Snowy Peaks and Unknown Roads: Spring Riding in the Tian Shan Mountains –

Continuing his trip through Central Asia, Ryan Wilson weaves back and forth between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Follow along as he crosses the Northwestern corner of the Tian Shan Mountains and gets cross-examined by border guards…

New Parts of Familiar Places

Escaping the traffic of Taraz, in Kazakhstan, I weaved through neighborhood streets toward Kyrgyzstan’s northwestern border. I immediately knew that this crossing doesn’t get a lot of tourists when the Kyrgyz border officer had to stare at my passport for a while and then ask around to a few of his coworkers about whether I needed a visa or not, with everyone was confused. I pieced together enough Kyrgyz and Russian to let him know that it’s 60 days visa-free, but he was skeptical.

The line behind me, full of only locals, gets antsy before the man eventually shrugs and ker-plunks the stamp on an empty page. After six years, I was back in Kyrgyzstan, with a vague route plotted out to visit as many regions that I missed back in 2019 as I could fit into those 60 days. Kyrgyzstan is essentially a bike camping paradise, so it wouldn’t be hard to aim toward a random spot on the map and find myself in a stunning place to ride.

While many border roads can be clogged-up disasters of traffic, this one was surprisingly chill. Still, I decided I’d meander off the main route toward an even quieter valley where I’d have a chance to get back onto dirt roads ASAP. In the first days of May, my options were still a bit limited by snow clogging up the higher dirt road passes, but the sun was strong, and it was melting fast.

I passed a few villages and made my way toward a small area that looked less cluttered by civilization on the satellite map. It wouldn’t be all that difficult to find a place to camp around the villages, but it’s always nicer to get a little bit further out. Sure enough, after I got just outside of the village of Aral, the options really opened up, right as the sun was getting low.

Detours

After a quiet night tucked into the hills, I continued east toward Talas. Shifting from the lush spring green hills I’d become accustomed to in Kazakhstan, the scenery started to turn more arid with every passing kilometer. I stopped as another little dirt track veered off toward some nice-looking rock formations as a local man and his son, on a donkey, came down from a farmhouse to greet me (and take the obligatory selfies). I pointed down the small track, which wasn’t on my map, and asked if I could connect it to Talas. They nodded in return, and so it was decided, I’d take the little detour through the mystery valley to see what I could find.

The track pitched up steeply for a moment, but then weaved its way down through rocky outcrops for a few kilometers. A couple of kids at a farm stared at me, frozen in shock as I came down the little double track past their home. In many Kyrgyz villages, the kids love to play a back-and-forth game of shouting out “hello!” to tourists. I yell back “hello!” and the cycle continues until I’m out of sight. Here, I broke the silent stare by being first to shout “hello!”, but they didn’t unfreeze to reply. I would guess it’s exceedingly rare that they’d see a foreigner rolling by here, but maybe the next one who passes by will come as less of a surprise, and they can start to pick up on the game.

Up and Over Otmok

After arriving in Talas, there was only one way to go, and that was straight over Otmok pass, the lone route that wouldn’t be buried in snow at this point in the year, but that meant some significant time on the main road until I made it to the 3,326m (10,912ft) pass. I managed to find a couple of “shortcuts” to break up the monotony of hugging the shoulder of the pavement, but “shortcut” is a loose term, as these usually tend to double or triple the time spent as I end up on some vague trail for hours just to trim off a handful of kilometers on the asphalt. It does, however, triple my enjoyment, so it’s a win in my book.

After a nice night alongside a river amongst the herds of sheep, I jumped back onto the main road and tried to make real progress to get over the pass. A big truck pulled in front of me and stopped just as I got to the long, steep part of the climb. A man looked at me from the driver’s seat, pointed to my bike, and then to the back of his truck. He motioned with his hand that the road was very steep, miming the movements of a struggling cyclist with his arms. I can’t lie, it was tempting to skip this bit of the main road, but it was still early in the day and the traffic wasn’t all that bad yet, so I declined and pressed on.

Crossing the snowline, still hundreds of meters below the pass, the views were already getting good, but as I got to the top, my first view of the sprawling snow-clad peaks came into view— it was well worth the effort.

On the Plateau

I descended toward an open plateau, eventually meeting with the main road between Kyrgyzstan’s two largest cities, Osh and Bishkek. I’d be trying to avoid that like the plague, but I was heading to Bishkek, so it wouldn’t be entirely unavoidable. Thankfully, these grassy highlands of the Tian Shan mountains have a lot of little double-track roads to veer off onto.

That first track I went down led me toward one of the finest campsites of the trip, perched above a river on a bed of grass, with 360-degree views. Of course, the majestic views came with a roaring wind that picked up at around 1 am, but that’s all a part of the package.

In the morning, I followed the same track down the river until I stumbled upon some super-friendly tourists visiting from Saudi Arabia with their local guide, who invited me to share breakfast with them. They convinced me that my next trip should be to the Kingdom and invited me to their homes when I come— an offer that I just might have to take them up on one day.

Taking the Long Way

Still dealing with my main road phobia, I briefly joined it before heading up what I knew was going to be a brutal climb just looking at the gradient. Even the line on Open Street Maps was oddly unnatural, with straight lines and sharp angled corners… usually not a great sign. It would, however, avoid climbing the bulk of Too Ashuu pass with the traffic, meeting it near the top of the road, so I was willing to risk it, even if I was hike-a-biking.

And boy was I hike-a-biking. After a couple of nice kilometers that lulled me into a false notion of what I was getting into, the road abruptly stopped and met a river. OSM lied to me again. I could see a track on the other side, but it was clear that this was just a shepherd’s trail beyond this point. I tried not to even think about it. Immediately took off my shoes and threw on a pair of sandals. I tossed my shoes across to commit myself and waded through the knee-deep spring-flow water. No turning back now. I was in for a long push. But hey, at least I wouldn’t be getting buzzed by trucks all day.

I slowly worked my way up hundreds of vertical meters, crossing the river another handful of times, before reaching what appeared to be an old mining area closer to the top. Out of nowhere, a nice dirt road appeared, and like magic, I was riding again. That is, until I started to hit the giant snow fields that were covering many of the avalanche-prone zones of the mountain.

They were a pain to cross at times, but I used those big snow drifts to my advantage, setting up my tent right on the road, sheltered from the wind, knowing no one would be driving through any time soon.

Through Bishkek, Back to Kazakhstan

With a bit more climbing, I hit the main road again and hitch-hiked through a very long and sketchy tunnel with some Russian guys who were driving a huge semi-truck full of strawberries. They had to drive 2 days non-stop from Southern Kyrgyzstan, through all of Kazakhstan, and well into Russia. After we got through the tunnel, they pulled over, unloaded the bike from the back, and threw a couple of handfuls of strawberries in a bag for me before I would bomb down the 50+ kilometer (31-mile) descent toward Bishkek.

After a day off in the big city to wander through the bazaar and eat samsas, I was heading straight back into Kazakhstan. This time, heading toward Almaty via a remote dirt pass that hugged right up against the border. I couldn’t find much info about this road online, but some Google Earthing led me to believe it was worth a shot.

The Kazakh locals are especially chatty and interested in what I was up to. They were particularly keen on figuring out why I was heading in the direction I was going. The main road to Almaty takes a long route around the mountains in the opposite direction, so everyone was confused when I insisted there was a mountain road I was trying to take to get there. “No, no, it’s the opposite way!”

Even in the last town on the road, I had guys coming after me on motorcycles to warn me “Net dorogi!! Net dorogi!!” (no road!), making a big X sign with their arms. I pointed to the dirt shoulder on the road and pieced together a bit of Russian to tell them I knew it would be a rough road, but they insisted that no road existed. I pointed to one man’s brand-new-looking dirt bike and translated, “Could you make it with your motorbike?”. “Of Course!” he replied with pride in his skills. “Then I’ll manage”.

The Unknown Road

The road was much tougher than it appeared on paper, with an endless series of steep downhills and uphills; it felt like I wasn’t making much progress toward the top of the pass. Every 10 meters of elevation gain felt like it came with 8 meters lost, and the road was indeed quite rough at times, so progress was egregiously slow. Thankfully, the vibrant green scenery served as enough of a distraction to make it manageable.

Before crossing the pass, the trail went right in front of a rare yurt, only the second I’d seen all day, with a bunch of cows clustered by the river. A man inside spotted me going by and waved me over. He made tea and put out some candies and cookies, as is customary in Central Asia. I asked how long he has been coming to this land during the summer with his animals, and he simply replied, “Years”. I asked how many tourists he has seen come by. He held up one finger for a moment and then pointed it toward me.

The wind was raging outside, and I was dreading trying to pitch the tent, but before I could worry too much about that, he pulled out some blankets on the ground and said I could stay there for the night. It was great not to have my tent getting rocked by 50kmh winds, but the cost was hotboxing in a yurt while my new friend was chainsmoking cigs all night. Perhaps the wind wouldn’t have been so bad.

The Wilson Identity

The last push over the pass the next morning was covered in a sea of wildflowers. I had arrived at the perfect time. Winding through the remote valley on a bed of grass was exactly what I had in mind when I decided to come to Kazakhstan in the spring.

As I made my way down, I eventually came up to a large house with a gate crossing the road and some uniformed men outside. There isn’t much but a hill separating Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan here, so it was a military outpost to make sure no one was crossing improperly.

The guys asked where I was from and then carefully examined my US passport. I showed them the Kazakhstan stamp I received just 2 days earlier, but they were confused by the two previous stamps from a couple of weeks before. I repeated exactly where I came from a few times, but there was still confusion.

The man in charge kept flipping through pages in the passport and looked at me. “Tourist?” he asked. I replied, “Yes”, and looked down at my bike, wondering what else this could be. He was clearly wondering why I would come to such a remote place that doesn’t get tourists and then said to me, with a totally straight face, “FBI?”. I laughed and joked that an international bicycle spy would probably be more of a CIA thing. I explained that I’ve been bike touring all around the world for 9 years and that I now do it as my job, taking pictures.

The guys cracked some smiles, but I couldn’t get a read on whether the main officer was serious or just entertaining himself. Maybe it was just a deadpan Kazakh sense of humor. A bit more questioning about my route followed, but in the end, they handed back the passport and came out with a plate of fried dough for me to eat before sending me on my way. It wasn’t unlike some of the encounters I had with Turkish military checkpoints, where they would seem quite suspicious of me for a while and then be like, “ok, now it’s time for tea and baklava”.

Sixty kilometers later, I reached a town with a hotel and decided I’d take a day off there to do laundry and rest. Luck would have it that when I sat down at a restaurant in town for lunch the next day, a young man came up to my table and sat down. I didn’t recognize him in plain clothes for a moment, but he was one of the officers from the military post the day before. We laughed at the coincidence, and then he translated on his phone to me, “Are you really a spy?”, with a face of earnest curiosity. I laughed again, “Have you seen the Bourne movies? I’m like Matt Damon, but my power is riding a bicycle very, very slowly”. I showed him some photos from different countries around the world, and he started to understand.

From there, I had an easy, but chaotic day of riding into the city of Almaty. It’s arguably the most modern and developed city in all of Central Asia. Last time I was here, I didn’t have a chance to head into the nearby mountains because winter had already set in, but I was looking forward to changing that in the coming days.

Stay tuned here for the next installment when I make my way through those mountains toward Kazakhstan’s famed Charyn Canyon, and return to Kyrgyzstan.