Ala Archa Valley

We've spent yesterday in the Ala Archa; a national park only an hour south of Bishkek. We were prevented from camping up the valley because it was closed due to a VIP visit- who turned out to be the president of Kyrgyzstan camping himself.

After a bushcamp lower down the valley, some of our group set off at 7am for a big hike up to a Glacier far above us. We didnt have any maps of the area, and the info we'd been given to find the path was ambigious to say the least. So we ended up scrambeling up a river bed for almost 2 hours, not knowing whether we were even heading up the correct side valley. We eventually joined a path and continued the steep climb up to a mountain hut at 3400m (we started at about 2200m altitude- I think) From here was the most spectacular view of a giant glacier. Three of us continued on to the glacier so we could say we at least had touched it, then headed down. It turned out to be an 8 1/2 hour strenuous hike but it was all good because we drove into Bishkek and due to our agent messing-up, we're staying in a 4star hotel with indoor and outdoor swimming pools and sauna. I'm definitely not complaining!