Hiking through the Charyn Canyon and staying overnight in yurts
Summary
I’m surprised the Charyn Canyon doesn’t get more attention – it is a 300m / 1000ft deep, 155km / 100mile long gash straight through the almost perfectly flat plain floor, with snow capped mountains in the distance and spectacular rock formations all the way along the 3km / 2mile easily accessible walk along the canyon floor. Its not even listed as a highlight of Kazakhstan, let alone Central Asia, which I think it certainly should be
A few high level tips:
- I don’t think its really worth visiting as a day trip from Almaty – it takes around 4 hours to get there, 4 hours back and you’re really rushing it for time to walk along the canyon floor. Instead, stay the night in one of the yurts at the end of the immediate canyon floor and enjoy the changes in colours all around the canyon for the sunsets and sunrises
- Stay longer? I even think it would be worth staying a bit longer to be able to head off on one of the jeep tours of the surrounding area. Seemed beautiful country and a fantastic way to explore it
- As with most spots in Kazakhstan, be aware of the weather – freezing in winter and boiling in summer
- Where to stay? – the only place to stay in the canyon itself is the Eco-Park Charyn Canyon Tourist Complex, which has rooms and yurts, plus a restaurant. So book ahead
- If tired in the heat or cold – there are a series of small trucks that pass along the road in the canyon and, if you ask nicely, they seem more than happy to give you a life
- Heading from here to Kyrgyzstan – as an extra tip, if you want to head to the beautiful hiking area around Karakol just over the border in Kyrgyzstan, you don’t have to go the super long way round via Almaty and Bishkek. Instead, you can travel directly over the border when it is open in May – October and head through the actually quite beautiful Karkara Valley. I did it myself and it was surprised how straightforward it was with a little basic planning and using a couple of taxis – do not try and do it with public transport. Rather than listing out all the info I vaguely remember about it, I found the website Away with the Steiners Kegan border crossing pretty accurate
highlights
#1 Walking along the 3km / 2mile stretch of the valley floor and seeing the combination of the surrounding roadrunner-style rocks and surrounding mountain views
#2 Spending the evening in the yurts at the end of the valley, and being able to look up to the stars in the evening
#3 Climbing up some of the precariously leaning rocks and being rewarded with views from the lookout points at the top
#4 The great contrast when you see the fast flowing river at the end of one part of the canyon, after walking through the desert setting
Experiences nearby
The below map shows experiences nearby with a colour that reflect the Overall Score of those experiences
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Score Detail
Background - how many times have you asked someone what a travel experience was like and the response was "amazing" or "awesome"? That response is nice to know, but it makes it hard to differentiate that experience compared to others. That is exactly what these scores are trying to do - differentiate the experience by giving a score out of 10 based on 6 categories and then giving an overall experience score
This overall experience score is calculated by: take the highest of the "Culture" or "Nature" score (1-10) + "Fun factor" (1-10) + "Avoiding the crowds" (1-10) + highest of the "Unique" or "World Famous score" (1-10). Then convert into a score out of 100
Extra detail - the logic being that I find all of the 6 individual scores important, but I don't want to mark an experience down just because it doesn't cover both "Culture" and "Nature", or because it isn't both "World Famous" and "Unique". Take the examples of Safari in The Serengeti and walking through Rome - they both appeal at opposite ends of the nature / culture spectrum, and you can have a fantastic time without needing to appeal to both sides. So, their overall scores aren't penalized for their lack of one or the other, and I've done the same for "World Famous" vs "Unique". But . . . I do think that the "Fun factor" of an experience is important, irrelevant of other factors, and so is "Avoiding the Crowds" (or where there are crowds that add to the experience). So, both of these scores are standalone