Saryarka

One of the best things about using WHS as your travel compass is that it sometimes pushes you to go somewhere that seems inconvenient and involves a subject you have no interest in. And after you complete that visit, you are glad you did it. That was how it went with my June 2024 visit to Saryarka, the WHS of Steppe and Lakes.

The Korgalzhyn Nature Reserve (the most accessible part of Saryarka) superficially has a similar geographical position to the Kazakh capital Astana as Tanbaly WHS has to Kazakhstan's second city Almaty. Both need a full day trip to visit from the big city, with a car (rented or hired with a driver). Korgalzhyn lies only 125km away from Astana, and although it is a secondary road with a speed limit of 80 km/h, we arrived after about 1h45. The outgoing traffic from Astana is nowhere near as busy as in Almaty.  

But while you can roam around on your own in Tanbaly, Korgalzhyn needs a proper local guide and a 4x4 vehicle. The Reserve is crossed by sand roads and tracks only, and we also did a fair bit of off-roading through the steppe grass. The tracks were muddy at times as well – it had rained a lot in the past weeks, and the grass was very high. There were still some flowers, but they mostly bloom here in April/May.

Most foreign visitors here are birders – my guide said that Dutch and Danish …

I visited this WHS in June 2017. From Astana, we drove for around 2 hours (130km) to the "Bird Paradise" Visitor Centre in Korgalzhyn. The impressive flat steppe view will kick in after you exit Astana and will continue till you get to Korgalzhyn. Countless horses and cattle, a few old Soviet Union ghost buildings, and a vast never-ending flat steppe. Road conditions are not too bad but careless overtaking and non-existing markings on the asphalt are the cause of frequent car accidents.

Once in Korgalzhyn, we visited the Visit Center "Birds Paradise" with its old dioramaas and watched the 20 minute information video named "Mystery of protected lands". Hanging on the wall among different birding certificates, I spotted the original UNESCO Biosphere inscription certificate but not the UNESCO WHS inscription certificate. Korgalzhyn Nature Reserve is the largest protected area in Kazakhstan and is at the crossroads of migration routes for migratory birds, making it one of the key ornithological areas of international importance with 346 bird species, 700 butterfly species, 14 fish species, 374 species of flora, 2 species of frogs, 4 species of snakes and 43 species of fauna. Outside of the designated area, I could already spot pygmy owls, swans, marsh harriers, pelicans, herons, warblers and several waders apart from several marmots.

Instead of losing precious time to take lunch, I brought some packed lunch with me and spent more time by the designated lakes. We drove more than 60km offroad on grassland and shrubland to see …

The agency in Kazakhstan which prearranged our trip to Korgalzhyn was concerned about whether we would be able/allowed to get inside. It appears that both the road from Astana to Korgalzhyn and the dirt road from Korgalzhyn into the park can get flooded/impassable in spring and our planned date of May 4 was still in the “problem” period. Phone calls to the reserve had received a “well we will see on the day” response. In the end, the period immediately before hand had been dry and we had no problems.

As you make the 2hr drive from Astana to Korgalzhyn there are some interesting aspects of Kazakhstan’s “Russian” past and present to look out for. Around 40kms out you drive past the site of the ALZHIR women’s gulag where the wives, sisters, mothers etc of class enemies had been deported for “Betrayal of the Motherland” – guilt by association. The road then enters an area of flood plains of the River Nura on its way to the endorheic basin of Korgalzhyn – on our day of travel the river was a huge lake lapping the road and showing that it could easily block it. This was followed by an area of rolling, but no longer “virgin”, steppe which had been ploughed up during Khrushchev’s “Virgin Lands” campaign – indeed Astana (then called “Akmolinsk”) had been renamed “Tselinograd” = “Virgin Lands City” in 1962. However, the closer you get to Korgalzhyn the more …

Visited December 2016.

It is not a good idea to visit Northern Kazakhstan during winter. And especially windy Korgalzhyn with temperatures dropping to -20 degrees when I was there at the beginning of December. But I did, and this state reserve is ticked on my list.

It is possible to visit Kargolzhyn National Park as a day trip from Astana, but you have to arrange everything in advance because there’s no one at Visitors’ Center (they call it museum in the village) who can take to the reserve without prior arrangements.

The first bus from Astana Saparzhay Bus Station, very close to the train station, departs at 10am, and at 9am all tickets were sold out. I wanted to take a marshrutka, but the driver wanted to charge more than other pax in his car, so I waited the next bus (500KZT) at 1130 am. And I was a very good idea, because in the bus I met a young speaking English man (Artiom Yanushevski) who helped me a lot.

Korgalzhyn used to be a small town but after the collapse of USSR most people with German, Polish, Russian and Ukrainian origins left the country. Only the half of the village is Kazakh and everybody speaks Russian. Lots of ruined houses, and at this time of the year everything covered with snow, lots of snow.

After visiting Aksu Zhabagly on an organized tour with a German-Kazakh tour company (that cost me a lot, but it was worth), I decided to …