This year’s edition of Lads On Tour took place in Kyrgyzstan over two weeks at the beginning of August. We visited Bishkek, Son Kul, Bokonbayevo, Ak Terek, and Karakol. Here’s an overview of what we did and how we did it.
Every effort has been made to ensure I’m not spreading any fake news regarding details about the wonderful country of Kyrgyzstan. However, if you spot any factual errors, please do let me know.
Why Kyrgyzstan?
Natural beauty, cheap prices, good traveler safety, and overall fun post-Soviet vibes.
Matt Lakeman’s excellent writeup on Tajikistan was what first got me thinking a bit about doing a trip to the ‘stans, although I thought Kazakhstan would be the safest bet for a travel noob like myself. The idea of a Kyrgyzstan holiday was pitched to me by my friend over text some time in January this year, and I agreed after doing about a minute and a half of Googling.
Where Kyrgyzstan?
Here.
(Credit: Wikipedia)
How Kyrgyzstan?
Getting there
One generally flies into Kyrgyzstan by way of Manas International Airport, which is about 30 minutes north of Bishkek. I got there via Istabul, and some others in our party got there via Dubai.
Getting in
A subset of us have only South African passports, meaning we’d be politely turned away if we showed up at Manas airport border control unprepared. The search for information on how to obtain a visa was straightforward at first. Several nice websites informed us that our options were either to obtain an e-visa in advance, or to risk standing in a huge queue at the airport for a visa-on-arrival, the latter of which being an option for only South Africans, Indonesians, Venezuelans, and Philippinos.
Past editions of Lads On Tour have each had their own iconic disaster, ranging from a clogged sink in Cape Town to extreme medical emergencies in Eastern Europe. It would be a tremendous shame for this trip’s big (potentially trip-ending) disaster to occur right at the start, so we opted to do our homework and apply for an e-visa. This was a headache-inducing process, which included (but was not limited to)
- a $50 application fee,
- unclear instructions as to whether one needed a letter of invitation from a Kygyz national,
- even more unclear clarifications from the Kyrgyz visa WhatsApp hotline to this effect,
- a hilariously bugged application form which refused to accept my uploaded documents because the file size was too small, and
- an eventual outright rejection of the application with literally no elaboration on why this happened.
With the only remaining option being a visa-on-arrival gamble and with our tickets already bought, we decided to show up and see what happened.
When we landed at 04:00, there was nobody else at the visa-on-arrival desk. As in, there was no queue at the desk, and no attendant to attend to the non-existent queue either. We managed to flag down an airport staff member and began gesticualting panickedly at the visa counter saying, “visa? Visa?” The staff member then walked over to the counter, banged on the glass several times, and lo and behold, a visa attendant crawled out from under the desk, where she was evidently until recently sound asleep. She rubbed her eyes, said “you need visa?”, took our forms, printed a visa with a spelling mistake in the surname, took some money, and we were done. Simple as!
Perhaps not very many Indonesians, Venezuelans, or Philippinos (much less South Africans) arrive on this flight at this time, so I don’t fault her for taking a doss under her desk. I mention it here since it was simply a very entertaining conclusion to the visa saga, and a rather iconic way to begin the holiday.
Getting around
For our first few days in Bishkek we mostly walked around and made use of the pretty good bus system. For our subsequent odyssey to and from the great lakes, we hired an automatic all-wheel-drive from Russian Troika, which we can recommend wholeheartedly. Sergei was even nice enough to let us keep the car after seeing us somehow stall on our way out of the parking lot.
Yandex Taxi is the analogue of Uber, and it is quite popular in and around the big cities. We got one from the airport after landing that was certainly a sign of things to come: a mostly cracked windshield, no seatbelts, a yelling gearbox, and an incredibly friendly driver who, while certainly not understanding all of our slang-laced banter about old high school mates, would laugh heartily along with us when the time was right.
Most Yandexes we saw had seat covers on the back three seats which totally hid the seatbelt buckles. Okay, fair enough, passengers can leave a mess sometimes. But the moratorium on seatbelts extended to the copilot seats too in some cases, with either just no belt or one of these doohickeys preventing buckle-up. This, coupled with some of the terrifying car wrecks we saw along the Issyk-Kul shore highway, made Yandex Taxi trips more exciting than their western counterparts.
The peak Yandex Taxi moment occurred in the final hours of the trip on the way back to the airport, when our driver climbed out of the car to throw hands with a drunk guy in the middle of the road. The drunk, who had almost been hit by our car moments earlier, received an absolute tonguelashing from our brave driver before being party to a brief slapfight and suffering a high-speed plastic cup to the head. Luckily, our hero knew to walk away before the cops were called by numerous honking onlookers, and we made it to the airport on time with not even a single grunt of acknowledgement from him for the rest of the journey. It breaks my heart to admit that I did not manage to get footage of the actual fight; it would have been the finest piece of media I have ever had a hand in creating.
Kyrgyzstan?
The National History Museum in Bishkek is honestly the best place to learn about the history of Kyrgyzstan, since online resources are a little scant. The Wikipedia article entitled “History of Kyrgyzstan” is quite good, and one can also certainly take a look at the US Department of the Army’s Country Study on Kygyzstan. I am a fan of the latter’s web design, but it is quite out of date, having been written in 1996. I also feel like one should perhaps also take US army sanctioned research about Soviet state history with a ladle of salt, but that’s just my opinion.
The mega ultra super condensed version of the story of Kyrgyzstan goes a bit like this in my head:
People seem to have been hanging out in the region of Kyrgyzstan for between 200,000 and 300,000 years. The next major records we have involve the Göktürks being some of the first people to form a proper state in the region in around 500 A.D. In 751 A.D. the Arab and Chinese armies duked it out at the Battle of Talas, and the Arabs’ victory is widely believed to have lead directly to the spread of Islam throughout Central Asia — at least according to the exhibit about the battle in the National History Museum. In the 1200s, the Mongols invaded and took over, and Kyrgyzstan was only rid of them in the early 1500s. However, Kyrgyz tribes remained under the thumb of other tribes (such as the Kalmyks and Uzbeks) until as late as the 1800s.
Attempts at diplomacy with the Russian Empire were made in the late 1700s. The Khanate of Korkand – which Kyrgyzstan was a part of at the time – was then annexed by the Russian Empire in 1876. In 1916, Kyrgyz rebels (among others) lead the Semirechye Revolt against the Russian Empire. The reasons for the revolt included newly introduced land confiscation laws as well as the conscription of locals for the then-ongoing Great War. The crackdown from the Empire was brutal, leading to the deaths of at least 100,000 Central Asian natives, and reportedly causing at least one third of all Kyrgyz people to flee into western China.
Kyrgyzstan (or the “Kyrgyz Autonomous Republic”) became a full Soviet republic in 1936. The Kyrgyz language was eventually forced into settling down with a Cyrillic alphabet during this time, before which it went unwritten, and then written in Arabic script, and then in Latin script. The only legal versions of The Epic of Manas (the most important poem in Kyrgyz tradition ever) were ones which had had sections rewritten to better conform to Soviet socialist ideals. Such attempts to stifle Kyrgyz traditions have seemingly backfired spectacularly in the long run, with some traditions becoming arguably even more uniformly widespread today than before Soviet rule.
In 1991, Askar Akayev – a middle-aged physicist – became the first truly post-SSR president of Kyrgyzstan, winning 95% of the votes in the 1991 democratic election. Various shenanigans ensued, including the filling of important positions by Akayev in his government with family members and a suspiciously large number of individuals from his home town. He was re-elected (?) in 1995, and then again in 2000, and then again in 2005, with the outcomes perceived as becoming increasingly dodgy each time. His 2005 “victory” was a bridge too far, though; it sparked the Tulip Revolution, which caused Akayev to flee to Russia and resign.
Kurmanbek Bakiyev took the reins immediately after Akayev. He was also chased into hiding after the 2010 revolution, which was due in large part to grievances about the availability and price of electricity. Roza Otunbayeva then became president and remained so until 2011, claiming the title of the first female head of state for any country in Central Asia, perhaps ever.
Almazbek Atambayev was then elected president in 2011. He is my favourite. Firstly, unlike his predecessors (with the exception of the interim presidency of Otunbayeva) he did not try to remain president longer than his prescribed term. Secondly, the progress he made towards areas like freedom of the press and gender equality seems to have left a pretty positive impact on Kyrgyzstan. Thirdly, he survived two poisoning assassination attempts during his presidency as well as having his car being shot up by some guy in 2020.
Sooronbay Jeenbekov then won the 2017 election. One of the first things he did upon getting into office was to confer the title of “Hero of the Kyrgyz Republic” to his friend and predecessor Atambayev. However, come 2018, the girls were fighting: various scandals had inspired Atambayev to publically express regret having endorsed Jeebbekov as his successor. Jeenbekov’s government was so upset by these comments that special forces invaded Atambayev’s home in Bishkek in 2019 with orders to “not to take ex-president Atamba[y]ev alive” — make that four assassination attempts, then. They did not get him that day, but during another raid one day later, he surrendered and was arrested. The charges brought up at his closed-door trial involved Atambayev’s role in the premature release of a Chechen crime boss from prison in 2013 on dubious medical grounds, as well a manslaughter charge owed to a special agent having died during the raid of Atambayev’s home. He was sentenced to 11 years and 3 months in prison.
Atambayev was subsequently broken out of prison by a team involved in the 2020 revolution. Among the reasons for the revolution this time were the perceived dodginess of the Atambayev trial, and (would you have guessed it) the perceived dodginess of the 2020 parliamentary election results. Jeenbekov resigned in October 2020.
Atambayev ended up going back to prison after the riots were done, and was released in 2023 on medical grounds. He immediately hightailed it to Spain and has not since returned to Kyrgyzstan, where an April 2025 retrial’s guilty verdict awaits him.
Sadyr Japarov has been president since January 2021. Perhaps coincidentally, the power of the Kyrgyz parliament has since been diluted greatly, and there has been enormous crackdown on independent journalism and opposition figures. The National History Museum has a nice little exhibition of him mingling with various world leaders, including Vladimir Putin, Viktor Orbán, Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and Xi Jinping.
Kyrgyzstan
Bishkek
Bishkek was called Frunze until the end of Soviet rule. The local airport, Manas International Airport, actually changed codes while we were there, from FRU to BSZ. Still not that close to “Manas”, and still only a bit closer to “Bishkek”, but whatever. This caused Turkish Airlines to send us concerningly vague emails about “changes to [our] flight”, but everything turned out okay.
Through the cracked windshield of our Yandex from the airport we spotted the largest flag any of us had ever seen. The 45m flagpole and accompanying huge statue of Manas himself really make Ala-Too square one of the coolest places I’ve visited. This sentiment remained even after the jetlag had gone away.
We explored the numerous monuments scattered around the town, both the Osh and Dordoi bazaars, the National History Museum, and various restaurants. I also visited the Boho City Bar, which had good music, friendly waitresses and a “meat show”, and where I got chatting to three Uni Bonn economics bachelor students in Kyrgyzstan National Boxing Team shirts.
Son-Kul
The trip really started when we made a break for the shores of Son-Kul. Son-Kul is a lake that sits at 3016m of elevation among vast, featureless grassy mountaintops. It was amazing.
We stayed at Zalkar Yurt Camp, which boasted cozy yurts, traditional meals, horseback rides through the mountains, and no cellphone signal. In addition to these we encountered more Germans, flocks of adorable sheep, and a local dog who seemed hellbent on trying to bully all of the local livestock to suicide. He liked us humans, though.
A significant portion of the group rated the horse ride through the mountains as the highlight of the whole trip, and this is not a bad call at all.
Issyk-Kul
Issyk-Kul is kind of the place to go in Kyrgyzstan. It an absolutely humongous saltwater lake that measures about 180km long, up to 60km wide, and reaches a depth of around 660m. Our journey took us along its southern shore, which is much less touristy than the northern one.
Our first stop after Son-Kul was a small yurt-ish-themed BnB called Meiman Ordo just outside the town of Bokonbayevo. It was right on the shore, and in the sunset you could see the ginormous mountains that comprise the Kyrgyzstan–Kazakhstan border some 60km away. They also had a massive hot tub, where we spent a whole evening arguing about everything from TQFTs to Charlie Kirk.
The title of “most interesting day trip” of the holiday has to go to our expedition to Aalam Ordo. This location was planned to serve as a leading cultural center for Kyrgyzstan, where youngsters could come spend time on the lake shore and learn from various programmes run by invited experts and elders. Construction of this massive structure began under the Bakyiev presidency, but lost momentum entirely after he was ousted, and has since fallen into a state of beautiful disrepair.
After departing Bokonbayevo, we did a little hike in the Barskoon Valley. We were greeted with stunning alpine views and a very cool monument to Yuri Gagarin, who apparently came to the Barskoon Valley to relax after his wild ride.
That night we stopped in Ak-Terek. We stayed for one night at the Royal Ak-Terek hotel and had an absolutely amazing boso lagman dinner at the local restaurant, Ayzirek. Our evening’s experience was only enhanced when a 4 year old child ran into the restaurant brandishing a rather realistic-looking AK-47 toy, and proceeded to pretend to shoot all of us sitting at the table.
The highway along the southern shore of Issyk-Kul was in an absolute state, and I think this has been the case for many years. In very regular intervals, one is forced off the road onto a dirt path for a few hundred metres, before being allowed back on the highway, only for the same thing to happen a few hundred metres later. It seems as though the road agency calculated the most annoying way to revamp the highway (i.e. in discontinuous 100 metre streaks), tore up the road in these intervals, and then got bored of the idea and left. The “temporary” signs indicating where one should turn off onto the dirt path all seemed very, very old.
Along these dirt path detours you are also bound to see a fleet of trucks whose sole purpose seems to be just watering the dirt. They lumber along at 20km/h sprinkling water over the scorching hot dirt all day, and then get up and do it again the next. I wonder how much money their companies have made since the road repairs began.
Karakol
Karakol is Kyrgyzstan’s third largest city. We did not stay in the city itself, but we visited it to see the Blue Mosque and the Holy Trinity Cathedral, and to have lunch.
We stayed in the mountains roughly an hour outside of town in an AirBnB marketed as having “James Bond views”. We all agreed that it lived up to this promise.
It was at this point in the trip that I began to feel a bit ill, so I sat out another large (and somewhat disastrous) planned hike and instead read “Ring” by Stephen Baxter while enjoying the James Bond views. I felt almost completely better the next day; cool mountain air is good for a boy.
After departing Karakol, we went back to Bishkek, at which point three of the crew popped over the border to Almaty in Kazakhstan, while two of us hung out a bit more in Bishkek with our shitty passports and played Bananagrams.
Final thoughts
About Kyrgyzstan as a place to visit
Kyrgyzstan is a really great place to visit. Getting there and getting around can be a bit daunting, but with a bit of effort put into ones planning, one can have a lovely time.
Young locals seemed keen to practice their English on us, but it is always good to have the Russian language files from Google Translate downloaded on your phone just in case you find yourself arguing with a babushka in the mountains away from cellphone signal.
We’ve set the bar quite high with Kyrgyzstan, in that I doubt the location of the next Lads On Tour will elicit as many raised eyebrows during conversations about summer holidays. We’ll have to see.
About stuff that doesn’t fit anywhere else in this post
- I had crab chips and they tasted okay.
- I came second place in the yearly Lads Uno Championships, the highest I’ve ever been, despite a rocky start on the first night:
- There is quite an obsession with KFC here — obviously, they would like the K to stand for something else. However, all but one of the (rather few) officially franchised KFC branches in the country lie inside the Bishkek city center. This didn’t stop the locals in Bokonbayevo and Karakol from having some fun, though:
Thanks for reading!