Ak-Talaa Valley

A single dirt track winds through grass so tall it brushes the flanks of passing horses, and somewhere ahead an eagle screams from the wrist of its hunter. Ak-Talaa Valley in Kyrgyzstan's Naryn region stretches between ridgelines that seem to recede forever, its settlements so scattered that smoke from a distant yurt is the closest thing to a signpost. The silence here is not empty — it hums with insects, wind, and the far-off bells of livestock.

Ak-Talaa is one of Kyrgyzstan's most remote inhabited valleys, lying in the western reaches of Naryn province. The valley is home to practising eagle hunters — berkutchi — who train golden eagles to hunt foxes and hares across the open steppe. This is not performance; eagle hunting remains a living tradition here, passed through families across generations. The valley's isolation has preserved semi-nomadic patterns of life largely unchanged by modern infrastructure. Seasonal migration between winter villages and summer jailoos (high pastures) still dictates the calendar. Visitors who arrive during the autumn hunting season witness eagle training in its working context, not its festival form.