Today we woke up early as usual and got into our minibuses to drive to the Kazakhstan border. After about an hour and a half, we reached the border, which looked so small in the middle of the vast plains. Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to take any photos.
Luckily for us, our border crossing only took the whole group about 30 minutes. We first got our red stamp to show we were leaving Kyrgyzstan, before getting a blue stamp for Kazakhstan, and off we were into a new country!
In this new country, we boarded our new bus, a brand-new, full-sized bus where we could all have four seats each. Ji and I found some great seats where we could lie back as much as possible and store all our stuff.
Our first stop was a canyon, where we got off and were able to explore, take some photos, and avoid the tourist traps. It seems like Kazakhstan has a lot more tourism and is much more set up for it.
Next, we stopped at a pit stop on the road where we got some of the same food the locals eat: potatoes with chicken and some manti (dumplings).
After driving some more, we arrived at our guesthouse, where we had a short break before heading off to our afternoon activity. We were picked up in these 4x4s and driven at maniac speeds by our driver in his questionable car. The car’s speedometer wasn’t working and there were several warning lights on the dashboard, most of them red.
We arrived in a valley where we were dropped off and started a 45-minute hike to reach the sunken forest. There, we saw a beautiful turquoise lake filled with dead fir trees.
After coming back down, we took our 4x4s again to head back to the village, stopping at a supermarket along the way where I bought some funki snacks.
For dinner, we stayed at our guesthouse and were served some more manti, a giant plateful for the entire table. They were delicious, but there were far too many!
Feeling quite full, we headed back to bed, especially as Ji seemed to have caught my illness and was feeling feverish.