Scenic drive through At-Bashy mountain range and a visit to a 15th century stone relic, the Tash Rabat Caravanserai

Tash Rabat Caravanserai is a well preserved ancient stone relic from the 15th century. It used to provide shelter to traders, merchants and travelers on the old Silk Road. Located inside the At-Bashy mountain range, with the structure half tucked into the mountain side, our drive in the valley takes us through some pretty scenic rocky mountains.

Turn off the main A365 and onto the dirt road that goes through the At-Bashy mountain range to Tash Rabat

Following the river as we enter the valley

Yurt camp at Tash Rabat

Dramatic rocky mountains

This one looks like a dinosaur resting

A village house

The Tash Rabat Caravanserai tucked into the mountain side.



We are now more than 3,100m above sea level.



We will visit the caravanserai later. In the meantime, continuing to drive further in to see the view.

A group of tourist returning from their walk.

Our Sorento and the At-Bashy mountain range.

Too muddy to continue further..



No more track.. that's as far as Our Sorento can go...

View of the valley in the distance. The sun is trying to make an appearance.

We returned to the caravanserai and enquired about a yurt stay nearby..

Choosing our yurt

Nicely decorated with enough beds for 5 people.

 

Latice side walls with reed mat lining hold up the poles for the roof of the yurt

The centre of the roof with the circle is called the tunduk. A piece of felt covers the circle and attached to a string that is then used to open and close the flap to allow fresh air and light in when needed.



A small iron stove used to heat up the interior or even make some tea.
Dried animal dung is used as fuel. We had earlier bought some fish and mum is frying it up so we can keep it for our lunch tomorrow. 

Felt and wool covering the entire structure on the outside.

Stayed the night in this basic yurt..



The felt flap that is the door is really heavy.



Peeking out from our yurt entrance.
The felt door is rolled up and tied at the top.

We make our way to the yurt owner's house for dinner served at 8pm.

Kuurdak - mutton with potatoes and veges

Shorpo - soup dish with meat, wheat / barley and vegetables

Cucumber and tomato salad

The whole dinner spread. Boorsok on the bottom right.
Krgyz non / bread is also served together with tea, some sweats and jam.
Click here for more info on these local dishes.

The was another group of tourists with their guide having dinner too. They were spending 7 days touring Kyrgyzstan. We chatted for a couple of hour after dinner and went to bed at 10.30pm.

The next morning, our breakfast was wheat / oats porridge, pancakes, bread, home made black currant and apricot jam and tea with some sweets. The apricot jam was good, we bought a jar for the road.

After checking out, we visited the Tash Rabat Caravanserai.

The well preserved 15th century stone structure, Tash Rabat Caravanserai

This was once a place of shelter for traders and merchants travelling on the old Silk Road.

According to Wikipedia, the caravanserai may have been built even before that... in the 10th century, when it served as a Christian monastery..



now mostly catering to tourists and a good stopping point for overlanders like us before taking the Torugart Pass to cross the border to China.

The large dome on the top..

Mum at the entrance of the caravanserai

Me at the entrance..

 

The doorways are quite small..

 

 

The dome roof

As we were leaving the caravanserai, a whole group of tourist have just arrived.



A couple of marmots foraging for food on the slopes behind the caravanserai.

We found a nice spot near the river that runs through the valley and had our picnic lunch.

Retracing our steps to get back to the A365 and continue our drive to Torugart Pass, the Kyrgyz / China border.