McLeanCamino: 15th May Naryn to Karakol with stop for demonstration of hunting with eagle

After a good night at our comfortable guest house, a great breakfast with local cheese, fresh crepes and even instant coffee, we drove toward our next destination, Karakol. En route we stopped for a quick lunch at Barskoon, a village at the mouth of the Barskoon valley – which has impressive waterfalls and is a very popular base for trekking and horse riding. Ate at the local restaurant run by the community based tourism office. We had a quick lunch of Manti which is a meat stuffed dumpling. We had asked for some cooked vegetables but were told by our guide that we are in a wonderful place for meat but not for vegetables or fruits. She did speak to the "chef" and procured a cucumber and tomato salad.... We don't usually eat salads but since she had gone to all the effort we did eat it.

Our guide, through the same community based tourism office, had arranged by phone for us to follow a local man who hunted with a mountain eagle. On meeting him we learned he had caught and trained this eagle for three years, and he had agreed to show us how to handle the eagle and how it would hunt for him. First he showed how he put on a leather cover for his arm, and got the bird to hop on, while he kept the eagle hooded so it would not get excited and try to fly away. He let us each have the bird on our arm-it was fairly heavy-and then he removed the hood to show us how it would kill a rabbit that his daughter released at the bottom of a gorge about 100 yards away.

The bird flew off his arm, made one pass over the poor rabbit that surprisingly stayed motionless, then swooped down and hit the rabbit with his claws, killing it instantly, and holding it. He then proceeded to rapidly eat the rabbit, while we scrambled down into the gorge and the owner grabbed the main part of the rabbit and set about trying to pry it away from his eagle, so that his family could have it for dinner. This was not easy but after the eagle had scarfed down about a pound or two of rabbit, and it's gullet was full, the owner got the carcass away and took the bird back up the hill, everyone quite satisfied except for the poor rabbit. He showed us how to make the bird stretch out its wings as we held it on our forearms, and his daughter had no trouble handling the eagle. The owner was training her to take over the eagle-handling job after him.

We next drove up the Barskoon Valley for almost an hour, getting higher and seeing more spectacular scenery as we went, with many fields used for horses or sheep or cows.

We came back from the valley and again passed along the south coast of Lake Issaykul, which is the second largest mountain lake in the world, and the second-deepest. It is 170 km long and 70 km wide and over 500 feet deep. It has very salty water, and even in winter does not freeze, due to hot springs that feed it from below. The lake is a brilliant blue color and very striking with white-capped mountains rising both north and south. It has long been a favorite vacation spot for Soviet citizens, particularly now from Russia and Kazakhstan.

We reached Karakol (or Przhevalsk in Soviet times) after about eight hours on the road. It is a peaceful, low–rise town with back streets full of Russian gingerbread cottages, shaded by rows of huge white poplars. It was founded and built by Russians in the 1800's, and still has a lot more Russian-appearing people than further west. We checked in to our 8-room hotel “Amir”, which was comfortable and also provided a much superior breakfast experience compared to China's hotels.

For dinner we were driven to a nearby outdoor Russian restaurant where we enjoyed a lentil soup and a wonderful chicken dish along with some Russian white wine. We were back at the hotel by 9pm and were happy to hit the sack. The weather had been cool, clear, crisp and sunny.