Kul means "hot lake". Indeed, despite its high altitude - 1 600 m above sea level - the lake never freezes. Its water is slightly salted, many hot springs feed it and its depth reaches 695 m, three reasons why the lake keeps a minimum temperature of 4 to 5 ° C even in the coldest month of January. In July, the temperature reached about 18 ° C. To the east of the lake, the old town - Karakol garrison - became a base of the trekkeurs world entie.ClimateIn winter, the shores of the lake are snow-capped, but Issyk Kul, thanks to the low salinity of its waters, never freezes. The north shore is still served all year by road linking Balakchy to Karakol, which is not necessarily the case of the south shore, much less urbanized, and where roads are not always cleared. Winter is very harsh in Karakol, at the foot of the mountains, but the waters of the lake begin to warm up when the beautiful days come and become a very popular seaside rendezvous.AccommodationOn the north shore, around Cholpon-Ata, the hotel is resolutely oriented towards luxury. In summer, rooms can be charged up to 150 € without the service or comfort up to the expense. Prefer to stay home in Tamchy, which also offers the advantage of enjoying a more popular and authentic atmosphere. In Karakol, the main city in the east of the lake, you will find more diversified and cheaper accommodation. Finally, on the south shore, more wild and less busy, you will need to stay in the majority of the time in the living room or in petitesguesthouses. Hotels and holiday villages are in project but will not open their doors for a few years.ItineraryFrom Bishkek you can easily relierez Cholpon-Ata or Karakol in less than a day by minibus or shared taxi. If you embark on the complete tour of the lake, allow longer journeys and more difficult connections on the south shore. Bus lines exist and work but vehicles are filling faster and more frequently broken.HistoryLake Issyk Kul is easily one of the twenty oldest lakes in the world, formed over 25 million years ago. Its average depth is 280 m and the deepest point is 668 m below sea level. The river system surrounding the lake (almost 200 rivers still feeding it permanently) has given rise over millennia to large valleys conducive to the implantation of early human inhabitants. In 2006, on the north shore of the lake, between 5 and 10 m deep, even traces of a civilization dating back to 2 500 years before our age were discovered. The research found that at that time the shores of the lake were inhabited not by nomads camping from one point to another but by a sedentary settlement. The irrefutable evidence of the existence of a city comes from the discovery of an enclosure of more than 500 m long, indicating the presence of a city developed and certainly rich. The many discoveries of scythe origin (tombs, or kurgan, jewels…) on the sites of discovery have not yet revealed all their mysteries…Well before 2006, Lake Issyk Kul already focused the attention of archaeological environments. During the Soviet period, the archaeologist Prjevalski spent many years exploring his shores, looking in particular at the great Tamerlane Palace evoked by some chronicles and no trace has ever been found. Many archaeologists wondered whether the walls of the city discovered in 2006 could not form part of this famous palace. Various inscriptions on graves found around Bishkek also appear to attest to the presence of an Armenian monastery on the shores of the lake in the th century, but only crosses were found. Depicted on a map dated 1380, this monastery would have sheltered the relics of the Evangelist Saint Mathieu, who died far from there, in Ethiopia. At this time, the Silk Road effectively passes close to the lake and the caravans are many to step in, to carry luxury foods, spices, silk or tea, but also cultures, ideas, religions and, it seems, the plague of the plague which, from the puces of the merchants, would have travelled to Europe to pass on to Europe. the great black plague of the th century.Lake Issyk Kul todayWith the expansion of tourism, Lake Issy Kul is changing its face. The north shore, around Cholpon-Ata, is already overrun with luxury residences and hotels. The beaches, which are very popular with the rich fortunes of Central Asia, take place in the beautiful days and have a festive atmosphere throughout the summer. On the south shore, less populated and urbanized, tourism is more articulated around tradition, especially that of falcon hunting. Practiced in farm farms around Tamga or Bokonbaevo, since 2009, it has been in a festival for which a large esplanade and galleries have been arranged, still far too large to accommodate the few tourists willing to take a long journey to admire some of the rapaces on prey with no chance of getting away. Karakol has become the main tourist centre of Lake Issyk Kul. Thanks largely to the great natural potential surrounding the town (Chutes Öghuz falls, Edition Arashan valley, hot springs…), but also to the dynamic action of the local director of CBT, which has made it possible to establish many walking or horse tours, now rôdés. In the summer, the streets of Karakol are not far from talking about an atmosphere already known in Nepal, where the trekkeurs seem more numerous than the inhabitants of the city, and where the trucks loaded with the refuelling, the equipment and the bags of the various expeditions will dazzle the taxis that make them… The region of Lake Issy Kul is still far away from having achieved full development of its potential. tourism, but already seems to be unable to do without this new industry.