Altyn Arashan - Alpine Shangri-la

The journey up to Altyn-Arashan a bone shaking ride in Valentin's 50 year old jeep. We spent the 14k journey up squished into the back of the jeep with our luggage, the cook (Tania), the guide (Sasha) and a selection of fence posts that Valentin was talking the opportunity to bring up to the camp. The jeep is a relic from the Russian army that actually starts using a hand cranked starting handle in the front. It constantly sounds as though it is on its last legs – but made is successfully up something that even an avowed optimist could not call a road. We eventually reached the “lodge” - in the loosest sense of the word, with The Aussie, David (who was refusing to SHUT UP! Not that annoying me of course) and a bunch of very friendly mice.

The only people we spotted on this journey were some hard looking men riding back down from the pastures – the equivalent of Kyrgyz cowboys or frontiersmen – not someone you’d want to get into a fight with, or be close enough to smell….. They sat stoically on their scruffy ponies with dirty, white Kyrgyz hats atop swarthy weather beaten faces. Bedrolls attached to their pack saddles indicated their nomadic tendencies – it seems facetious to say that it didn’t look like an easy life.

Altyn-Arashan is remote. The only sign of people were the squat concrete huts next to the hot springs, manned by scary, bearded Russian women and the tents along the track up from the road which were being used by local loggers with noisy dogs chained to their logging equipment outside. The drive up to the valley stutters across pine clad slopes with steep pine clad slopes to the left and a stony drop t the river on the right. At times the road was so blocked with chunks of rocks from winter avalanches that we had to get out and skirt around them on foot, leaving Valentin to coax his beloved jeep up vertiginous rock falls to make it through. It was music to our ears (although maybe not those of the local people!) that bears are known to frequent the area during the summer and that wolves move in during the winter.

The name of the valley translates as “Golden Spa” in Kyrgyz – a reference to the abundance of natural hot sulphur springs to be found. The valley itself sits at 3,000m – an alpine Shangri-la with lush pasture carpeting the valley floor, bathing in golden sunlight – with little stirring but the eagles riding the thermals overhead. At the head of the valley is the 4,260m Peak Palatka (Tent Mountain) looming as a snow capped benevolent giant in the shape of a giant marquee and supplying the snow melt water that courses in a fast, shallow Arashan river down to Karakol. Local peaks (of the Ak Suu rage of the Tien Shan) reach up to 5,022m. That’s quite high!

On our first afternoon Valentin sent us out to climb a local hill to get a breath of fresh air and see how we found the altitude. It was pretty knackering – but had amazing views. Our acclimatisation walk was fun, if slow going, and we came down as it started to get dark to have a warm up in the hot springs. David had sprinted on ahead and disappeared further up the slopes from us and we did get a bit worried waiting for him as it was pitch black and we started to think that he might have missed his footing somewhere. We went and told Sacha who didn’t seem to care at all and eventually dragged Tania out to wave a torch around and look for him. Luckily he turned up – just as we were wondering what on earth to do – and got thoroughly told off.

Our food was provided by Tanya in a leaking coach. There were many giggles as she kept disappearing behind a ragged curtain to giggle with Sacha. It didn’t take us all that long (even with the altitude making us feel a bit peculiar) for us to realise that they were getting it on with a bit of alpine passion between courses.