The Seven Stans

Aside from under the sea and uninhabitable regions such as the poles, ‘The Stans’ are probably the least known spot on the globe in peoples’ minds!

When you think of a world map is there a blank space in your head roughly inbetween the Middle East, Russia and India? This is exactly where the Stans are. There are seven countries in Central Asia ending in ‘stan’ (meaning ‘land of’): Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

[googlemaps https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/embed?mid=1EhUASyJDv47FgMdxAqcPm2qUYmcbLIYA&w=640&h=480]

How do you picture it?

Overlooked because of inherent safety issues, but also because thier neighbours steal the headlines so often they have almost dissapeared from many peoples’ minds! Most people associate the Stans with Borat, extremism and backwardness and as such, those who have visited usually fall in to one of four groups: military, family relations, extreme tour groups and a handful of specialist photographers.

However, whilst it may not be as safe to travel to them as other countries and even illegal as a solo traveller that doesn’t mean there aren’t incredible places to see and fascinating cultures to experience. This post is here to change your mind, or at the very least bring 7 new countries in to you internal globe. Here goes…

The great expanse of Central Asia has a population density of just eighteen people per square kilometre and is over 90% mountains! This made it very easy to come up with 28 places to add to your bucket list! This list includes both natural wonders and man made curiosities that many eyes may never see.

The Great Expanse and Cannabis Creator

1 Aksu Canyon

This surprisingly stunning and luscious canyon plummets from the rocky outcrops to 500m below where the river rumbles through the valley floor. Aksu Canyon in The Aksu Zhabagly National Park is the oldest nature reserve in Central Asia! Whilst theoretically anyone can enter, you must first pay (640,5 Tenge which is about £1.30) for a permit to walk through the valley and you will be assigned a mandatory tour guide who rarely speaks and when he does it’s not in English. But then you didn’t come here for the easy holiday!

2 Charyn Canyon

The Grand Canyon of Kazakhstan may not be as deep as America’s but the 300m walls climbing before your eyes are sure to leave an impression! The most popular trail is the Valley of Castles trail or the lesser known Witches Canyon trail so called because of holes in the cliff face which when wind passes through the locals say it sounds like the insidious witches of legend who pushed people from the canyon edge!

The park isn’t just for hiking, you can also go adventure kayaking down the river and even stay over night in a log cabin or yurt so you can wake up to those golden sunrises peeking over the valley.

3 Kaindy Lake

This accidental natural wonder was created in 1911 when an earthquake caused a monumental landslide that formed a dam and sealed off part of the river. Whilst the erie trees poking out of the water have been stripped bare, beneath the surface they still have thier bushy leaves! This rare occurence is made possible by the incredibly cold waters, which remain near-freezing even in summer.

The Roof of the World

4 Ak-Balyk Lake

Ak Balyk, meaning white fish pond, is a heavenly holy spring which on calm days is crystal clear. It’s one of the many beautiful roadside stops along the Pamir Highway, sunken in to the rich lichen draped plateau .

5 Wakhan Corridor

This narrow strip of land defined by the Wakhan River once formed the buffer zone between British India and the Russian Empire and is no less contested today as it straddles the border of three Stan countries: Pakistan, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. If you want to see the oasis of luscious river valleys and herding communities nestled in the valley I strongly suggest you visit the Tajikistan side of the border! As it’s so close to the border you will need both a Tajik Visa and GBAO (Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region) permit.

6 Garam Chashma Hot Springs

Garam Chasma is another of the essential stops along the Pamir Highway, an open-air hot spring and centuries old pilgrimage site. Though it’s essentially just a single milky blue pool the calcified steps surrounding the water might bring to mind the steps of Turkey’s Pamukale. In some ways the isolated pool is very civilised, with an organised rota for naked same-sex bathing at 2 hourly intervals, but in reality its more a matter of wait till the last person’s out and then rush in and secure it for your gender!

7 Iskander-kul

Some of Tajikistan’s most beautiful natural wonders can be found in the Fann Mountains. The turquoise water might look inviting, even mesmerising as it reflects the undulating peaks surrounding the lake but at a height of 2200m above sea level this bitterly chilly lake is not for bathing! To remove temptation explore the valleys surrounding the lake, one of which conceals a thundering waterfall!

//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js

Iskanderkul Lake, Tajikistan by Damon Lynch licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

Architectural Hub of the Stans

8, 9, 10 Khiva, Bukhara & Samarkand

The three cities of Uzbekistan’s Silk Road, Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkand are what make Uzbekhistan the architectural hub of Central Asia and an unmissable stop along the Silk Road!

Khiva is best known for its citadel walls which resemble an enormous sand castle, but unlike your regular bucket castle, this one conceals 94 mosques and 63 madrasahs (schools teaching Islam)! Whilst the city can make claims of great cultural value such as being the birth place of the ‘Father of Algebra’, it’s better known for its history as the epicentre of the Silk Road’s slave trade! A city that once realised peoples’ worst fears is now a popular tourist spot! The city’s minarets are some of the most unusual I have ever seen, they are so wide they look more like stubby but gorgeous tiled lighthouses. (Apparently it was originally meant to be 80m high, making it the tallest minaret in Central Asia at the time, but the Khan who commissioned the construction died and the minaret was stunted at 29m.)

Bukhara city is an incredible 2500 years old and was once the centre of the Persian Empire. It’s also the most authentic of the three cities I’ve mentioned, as unlike Samarkand and Khiva it has had little restoration and what has been done is very subtle. But my favourite place is the heart of city life, the Lyab-I-Haus pond, around which you will find children playing in the street, trays of baklava (my favourite pastry!) and teahouses strewn among tree roots.

Samarkand is the most popular place to visit in Uzbekhistan, or more specifically its Registan Square which Lonely Planet has confidently hailed as “arguably the most awesome single sight in Central Asia”. Registan Square’s tiled plaza (photo below) is dominated by three mosaic adorned madrassas (Islamic schools) dating back to the 15th century! Inside the Tillya Kari Madrassah is a courtyard (second photo below) draped in tiny blue and gold tiles circling a tree shaded walkway, perfect to take in your surroundings and forget the noisier parts of the city, as the students who once lived here did.

Though toursists do tend to flock here (relative to the rest of Uzbekistan) they are outnumbered by the pilgrims who journey to the holy sites scattered around the city. Follow thier lead and explore the rest of the sites, such as the impressive blue alleyways of the Shohizinda Necropolis (photo 3 below).

According to noteworthy travel writer and journalist, Erika Fatland (Sovietistan), ‘It is still possible to experience a hint of the old Silk Road atmosphere at the Siyab Market’, which is one of the largest in Samarkand.

11 Mo‘ynoq and the Aral Sea

It’s not just land-locked Uzbekistan that has a shipwreck graveyard but every country that once bordered the Aral Sea. Whilst the countries have gone to great efforts to revive the sea, the southern part of the Aral Sea is refusing to make a comeback. Until this changes Uzbek communities and adventure tourists are slowly choking on the dust being whipped up from the former lake bed by the winds! For example, the once thriving port city of Moynoq, which provided 40,000 jobs, is now an enormous ship graveyard where the only jobs are to salvage metal from the wrecks where camels now shelter from the sun in this post-apocolyptic landscape!

The Aral Sea was once the fourth largest lake in the world! It wasn’t until Soviet irrigation channels diverted the rivers feeding it that the trouble started and the lakeside residents watched the waters recede in to a salty pool, polluted by fertilisers making it too harsh for fish to thrive. The sea has become the Aral Desert, the youngest and most polluted desert on earth. Many villagers remember the shock of having to go to the market to buy fish for the first time in their life, when before they had relied on their sons to catch fish from the lake for free. Though some people do still fish here, what they catch is toxic!

The Most Dangerous Stan of All

12 Blue mosque

Without a doubt the majority of the world thinks of Istanbul when you say ‘Blue Mosque’, but not Afghanis. Why would they, with such a beautiful one on their doorstep! This oasis of calm in a bustling city is said to be the resting place of the son-in-law and cousin of the prophet Muhammad, as such the mosque is an important pilgramige site, from which pilgrims often nick tiles as momentos! In fact, due to a combination of stealing and weathering, 2 square feet of tiles have to be replaced every day!

13 Bamiyan Buddhas

The large opening in the canyon wall (below) is where the largest (170ft tall) of the Bamiyan’s Buddha’s used to stand, known to locals as the “Father Buddha,”. Until 2001, when the Taliban dynamited the statues, they had been the largest statues of standing Buddha on Earth. Ones which had watched over this valley since 501 AD!

The debris from the explosion was collected and sorted to be stored (left photo) in the hope that one day, not to far away, the statues can be rebuilt with as much of the original stone as possible! People are eager for them to return, which was shown by the impressive lightshow projecting 3D buddhas into the caves that once sheltered them, using the same technology that gives us Michael Jackson comeback shows. The projection gear was giften to the Afghani people by a couple in China who wished to provide some peace to the valley, as the very people who live there are the people who were forced to destroy the statues by the Taiban. Author Qais Akbar Omar who recently wrote a book about how his family fled the Taliban in the 90s retells the story of how he and others hid in the caves behind the tallest Buddha’s head!

Personally, I think this is a beautiful temporary solution but nothing can compare to seeing the statues every day for the locals. Unfortunately UNESCO seems to think it won’t be possible to rebuild them, simply because if less than 50% of the new statue is made from the debris of the original, this jepordises the UNESCO status of the site and it will no longer be protected! I think that is such as shame, in exceptional circumstances such as these!

Nomadic Heart of Central Asia

14 Nomad Games

Nowhere in Central Asia is the nomadic culture more alive than in Kyrgyzstan, where the biennial nomadic games are held. Corona Virus has prevented many international gatherings but I doubt it can’t stop one as primordial as this! The competitions are just a whirlwind insight into the culture of the Stans but a photographers’ dream! Events include yurt building, wrestling, polo (using goat carcasses!), horseback archery and hunting with golden eagles! Entry to the games is free, but to make sure you dont miss the opening and closing ceromonies you must buy tickets either in your local Uzbekistani post office (unlikely) or on the World Nomad Games mobile app! Cant believe that exists! Fantastic!

Nomadic culture was central to life in Kyrgyzstan and went largely untouched until about 65 years ago when Soviets introduced the infrastructure of towns and cities. Luckily, many nomads have preserved their way of life, some even went back to the land after having lived in the Soviet towns despite nomadic life being inherently hard and demanding. Even some of Kyrgyzstan’s youth, who have only ever known the city, have learnt and saved nomadic skills such as archery, some even learning to aim and shoot with thier feet whilst doing a handstand! If that’s not a talent I dont know what is!

15 Seven Bulls Mountain

The names alone of the rock formations you can see in this valley make me want to visit: Seven Bulls Mountains, The Broken Heart and The Dragons’ Valley!

The Jeti-Ögüz Rocks have a unique appearance, sheer red cliffs split in to 7 knuckles resembling the backs of seven strong bulls. The rocks’ name comes from a legend of two rival khans, one of which coveted the other’s beautiful wife who then fell in love with her and kidnapped her! Unsurprisingly, this started a war. The Khan who started it sought advice from a local wise man who told him the only solution was to kill his beautiful wife so that she could never belong to her first husband again! Accepting this, the Khan held a festival in which he killed seven bulls and then the beautiful wife. The blood flowing from her broken heart washed away the seven bulls and drowned her kidnapper and his tribe. As time passed the bulls rose out of the blood and became the prominent red cliffs we see today.

The rock formations, especially ‘Broken Heart’ are a well-known landmark in Kyrgyzstan and are even seen as a national symbol which appears in paintings, songs, and even music videos. 

16 Issyk Köl

Despite being nestled amongst the snowy peaks of the surrounding mountains Issyk Kol never freezes, earning it the name of ‘warm lake’. It’s for this reason the area became a popular spot for holiday makers during Kyrgyzstan’s Soviet era, only to be abandoned after the USSR collapsed. I like to think those holiday goers didn’t know the lake is rumoured to be the source of the 14th-century plague, the black death. It’s rumoured that this exact lake was the source of the plague and being a popular stop for traders the plague was spread to other countries via the Silk Road! Even more intriguing is the rumour that the lake hides a 2500-year-old lost city, thought to be the resting place of one of Jesus’s diciples!

The Edge of the World

17 Gates to Hell

The infamous ‘Gate to Hell’ was the only place on this list that I knew about before I started researching. I had only heard a few things about cooking eggs over the great firey pit but that was reason enough to continue investigating!

The Darvaza Gas Crater was an acident that began in 1971 when a Soviet oil rig drill accidently speared in to a natural gas pocket under the Karakum Desert. The gas pocket promptly exploded and engulfed the rig and its workers into the football pitch sized burning crater you see today. Not only was this ‘Gate to Hell’ born into the landscape but it belched out toxic gas which killed all of the local plants life and animals nearby!

As is common practice in this situation, scientists advised the company to set fire to the crater in the hope of burning off what was left of the gas. This usually takes a few weeks or at most a year to eradicate a gas pocket, but it’s now 50 years later and it’s still burning! No one knows how long it will continue to burn, or if it will even stop considering that Turkmenistan has the 6th largest oil reserves in the world!

It’s taken a while for everybody to get used to having an exact location for the ‘Gates of Hell’ but now it’s one of Turkmenistan’s top tourist attrcations, open 24 hours a day!

18 Yangykala Canyon

This is exactly the kind of place that inspired me to make this post. Somewhere breathtakingly unexpected in one of the least touristic and most sparsely populated countries in the world. In other words, somewhere that if it was in the western world would be world-famous but because it’s in the Stans no one but locals and Google Earth trollers know it exists!

Unlike the Grand Canyon of America, this striped valley was formed at the bottom of a long lost ocean millions of years ago. A walk on the valley floor would have put you hundreds of meters below the surface of the sea! The rusty ribbons of oranges and reds colouring the rocks are ideal for a golden hour photo and one of the most dramatic places you could ever camp at! The entire valley is a surreal exploration of an underwater world we rarely see!

19 Ashgabat

A slice of North Korea ecentrisism with a decorative splash of Dubai’s bling in Turkmenistan’s capital! Ashgabat is the city of world records on every corner. It’s the proud holder of the record for the highest concentration of white marble-clad buildings (to cover up the former Soviet tower blocks), the world’s largest indoor ferris wheel (I can’t even begin..) and the largest number of fountain pools in a public space (27 to be exact, which divert water from the only source in the country, rather than to its water insecure residents!). Those are just the record holders! That doesn’t include the spiral glass bank with an enormous gold coin balanced on its roof or the 11 storey Wedding Palace, in which a 32m gold ball is levitated between a 3D eight pointed star! As if that wasn’t enough, the surreal city goes even further, the first non-Soviet leader in 1990, Niyazov, reimagined the country in his own image. He created official holy days that related to important events in his life and had gold statues of himself errected in the street!

You would think this city was crying out for the attention of international photographers, however, the rare few that see it are constrained law forbidding photography of said buildings! (Obviously someone has though haha). Not surprising for a city that forbids independent travel!

Once upon a time Ashgabat was ‘The Garden City of Turmenistan’, an impressive claim when 90% of the country is desert, but lately it has become known by the people who live there as ‘The City of the Dead’ though they wouldn’t dare whisper it.

The Best Known Stan

20 Kaghan Valley

Kaghan Valley is a 160km long alpine valley in the Himalayan rain belt known for its fairy meadows, in particular, Siri Pae above the town of Mansehra. The steep cliffs of the mountains, a narrow mountain road and frequent devastating landslides make this one of the hardest places to get to in Pakistan, but also one of the most rewarding. The fact that it’s hard to reach even in summer has protected the meadows from development and preseved the undulating hills for any intrepid hiker to enjoy! Other attractions include the fairytale Saiful Muluk alpine lake and Naran falls, which are undisputed natural treasures of Pakistan’s landscape.

21 Pakistan’s Waterfalls

Pakistan is hiding some incredibly beautiful waterfalls, whose full flowing waters tumble over moss-lined shelves of successive fairy pools more often than not! My four favourite waterfalls in Pakistan have to be Chotok, hidden in a canyon within Mooli village (photo 1), Gulpur Falls (photo 2), Sajjikot Falls (photo 3) and Neela Sandh Waterfall!

22 Panjpeer rocks

The unusual rock formations of Panj Peer (Five Saints) are the highest point of the Danoi Ridge, peaking at an altitude of 5905ft! The name Five Saints was sparked by a regional legend of a group of saints who made the rocks thier home and remain there for eternity. Hike far enough and you will be lead by the engraved footsteps of the saints to thier holy shrine, with breathtaking views of the Kaghan mountain valley in the north and Kashmir to the east. Along the 12km path to the peak from Narar village, natures’s beauty has spilled to the valley floor where you must pass through tantalising waterfalls, dense forests and peaceful streams. I don’t need to tell you how incredible the sunrise and sunset is from the shrine plateau!

23 Rainbow lake Domel Gilgit

Rainbow lake in Domel is known for its reflection of 7 different colours in summer, created by the array of flowers indigenous to this valley alone!

24 Hunza

The staggeringly beautiful Hunza Valley and its villages are one of the few places on Earth lucky enough to source thier water directly from the Himilayas! This snowmelt is charged with rich minerals and said to be the secret to the Hunza peoples’ long life span, many live to 120 years old, some even reaching 160, whilst the women can give birth up until the age of 60! It also keeps them looking unbelievably young for thier age, which is how their secret got out! The Hunzas became a beauty fascination after a man native to the valley travelled to London but was kept at immigration for a very long time as officers couldn’t believe he was born in 1832 as stated on his passport!

Ganish village in particular should be visited as it’s the oldest settlement in the valley and the most beautiful.

25 Kumrat Valley

Kumrat is one Pakistan’s most beautiful river valleys, interlaced with luscious green grazing pastures fed by the Panjkora river. It is one of the best hiking and camping spots in the country.

26 Neelum Valley

The Neelum Valley stretches for 200 kms running parallel to the equally picturesque Kaghan Valley. Considering the valley is located in northern Pakistan, I shouldn’t have been so surprised that it looks almost like the stepped mountain villages of China.

If you do visit, which I can’t recommend highly enough, visit the villages of Sharda and Phalwai, which are especially beautiful. If you have more time, take a hiking tour of as many of the villages as you can: Kundal Shahi, Jura, Athmuqam, Kutton, Keran, Dowarian, Dudhnial, Tehjian, Kel, Arang Kel, and Taobat.

27 Karakoram Highway

The Karakoram National Highway (known as the Friendship Highway in China) runs for 1,300 km along the length of Pakistan, all the way north to the Khunjerab Pass in Gilgit-Baltistan, before crossing into China where it turns into the China National Highway 314. To many, especially driving enthusiasts, the highway is regarded as the ‘8th Wonder of the World’. Not least because it holds the record for being the highest paved international road in the world which took more than 20 grueling years to build, following the path of the ancient Silk Road.

The word Karakoram is a Turkic word meaning black gravel. This name was adopted after being used by early intrepid European adventurers who beat a trail between the ominous black gravel mountain sides. Frequent landslides coupled with impassable snow drifts and inumerable unpaved sections may make this one of the most dangerous roads in the world, but it’s one of the few places on the planet from which you can see the Himalayas, the Karakoram and the Hindu Kush from the comfort of your own heated car seat!

28 Derawar Fort

The desert of Cholistan is the home of a unique Medieval fort made from the very sand and mud on which it sits. It’s no longer a miltary stronghold but a private property and necropolis owned by the royal Abassi family! So, as you have probably guessed you will need special permission to go inside, but there is nothing stopping you exploring the fort from the outside which makes for incredible photos as the whole structure seems to rise from the otherwise barren desert floor. The exterior of the Derawar Fort has a cirsumference of more than 1 km and 30m high walls with no less than 40 defensive bastions which create a rippling wave affect if viewed from above.

Did you picture it like this?

If you would like to learn more about these places, here a couple of good books from the Escapist’s Travel Library.