Alatau Routes
Fifteen drives out of Almaty, properly researched.
Curated itineraries across the Ile-Alatau, Charyn and Saka frontier country — with the permits, vehicles and road conditions sorted before you set out.
Showing 15 of 15 trips.
Day trip200 kmAssy Plateau
A vast high-altitude grassland at 2100–2800 m, reached via the Turgen Gorge east of Almaty — home to nomad summer camps, an active astrophysical observatory, and skies clear enough to see the Milky Way with the naked eye.
Hard
Day trip340 kmBartogay Reservoir & Kurmety Gorge
A 340 km loop east of Almaty along the A-351, tracing the Chilik River to a turquoise seasonal reservoir and continuing to the spruce-lined Kurmety gorge — an unhurried alternative to the Charyn crowds.
Easy
Day trip56 kmBig Almaty Lake
A turquoise alpine reservoir at 2,511 m in the Ile-Alatau National Park, roughly 28 km south of Almaty — the city's most accessible high-mountain destination and its primary drinking-water source.
Moderate
Day trip40 kmButakovka Waterfall
A half-day hike into the Butakovka Gorge delivers two tiered waterfalls — 30 m and 20 m — tucked inside Ile-Alatau National Park, barely 20 km from Almaty's city center.
Moderate
Day trip430 kmCharyn Canyon
The Valley of Castles — 80 km of red sandstone gorges carved by the Charyn River — sits 200 km east of Almaty and rewards a long day behind the wheel with a landscape that looks borrowed from another planet.
Easy
Day trip40 kmFurmanov Peak — Ile-Alatau Day Hike
A 16 km round-trip trail from Medeu to Furmanov Peak (3,053 m) in Ile-Alatau National Park, climbing through spruce forest and alpine ridges to a summit with an unbroken panorama over Almaty.
Moderate
Day trip145 kmIssyk Lake
A turquoise alpine lake at 1,756 m in the Ile-Alatau foothills, 72 km from Almaty — a rewarding half-day drive through the Issyk Gorge, with forested shores, a reconstructed dam, and the nearby Saka 'Golden Man' burial mounds.
Easy
Day trip310 kmKaindy Lake
A 400-metre alpine lake where the trunks of drowned spruce trees still stand decades after a 1911 earthquake dammed the valley, their pale masts rising from water so cold it barely reaches 6°C in summer.
Hard
Day trip300 kmKapchagai Reservoir & Tamgaly-Tas
A double-stop day trip north of Almaty: swim at Central Asia's largest reservoir, then walk among 17th-century Buddhist carvings cut into riverside cliffs above the Ili.
Easy
Day trip34 kmMedeu & Shymbulak
The Ile-Alatau mountains rise straight from Almaty's southern edge; drive 17 km up the gorge and you reach Medeu's famous high-altitude ice rink, then a gondola carries you another 1,500 m to Talgar Pass at 3,200 m.
Easy
Day trip340 kmTamgaly Petroglyphs
An open gorge in the Chu-Ili mountains holds some 5,000 Bronze Age rock carvings — the densest concentration of prehistoric art in Kazakhstan, inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2004.
Easy
Day trip180 kmTurgen Gorge
A 45 km-long gorge in Ile-Alatau National Park, ~90 km east of Almaty, with seven waterfalls, dense spruce forest, and a working trout farm — all reachable on paved road for most of the drive.
Moderate
2 days620 kmAltyn-Emel National Park
Kazakhstan's most diverse national park packs singing sand dunes, chalky rainbow cliffs, volcanic badlands, and Iron Age burial mounds into one vast desert reserve 295 km northeast of Almaty.
Hard
2 days780 kmCharyn–Kolsai–Kaindy Loop
A 2-3 day loop east of Almaty that strings together Charyn Canyon, the three-tiered Kolsai Lakes, and the submerged spruce forest of Kaindy Lake — three of the most distinct landscapes in Kazakhstan in a single circuit.
Moderate
2 days330 kmKolsai Lakes
Three alpine lakes strung along a single gorge in the Kungey-Alatau range, 330 km east of Almaty — the lowest lake accessible by sedan, the middle lake by foot or 4x4, and the upper lake a two-day wilderness trek near the Kyrgyz border.
Moderate
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