Karakol

We made our first trip to the resort town of Karakol last weekend. it was better than expected.  after going to a couple of the local ski areas, my expectations were pretty low...but i was still intrigued as i hear Russians still come to this place for ski holidays. it actually felt like a ski resort area. Three chair lifts and lots of vertical. the only negative is they aren't high speed quads (i am spoiled from all my years on so many different mountains). i found the backcountry area which was packed with power - easily 2ft in some areas. interesting here that the locals don't go for the powder, everyone stays on the groomers. so even though it has probably been >1wk since the last dumping of snow, i had endless runs of steep untracked powder. heaven!! so much so that the next day i was toast - i was so sore and tired that on Sunday i only took a few runs and called it a day. Cant wait to go back next month...as long as we get some more snow.

Currently the weather is unseasonably mild here. i am following the weather at home in the PNW and it is colder there than here. bizarre (must give a liberal jab...global warming?!?!?). it is a long trip out there - about 6-7 hours. but we hired a driver and had on board video - so watched season 3 of Modern Family...a hit for everyone. and the vodka that was passed around helped to speed the time along. we stayed at a fantastic homey hotel (sort of a BnB) called the Green Yard. Even had a night of Karoke the last night in town at a new bar - Live Bar. and i had enough vodka (the national drink) to get up with our group and do a song or two.

I know this doesn't look real...but i was here. This is the top of the high chair - 3034 meters (almost 10,000ft). The endless potential backcountry makes me drool.

My only complaint - the SLOW old school chair. took about 12 minutes to get to the top.

The Backcountry area. plenty of places to hike and endless untracked powder. very easy to access. The single track on the way out was a pain. even with top speed, there were major hills and i had to skate to get out of there.

A little powder cache. i was the only one back here every time i rode this area.

Oh and did mention... glorious sunny days. Lucky for me, after the first few runs, Otto preferred to ride with our friends here Dinah and Maggie. freeing me up to ride the deep, steep powder!

Quaint little town with a very old Russian Orthodox church. similar to the one from an earlier blog post from Almaty. this was built entirely of wood - no nails used. Very elaborate inside, but photos not allowed. Incense and all, Otto couldn't get out of there fast enough.

The typical architecture and paint colors in town.  The blue is representative of Islam, but the wood work is more of the Central Asia influence. Beautiful old buildings.

So...this is one of the coolest things we saw in Karakol. This is a mosque with obvious Asian influence. it is one of only a few in the world, called a Dungan Mosque. It was build in 1910 (also with no nails...). Very beautiful. and for me striking because of the blend of cultures and religions. The caretakers were very gracious. We had to cover our heads to enter the compound and the women were not allowed to go in the mosque.