Lakes and Canyons

While I think Almaty is a very lovely city, full of trees and nature, a big draw to Central Asia was to see more of the natural landscape. So Alrica and I did a two-night trip to go see some of that spectacular scenery.

Look at those beautiful layers

Our trip began on Friday at 8 PM. We went back to the circus building. This time it wasn't to see the circus, but to meet the bus that would take us on our adventure. The bus didn't leave Almaty until nearly 9 PM. It took over 4 hours to reach the village of Saty. By the time we were situated in our room in a guesthouse, it was 2 AM. And breakfast was being served at 8 AM the next morning so that we could head out at 8:30. Not enough sleep, which was something of a recurring theme on this trip.

I am walking over and along the Kaindy River in this picture

The first breakfast was uninspiring: very bland oatmeal. But it was served with baursaki. This is a fried yeast bread common in Kazakhstan, especially during holidays. It is almost like a donut that isn’t sweet.

View of Lake Kaindy from above

At 8:30 Saturday, we drove out to Kaindy Lake. The fact that the name, Kaindy, is similar to the English word “candy” is entirely coincidental. The lake is not made of candy. But even not being a confection, it was a pretty interesting place. It has an origin story.

The mountains around Lake Kaindy

Do you know the word “orogeny”? An orogeny is a period in which mountains are forming. For example, about 80 million years ago, the Rocky Mountains of North America began to form. This continued actively for about 30 to 45 million years. That period of time was the orogeny of the Rocky Mountains, called the Laramide Orogeny. Arguably, the Rocky Mountains are still growing to some degree, but the really active part of their formation ended between 50 and 35 million years ago.

Lake Kaindy from the lakeshore

A more recent (still beginning 50 million years ago, so not that recent) orogeny is the Himalayan Orogeny, which created (and is still creating) the Himalayas. But what its name doesn’t imply is that it also created (and is still creating) the Tian-Shan mountains, including those here near Almaty. The Indian tectonic plate traveled north and met the Eurasian Tectonic Plate. When they crashed (a slow motion crash, but with immense power because of how massive these plates are), the land was bent upward, forming mountains. This orogeny is still active today. And, unlike the ring of fire in which the Pacific Ocean plate is subducting (sliding under) the North American plate and the Eurasian Plate, in this particular collision, the two plates are nearly equal in density. So it isn’t one sinking under the other. It is both of them smashing upward.

Kaindy River downstream of the lake as I hiked up to it

Because this process is still active, there is a lot of geological activity in this region. Almaty has earthquakes everyday. But almost all of them are so low in magnitude that no one even feels them. On occasion, a big one happens.

That occurred in 1911. There was a powerful earthquake that did damage to the city. But it also did damage to the mountains. In the Tian-Shan mountains, there was a landslide. Limestone crashed down, blocking the flow of the Kaindy River. This formed a natural dam and the water began collecting behind it. Soon an aspen forest was submerged and a new lake, Kaindy Lake, formed.

Look at the bare rock there. I wonder if this was exposed in the same earthquake.

It is a beautiful, but eerie, lake. The water is turquoise, due to the limestone base of the lake. That’s artistic. But the eeriness is the bare vertical trunks of the trees sticking up out of the water. The formation of the lake killed the aspens, but the water is so cold, it preserved the trunks. Over the decades since the lake formed, those trunks have lost all their branches. Now only these vertical wooden shafts lurch upward out of the lake.

Like tree skeletons, the plant kingdom's undead

To get from the parking lot to the lake, you need to travel. You have three choices as to how you do this. There are vehicles which can take you closer and then you have a short walk down a long staircase. Or you can hike a trail the entire way. Or you can ride a horse along a different trail that takes you most of the way there. Alrica opted for the horse and I opted for the hike. My hike was very pretty, much of it along the path of the Kaindy River that flows out of the lake when it spills over the natural dam.

Pretty flowers

Alrica had a good ride, though her horse decided it was shy of horses going the other direction. It walked Alrica into some brush and trees. So she had scratches on one arm and one leg, which is like a mark of courage.

Mosque in the village of Saty

After Kaindy Lake, we returned to the guesthouse for lunch. We had a rice dish, not sure what its name is. We were given a short rest period, and we needed it. But it wasn’t long enough for a real nap. Because in the afternoon, we headed to Lower Kolsay Lake.

That's me at Lower Kolsay Lake

There are three Kolsay Lakes, upper, middle, and lower. These are much older lakes, formed when the mountains were growing. In some ways, Lower Kolsay Lake was similar to Lake Tahoe back at home. It was much larger than Lake Kaindy.

Alrica on the pier at Lower Kolsay Lake

Alrica and I walked down to the lake an onto a pier. Here we decided to remove our shoes and socks and to dangle our feet into the water. OMG! The moment I plunged my feet into the water, my brain reeled with pain sensors. It was like acid was eating my feet. Except it wasn’t acid, and it wasn’t pain. After a few seconds, my brain corrected its first incorrect impression. These weren’t sensations of pain, but rather cold, intense cold. It made sense. Of course the lake is fed by snowmelt. But I had underestimated how close to snow and how barely warmer than melt that water would be.

Brrr!

It was actually pretty fun to dip our feet in, let them chill for a few seconds, and then pull them out so the sun could warm and dry them.

The expanse of Lower Kolsay Lake

We never visited Middle Kolsay Lake, but we learned a great story about its other name: Thousand Horse Lake. After Russia (pre-Soviet Union) conquered Kazakhstan, the Russians would do this thing that the Kazakhs hated. They would just come through and take away the Kazakh people’s livestock and call it taxes. Quickly the Kazakhs had enough of this. So they rounded up their horses and drove their cattle up into the mountains. There the cattle and horses could graze on the grasses and drink from the lakes. It is said that when one of the Russian explorers finally “discovered” the Middle Kolsay Lake, “discovered” being a relative term since the Kazakh people had known it was there for a long time, the lake was surrounded by a thousand horses, those of the Kazakh people.

After Kolsay Lake, we returned once again to the guesthouse. We had manti for dinner. Manti (the Kazakh name) or mantou (the Chinese name) is a kind of dumplings, a lot larger than say wontons or more traditional Chinese dumplings. These have a great origin story too. The word literally means “barbarian head.” You gotta know why, right?

This goes back to the third century, in what is called the Warring States Period of China. A military leader, Zhuge Liang, had just successfully led his forces in a battle against some barbarians from the south. He was trying to return home, but he had get his goods, horses, and men, across a river. The river was very turbulent and the only way to calm it was to make a sacrifice to the river gods. They demanded five hundred decapitated heads.

This is manti

Zhuge Liang was not a fan of human sacrifice. He opposed it. And being a good military leader, he also opposed killing his soldiers just to appease the river gods. Instead, he had a clever idea. He told the cooks of the legion to make big dumplings out of wheat dough and fill them with meat. He then offered these head-sized dumplings to the river gods who were like, “Awesome, thanks, man!” And the rivers calmed and Zhuge Liang and his troops were able to cross.

The manti served today are large, but not human head sized large. Maybe more like the palm of your hand sized. The ones we had were filled with chicken and potato.

That evening there was a bonfire and party with games. We did go, but decided reasonably soon that this event was geared towards people in their 20s and 30s who were keen to drink a lot of vodka. So we walked back to our guesthouse and got some of the sleep we badly needed.

Not the bonniest of bonfires, but somewhat bon.

On Sunday, breakfast was at 7 AM. We got fried eggs and buckwheat. I’m not sure I’ve ever eaten buckwheat before. (I’ve certainly eaten fried eggs before.) Buckwheat was good, not amazing, not something I am going to buy in bushels to make in the future. But I would eat it again.

At 7:30 we left the village of Saty and headed to Charyn Canyon. (That is pronounced more like shar-EEN.) Charyn Canyon is often referred to as the Grand Canyon of Kazakhstan. It isn’t nearly as big as the Grand Canyon of the United States, but it isn’t tiny and it is very pretty.

The beginning of Charyn Canyon

Our first stop was at the start of the canyon, the most upriver part of it. Here the rocks are dark, mostly black or dark gray. So one of the names of this area is the Black Canyon. Our tour guide on the bus was funny. She asked, “Now we go to the Black Canyon. Can you guess why it is called that?” Pretty much everyone could guess.

The Charyn River coursing through the Black Canyon

It is interesting that different parts of the canyon are very different in appearance. There are different types of rock with different minerals in them. So the colors are different, but also the shapes.

The Yellow Canyon or the Canyon of the Yurts

Our second stop was the Yellow Canyon or what is also called the Canyon of the Yurts. The Kazakh people were nomads. They led their herds across the land in different seasons to find grazing places. And they lived in yurts. These are fabric tents over a wooden frame. The base is cylindrical and the top is a cone. They are designed to be sturdy, easy to break down, carry, and rebuild. And they are designed so that in different seasons you could build the walls from different materials. For example, using wool in the winter helped keep the inside warm.

Do you see the conical tops? Those are yurt-shaped-ish.

The Canyon of the Yurts is named that because the tops of some of the stone sides of the canyons have that cylindrical with conical shape. Looking across at points, you see the yurt like forms, almost a skyline of yurts.

The Valley of Castles (as was the very first picture of the post)

Our third and final stop was the most visited part of Charyn Canyon, the Valley of Castles. (It does have a color name too, the Red Canyon.) The Valley of Castles is a canyon perpendicular to the main Charyn Canyon. It was formed by a tributary, not the main Charyn River itself. The walls of the canyon look like the towers of castles. For about two kilometers, you can see these pillars and marvel at what nature can do.

Maybe that one is a wizard's tower

That was not just our final stop in Charyn Canyon, it was the last stop of the tour. After that, we drove several hours back to Almaty. We were away for less than 48 hours. And we packed a lot of nature into those hours. And not enough sleep.