[black.beauty]

If I do this someday, I'd feel like I have accomplished something in life. It's already a part of my bucket list after reading this deep detailed lovely tour. It's not everyday you come across people hiking to a place where there is nobody else and cooking food as they go, especially when it's a foreign country. Such an extensive trip would require a lot of preparation and co-ordination, you're lucky to have such friends where you can execute it successfully. It just kept getting better with the valleys, mountains, the night tents, snow, and the tids and bits of knowledge you shared. Thanks for sharing, already bookmarking this to return whenever I plan. This level of exoticism is only seen in dreams.

[amyntor]

This is wonderful! I visited Central Asia last year around the same time and spent about two months travelling in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Tajikistan. Unfortunately, I couldn't go to Kyrgyzstan. These countries are truly well kept secrets. Great food (I eat non-vegetarian almost exclusively ), stunning sights while also being relatively inexpensive.


> Keep Euro or Dollar. Almost all cities will have currency conversion place and you will get good rates. You can even do small amount conversion at Airport itself.

I'd like to add that one could also use their debit cards to withdraw local currency from any Kazakh bank ATM. They are available in every big city throughout Central Asia and won't charge any fees. I used my HDFC debit card in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Tajikistan. There was never an additional charge.

[Kashi053]

Originally Posted by MalnadMansha

Hi Kashi. Excellent travelogue.

Were you able to find good and filling vegetarian meals everywhere, considering all of you were vegetarians?

Were you able to get adequate water at all camping sites? Were the trails well-marked? You didn't find the need to hire a guide anywhere?

Yes. The option for veg is limited but you get salads, soups in almost all restaurants. For non-veg lovers, Horse meat is delicacy there.

We had two 5L cans and used to fill them at hotels. On hiking trail, we used stream water. No issues with stream water availability in the hikes we did.

Originally Posted by sup?

This is quite amazing. I have myself been debating between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Having done Iceland/Norway/Austria/Swiss etc, there aren't too many places left in Europe with such natural beauty. Your travelogue will certainly accelerate my plans now.

I will definitely connect with you on Iceland/Norway plan. Planning a caravan Norway trip is in the bucket list. Also want to do extreme off-road Iceland as well. KZ is picking fast with tourism but KG is comparatively still raw.

Originally Posted by DasAuto1985

Lovely travelogue! Refreshing to see a different country than the usual EU ones. Just curious, what made you to opt for Kyrgyzstan ?

Thank you @DasAuto. KG is kinda other side of Kashmir with minimal or no crowd. Hence this country.

Originally Posted by sunny13

Hope to be able to do this sometime. A great reckoner to add to my Bucket list for sure ! 👌

KZ/KG are worth putting them in the bucket list esp if you like adventure, hikes, off-roading, camping.

Originally Posted by amol4184

This is one of the rare travelogs I read up completely, all the photo captions included. I usually just glance at the photos. Thanks for the post.

Thanks Amol. We had very less expectations with this trip but turned out great fun.

Originally Posted by Rev2Serenity

Wow! Superb and unique travelogue with beautiful pictures. Hats off for your preparation and planning. Less travelled country and it's all the more difficult to plan.

True. Google map do not work properly. The locals do not understand English at all. Google translate helped a lot. Not much documentaries online about KZ/KG especially remote areas and some of the hiking routes. But we kept out plan simple and went with the flow. Didn't book any stay earlier. Most of the stays were booked on that day.

Originally Posted by GTI

Wow! That's a great travelogue, I had no idea Kyrgyzstan was so beautiful! Not to mention the 4x4s on your trip... I did not expect to see the VehiCross and the Express there!

4*4 was indeed fun. I had been to Zanskar(via Padum, Lingshed), Hanle, Umling-La, Spiti (4 times) and many other off-road journeys already. So we were pretty comfortable with bad roads when we had 4L option. Isuzu VehiCROSS was a surprise for us as well.

[vb-saan]

Awesome travelogue! Stunning landscape and you have captured those so beautifully. One of my Kyrgyz friend keep raving about her country, but honestly I did not expect this level of varied landscape

Thank you for sharing

[Kashi053]

Originally Posted by nikhilarni

Hi Kashi053,

What was the drive to select Kyrgyzstan as destination ?

Curious to know road conditions and infrastructure (in light of the Ukraine war ).

I was never able to plan or join friends on trips during my initial work life or engineering days. Something or the other always came up - last minute

Less flight time, Affordable cost, Variety of options (camping, off-road, hikes, Yurts , Mountains, Lakes, Hot spring) drove towards KG.

Road condition of highways are really good. Locals follow all rules promptly. Locals mainly use Marshrutka (Shared taxi). Within city Yandex taxi works very well. Remote area roads are bad and you will need a high GC cars. Some of the extreme remote areas can be reached only by 4*4. Toyota/Lexus are vastly used. Supermarkets are more like EU ones. We didn't observe any effect of Ukraine war.

Originally Posted by black.beauty

It's not everyday you come across people hiking to a place where there is nobody else and cooking food as they go, especially when it's a foreign country. Such an extensive trip would require a lot of preparation and co-ordination, you're lucky to have such friends where you can execute it successfully.

Thank you for wonderful wishes. Absolutely true, hiking in the mountains with zero crowd, cooking beside the river, camp fire + tent was the best experience. All credit goes to my friends for turning this plan into reality!

Originally Posted by amyntor

Great food (I eat non-vegetarian almost exclusively ), stunning sights while also being relatively inexpensive.


I used my HDFC debit card in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Tajikistan. There was never an additional charge.

Totally agree that its paradise for non-veg lovers.

We did withdraw 50K Tenge (around 10K INR) at Almaty from HDFC debit card just to check what the charges will be. Later in the statement we saw around 300 Rs charges applied. Not sure which debit card works without any extra charges.

[sup?]

Originally Posted by Kashi053

I will definitely connect with you on Iceland/Norway plan. Planning a caravan Norway trip is in the bucket list. Also want to do extreme off-road Iceland as well. KZ is picking fast with tourism but KG is comparatively still raw.

Yes, I have written a travelogue for both Iceland/Norway on this forum. Feel free to ask any questions you might have.

Coming to KG, did you book the car rental online and if so, which site? We generally use Europcar on our Euro trips. We booked a 4x4 for our Iceland trip but hardly ever needed it as the F roads did not open up even in mid June and the other roads never required 4x4 capability. Did you really require a 4x4 in KG?

Using cash will be a little strange as our last few trips were all cash free. We literally did not carry a single Euro/Pound on our last trips to Greece and Scotland.

[Guru_Shikhar]

Superb travelogue and excellent pictures.

It gave adventurous feeling to me I can imagine what you must have felt going into unknown territory ( read lesser known ).

This must require meticulous planning and days of efforts to plan such thing.

Hats off to you and thanks a lot for sharing.

Cheers

[Pangaiha]

Excellent pictures! Kyrgyzstan always attracts me more than the most visited countries ☺️

[Kashi053]

Originally Posted by sup?

Coming to KG, did you book the car rental online and if so, which site? We generally use Europcar on our Euro trips. Did you really require a 4x4 in KG?

Using cash will be a little strange as our last few trips were all cash free. We literally did not carry a single Euro/Pound on our last trips to Greece and Scotland.

https://ironhorsenomads.com/rent/kyrgyzstan-rentals/
We rented from Iron horse nomads. Our experience was positive.
Yes there was a need of 4H while going to Ala-Kul hike starting point. Even Kalmak Ashuu pass will be tricky if there is snow. There are many river streams and crossing them after mid day will be challenging. It all depends on how remote you want to explore.

Went through your Iceland, Norway thread. What an amazing vacation that was!

Originally Posted by Guru_Shikhar

Superb travelogue and excellent pictures.

This must require meticulous planning and days of efforts to plan such thing.

Cheers

Thanks. Yes we had a high level plan but we kept it flexible. Had to change some of itinerary on the fly based on locals input. We didn't book any stay beforehand.

Originally Posted by Pangaiha

Excellent pictures! Kyrgyzstan always attracts me more than the most visited countries ☺️

Thanks. Good to visit before the commercialisation starts.

[sup?]

Could you refer the travel agent you used? And what was the turnaround time for the Visa/documentation?

[PreludeSH]

What ? Kyrgyzstan ? And you travelled so much over such varied landscape. Great looking photos and that's a lot of places you visited. Really surprising, off-beat and beautiful trip.

[Fdtheman]

What a fascinating travelogue - well documented and stunning pics. Thoroughly enjoyed reading this.

You guys really covered a lot on your holiday. Kudos.

[Kashi053]

Originally Posted by sup?

Could you refer the travel agent you used? And what was the turnaround time for the Visa/documentation?

We used Iron Horse Nomads for Invitation letter for Visa & Car rentals. We had good experience with them. They are located at Bishkek.
https://ironhorsenomads.com/

Originally Posted by PreludeSH

What ? Kyrgyzstan ? And you travelled so much over such varied landscape. Great looking photos and that's a lot of places you visited. Really surprising, off-beat and beautiful trip.

Thank you! Kyrg offers variety of landscapes.

Originally Posted by Fdtheman

What a fascinating travelogue - well documented and stunning pics. Thoroughly enjoyed reading this.

You guys really covered a lot on your holiday. Kudos.

Thank you. Initial research took time but we were able to execute the plan as per the itinerary.