Kyrgyzstan’s Tourist Attractions

Osh is the second largest city in Kyrgyzstan; it has an official status of the state’s “southern capital”, located on the south-eastern outskirts of the Fergana valley at the northern foot of the Kichialai Range (south-western suburbs of the Tien Shan and north-eastern suburbs of the Pamir-Alay) on altitude 700 - 1000 meters above sea level. This ridge surrounds Osh on three sides, with Suleiman-Too peak rises over 100 m in the city center.

The Burana Tower (or Burana Minaret) is an archaeological and architectural monument located among the ruins of the Burana settlement, 12 km south-west of the town of Tokmak in Kyrgyzstan, on the left bank of the Chu River.

Historians believe that it is all what was left of the medieval city of Balasagun, the capital of one of the largest and most powerful Turkic feudal, the Karakhanid state(940-1212). At this time, Balasagun, located on the Great Silk Route, was one of the booming Central Asian cities. 

Once, in the II century BC, the ancient travelers, with caravans of camels and horses chose a place to rest on the way from the Fergana Valley to the legendary Kashgar. It was the town of Uzgen (Uzkent, Uzgent, Uzgan) - a village between the Kara-Darya and Yassi. Today Uzgen is the administrative center of the Uzgen district of the Osh region of Kyrgyzstan, located between the major cities - Osh and Jalal-Abad.

For a whole millennium, Uzgen was an important transit point for various travelers and adventurers, hunters for oriental spices, and in the middle of the 11th century the Karakhanids (a Turkic dynasty that reigned in 840-1212) founded one of their capitals here.

The Alay Valley (Alai Valley) called by locals simply ‘Alay’ (‘Alai’) is one of the most picturesque parts of the Pamir-Alai, a tectonic depression between the Alay and Trans Alay Ranges situated in the south of Kyrgyzstan at elevations between 2,240 m and 3,536 m. The valley stretches 150 km west to east, with a width between 8 km and 25 km, and runs across most of southern Osh Province. The Alay Range is lower than the Trans Alay Range. It features a number of rich summer pastures (jayloo) hidden in its gorges, while the Trans Alay Range is characterised by very high, inaccessible, everwhite summits, which are massive and light at the same time, seeming rather to try to reach the sun and the sky than to press upon the earth.

The high-mountain valley Suusamyr is located 130 km from Bishkek and is bounded by the Kyrgyz range (the Kyrgyz Ala-Too, the Kyrgyz Alatau) from the north and the Susamyr-Too (Susamyrtau) from the south-west. The Jumgal-Too range closes the valley from the southeast, giving it a triangular shape: the long side (100 km) runs along the Kyrgyz ridge with peaks up to 4500 meters high.

The valley is located at an altitude of 2200-2600 m, its length is 100 km west to east, and the width at most is 40 km. The snow cover lasts 130-160 days a year here, reaching a maximum thickness of 70 cm. Suusamyr valley, protected by high mountains has a unique microclimate favorable for practicing skiing.

The famous Pamir Highway is an asphalt road running at high altitudes for 700 km to link Dushanbe with Khorog (Tajikistan) and Osh (Kyrgyzstan). The Pamir Highway also known officially as route M41 (M41 Road, M41 highway) largely follows the Tajik border with Afghanistan and China. This mountain road ranks as one of the world’s highest international asphalt roads. The highway is hugely important as part of the regional infrastructure, as this is the only artery linking the remote areas of the Pamir Mountains with the rest of the world.

The Pamir Highway is empty and unpredictable: it features beautiful scenery and several passes over 4,000 m above sea level, with very few garages and fuel stations all along the road.

Arslanbob is a unique creation of nature, a blooming oasis 1600 m above sea level and one of the most beautiful resorts in the south of Kyrgyzstan.

Arslanbob district is located in the boundary of the Babash-Ata ridge on Fergana and Chatkal ranges’ western and southern slopes and is famous, above all, for its stunning relict walnut-fruit forests occupying a total of 608.5 thousand hectares. These are the largest planet’s walnut forests. Up to 130 species of trees and shrubs grow here, including walnut, pistachio, almond, pear, apple, cherry plum, currant and others. The forests are multi-tiered with diverse shrub undergrowth.

Jety-Oguz is a ridge of red rocks covered with forest thickets. The length of the rocks is 37 kilometers, and the cognominal river formed the gorge’s landscape. The huge dark green forests spreading over the red sandstone mountain slopes create an amazing color contrast. On both sides of the gorge forest tracts stretch for nearly 25 km, and small picturesque groups of Tien Shan fir trees stand here and there before becoming another thicket. Above the forest zone (about 3000 m), in a valley about 15 km wide, there are magnificent subalpine and alpine meadows - jailoo.  In the spring and summer Jety-Oguz gorge “hosts” a real flower festival, as the rocks cover with silvery stars of edelweiss, alpine chamomiles and asters, elecampane (inula, “golden root”).

The greatest, mysterious, lost in the wilds of Asia - the mountains of the Pamir have always stirred minds. Sharp peaks seemed unattainable, deep rocky gorges - impregnable, winding roads heading to the clouds - unreliable. 

The Pamir Mountains divide Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Pakistan and Afghanistan. And everywhere they appear to travelers different, but exciting.

Tian Shan is the majestic and beautiful mountains in the heart of Central Asia. People come here to lose their heads from the beauty of landscapes, leave a part of their souls in deep gorges and lose peace forever, falling in love with dense coniferous forests and crystal lakes.

The Tian Shan mountain range stretches from east to west throughout China, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

Tian Shan is one of the highest mountains on the planet - more than thirty peaks here exceed the mark of six kilometers. It is not by chance that the name of these mountains is translated as “heavenly” or “divine” mountains.