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| Our location indicated by the black arrow - Kazakhstan is a huge contry |
Today was a perfect day for us. We went off-road in 4WDs to find the receding shores of the North Aral Sea. The whole of the Aral Sea was once considered the 4th largest lake in the world today it is a puddle of its former self. The vast steppe surrounding the North Aral Sea where we were visiting is such an otherworldly place - but not that dissimilar to some areas of outback Australia. As we drove, we saw evident of wildflowers, but they were mostly at the end of their season. From November to March there is snow covering the ground and little survives except for the Camelthorn bush which is drought-tolerant, cold-hardy, and salt-tolerant and which the camels love. But come Spring and the steppe is carpeted in wildflowers and marsh samphire, a favourite of the camels.
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| Top L: samphire, R: Salsola, prickly
Russian thistle. Bottom: Camelthorn
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| In the lead car with Janna our guide, seen here communicating with the rest of our convoy. |
It was a marvellous day – possibly the best we’d had to date although Kazakhstan seems to deliver in spades everywhere we have visited! But to explain this marvellous day in a bit of a nutshell. First stop was for a ‘restroom’ break in a Jalanash, population 2000. This small town is roughly 70 Km from Aralsk. It was once a bustling harbor village on the shores of the Aral Sea. Following the severe receding of the sea, the shoreline is now kilometres away, leaving the village completely stranded in the desert. It was once famous for the massive, rusting ship hulls stranded in the sand. Later in the day we saw probably one of the last keeled over on its side totally rusted out. The local economy now primarily revolves around camel herding. As it turns out there are no public toilets in town just a friendly local who allowed us to use his long-drop (one learns quickly not to be squeamish). In his backyard he had a huge beautiful blonde Bactrian camel tethered and after some chatting, we learned that she had a baby. This dear little creature was duly fetched and proudly shown off. His gorgeous pale silver silky hair had us all goo-ing and gah-ing. Then it was back into the cars (5 in all) for our next stop another small village, Tastubek (pop 200), for lunch. When we pulled us the village children surrounded us. The family with whom we were to eat were so welcoming and has laid out quite a banquet for us - deep fried fish fresh caught that morning, bread, rice, potatoes, onions, tomatoes – finished off with fresh camel milk. Both husband and wife had degrees from Almaty - she law and him engineering. They had returned to the family home to care for aging parents - it is what is done here.
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| Definitely an outback dunny! |
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| A beautiful Bactrian mother and her baby |
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| Kids were like kids the world over - curious |
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| Tastubek was once a fishing port |
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| A veritable banquet. On the left is the bucket of camel milk |
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| No indoor plumbing! |
The scenery was fascinating – flat and empty as far as the eye could see although sometimes in the distance, we saw the cliffs which once had been the shores of the sea. We were driving along wheel ruts sometimes beside dunes, across the old seabed. We stopped a number of times to wander through arid vegetation and look at the shells embedded in the sand, evidence that the sea once lapped over these areas. We scattered small herds of sleek horses and majestic camels (mostly Bactrian) as we flew by but of course, we had to get out to take photos of these beautiful creatures - all horse and camels we saw are domesticated but are allowed to roam freely.
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| The horses were beautiful and sleek |
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| These two older camels brought up the rear slowly. |
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| The ground was littered with shells |
As we approached the sea, we were driving alongside monumental, eroded hills looking a bit like the Utah desert – worthy of a stop to explore and climb. Wonderful! We saw a few massive Golden Eagles and once we got to the shore, we saw a small flock of flamingos wading in the shallows - and evidence of other wildlife. One of the highlights of the day was that we got to ‘paddle’ in the Aral Sea - that’s possibly an equal first with the Black Sea (2023).
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| Most of us clumbed this bute to look out ove the sea - it was extremely windy up there! |
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| A rusted hull evidence of more fecund times |
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| The northern Aral Sea |
Before returning to Aralsk – because we didn’t want the day to end, we visited a hot spring and then an abandoned fishing village, Aqespe near the western edge of the former Aral Sea basin. It was once one of the largest and most active fishing settlements in the area. When the river feeding the Aral sea was diverted the water moved dozens of kms away, destroying the local fishing economy. Massive sandstorms and advancing sand dunes eventually began burying the village, forcing residents to evacuate. It seemed pretty much deserted when we were there, the mud-and-reed structures half-buried and old streets blanketed by desert sand. A ghost town which felt very sad.
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A beautiful herb of camels ran alongside us.
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| Like hot springs everywhere people want to enjoy the water! |
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| The spring is reminiscent of the bore in Burketown NT and like that bore it supportrd wildlife |
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| The sad deserted village of Aqespe slowly being consumed by desert sands |
But what a day! We came home exhausted and smiling after a once in a lifetime experience. That evening we found somewhere to buy supplies for the next long leg of our westward journey. It’s always fascinating exploring local ‘supermarkets’ trying to fathom what things are. There are of course always the usual staples – bread, noodles, cheese, yogurt, fruits and meats. We came away with a plentiful supply. We don’t go hungry!
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| Tomorrow we would be heading west 2000-odd Kms to Aktau on the coast of the Caspian Sea |
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