Despite what we thought was an early start this morning, traffic was already fast and furious by the time we got underway heading to the southern part of the city of Almaty to visit Stantours. This is a well known Central Asian tourist company that helps travelers get visas and arranges tours and accomodation. We have been in contact with them for some months regarding our arrangements for Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Also this is where our package (the one we visited FEDEX about on Monday) was/had been delivered.

After negotiating our way through city streets with low trees and dense crazy traffic we found a place to park the truck and made the remaining 2 km walk to Stantours office. In the courtyard we were surprised to see a large 8 wheeldrive Kamaz truck onto which someone was building a camper box. While we were examining this fascinating machine David (our contact at Stantours) arrived and we went to the office, paid some money, and collected our parcel.

Back on the road we headed back north and then east out of the city onto the A351 which would eventually carry us to Charyn Canyon, about 200 km from Almaty.

On the eastern edge of Almaty we were stopped by, and had a pleasant sign language conversation with, a couple of police officers; interestingly (and other travelers please note) they checked our passports, dates of our kazak visa and that we had registered the visas.

We spent the remainder of the day driving along the bumpy (for us) paved road. The two really striking features of todays drive were the trees and the fruit and vegetable stalls dotted along the roadside. For long stretchs the A351 is flanked by large stands of very mature and tall trees (with white painted trunks) that offer travelers wonderful places to stop and get some relief from the heat. In the many small villages these same trees offer local farmers/growers a place to set up their stalls to sell all manner of fruit and vegetables to passers-by.

After the town of Chilik the nature of the country side changed abruptly, the trees ceased and suddenly we were in open grass lands then through a small range of mountains, then back onto grass lands eventually coming to the sign for the turn off to Charyn Canyon. About half way along the 10km dirt entrance road we met a couple of rangers who collected the entrance and camping fee.

At the Canyon we met a group of Kazaks on a days outing and we got the opportunity to try their national drink called qymyz- fermented mares milk. The consistency of milk with the flavour of sour unsweatened yogurt. I was assured it was low in alcohol.

After our new friends departed we drove along a narrow road towards an overlook to get our first glimpse of the famous canyon, but caution overcame valor and we stopped before the final lookout - the road was too narrow and the final parking area too small for us to turn around on. So after backing up and finding a secure place to park we walked down the road and got that glimpse of the river Charyn way down in the canyon.


As the LonelyPlanet says "it's no Grand Canyon but it is worth a visit". We found a flat place to park at the level of the plateau that forms the top of the canyon; turned the truck to take advantage of the breeze (a cross breeze through the camper windows) and settled in to a comfortable evening.