Most people who go to Kazakhstan stop in Almaty. It is an easy city to like — backed against the Tian Shan mountains, the skyline a mix of Soviet concrete and glass towers, with alpine trails starting practically at the city's edge. I used it as a staging point for something further and stranger.
Western Kazakhstan — the Mangystau region — is one of the most otherworldly landscapes I have ever seen. The steppe opens up until it becomes something close to nothing, and then the land breaks apart into chalk canyons and rock formations that look like they belong on a different planet.
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Almaty — The Gateway City
Add your Almaty story here. The bazaars, the mountains visible from every street, the mix of Russian and Kazakh culture, the food. The days you spent getting ready to head west. What the city felt like as a starting point.
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Into Mangystau — Camping Alone in the Steppe
Add your story here. How you got to Mangystau — the logistics are not easy, which is part of why few people go. What the landscape looked like when you arrived. Setting up camp. The silence. The light going strange in the evenings. What you cooked, what you thought about, what the nights were like without any light except stars.
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Bekatata — The Underground Mosque
Bekatata is a mosque carved entirely into the cliff face by a 14th-century Sufi mystic named Shopan-Ata. You descend underground into the rock. The chambers are cool and carved, decorated with the quiet geometry of Islamic art. It is the kind of place that makes you understand, viscerally, why people have always needed holy ground.
Add your experience here. What it felt like to be there. The pilgrims who come. The silence inside. The contrast between the arid landscape outside and the cool darkness within.
Bekatata — carved into the cliff face in the 14th century. Add your caption.
The Caspian Coast
Add your story here. The Caspian Sea is unlike any other body of water — landlocked, vast, deeply strange. What the shoreline in western Kazakhstan looks like. What you found when you drove or walked to the water's edge.
Full story and camping guide for Mangystau coming.