Kyrgyzstan
Altyn-Arashan
Sulphurous hot pools steaming between spruce trees at 2,400 metres, snow leopard territory above.
Steam rises from pools set among Tien Shan spruce at 2,400 metres, and the sulphur sting in the air mingles with woodsmoke from the guesthouses. The Arashan River runs cold and fast below the bathhouses. Above the treeline the rock turns bare and steep: snow leopard country, where the prints outlast the sightings.
Altyn-Arashan is a hot-springs valley in the Terskey Alatoo, reached on foot or by a bone-rattling 4x4 track from Ak-Suu village near Karakol; there is no public transport, and the old trucks grinding up the gorge are part of the experience. Three groups of thermal springs rise beside the Arashan River, their hot sulphurous water held in pools inside wooden bathhouses, and a long soak is exactly what legs fresh off a pass need. The valley lies within the Arashan State Nature Reserve, whose upper slopes hold around twenty snow leopards and several bears. Guesthouses and yurts run through the summer season, and the classic trek climbs from here over the 3,860-metre Ala-Kul pass to the lake beyond, which makes the springs both a destination and the finish line of the circuit.
Solo
Trek in alone, soak in sulphur pools at altitude, and bed down beside a woodstove. The valley rewards self-sufficiency with hot water and silence in equal measure.
Couple
Hot springs in a spruce forest at 2,400 metres; the setting does the work. Soak at dusk when steam catches the last light, then eat in a guesthouse that smells of pine and woodsmoke.
Friends
The Karakol circuit runs through here: over the Ala-Kul pass, down to the pools, boots off, bath first. The springs are the reward between hard days on the trail.
- Three groups of thermal springs rise beside the Arashan River, their sulphurous pools housed in wooden bathhouses.
- The valley sits inside a nature reserve whose slopes hold around twenty snow leopards and several bears.
- There is no public transport: you walk in or ride a 4x4 up the rough track from Ak-Suu.
- Trekkers cross Ala-Kul's 3,860-metre pass and come down to the springs as the finale.
Guesthouse dinners of plov or laghman by the woodstove, eaten in the mingled smell of pine and sulphur.
Packed lunchboxes from the guesthouse kitchens for the day walks, opened wherever the valley looks best.
Fürstensteig
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Naafkopf
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Empakaai Crater
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Tres Cruces de Oro
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A sunrise that can split and shimmer into colours where the Andes fall to the Amazon.
Song-Köl
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Tulpar-Köl
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Sary-Chelek
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Konorchek Canyon
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