Kyrgyzstan Summer 2016 Engilchek to Kara-Say ?
 

Hi,
We are investigating our trip by motorcycle in Kyrgyzstan next summer 2016.
Has anyone out there travelled between Engilchek and Kara Say. On my Kyrgyzstan map(GIZI Map) map it shows the road A364.
Many searches on the internet says that there is not a route or you have no permission to pass ??
If it is possable, I'm interested in what the road conditions are like and if the scenery is any good.
And do you need permit to go into this region? Where can i achieve one ?

Any help will be appreciated :)

Eric

get in touch with patrik at muztoo , he is based out there

West from Engilchek
 

FWIW:

Just poking around in 2012 I got as far as Engilchek, which was not very far, at all. At the bridge there is a guard asking for permits if you want to head further South / East. You want to head west instead. I have never been there, but have been poking around with the idea many times, including for my 2016 trip. I don't think it is going to happen for me (on 2 wheels).

OSM and satellite photos are your friend here. There is a track that runs west bound. Looking at the sat photo's it is clear that it used for 4 wheel traffic, but it looks like it could be very rough in places including multiple river crossings. There looks to be a power line running in that valley as well, so there is access. What is going to shoot it down for my 2 wheel travels is going to be fuel. From fuel in Karakol to fuel in Braskoon looks to be 214 miles per OSM. That would be doable fuel wise, but it also very possible you get to a place, well past the half way point, where you can't make it on 2 wheels and will have to turnaround. Coming from the other side (Braskoon) in 2012 I ran into a bridge at N41 40 35.8 E77 49 49.1 that was washed out and a huge river that would swallow any kind of truck without a burp. BTW, supposedly this bridge is back in place.

When I am back in the area again I would ride again coming from Braskoon South and East and see how far I can get. Lots of nice and challenging riding.

It will depend on how good / courageous / adventurous / foolish (take your pick) you are and how much fuel you can carry. Regardless not a place for riding single.

OSM mentions that at N41 34 06.4 E77 53 53.2 there is a military check point checking for permits.

For OSM maps for your Garmin go to garmin.openstreetmap.nl.

KP

Thanks for your interesting view and opinion.
We intend like you said coming from Barskoon going southward and explore a bit that region.

Kind Regards,

Eric

There is no road between Inylcheck and Kara Saj, the maps are wrong or very outdated.
You can try to get through in late season via the valley of Utsch-Kjoel when rivers are low, but better on foot, by horse or on a push bike.
I have not been there, only to Inylcheck and the Barskoon road from the south (over Suek), but was interested in the possibility to do it.
You can try and ask bikevagabond on the hubb, who has done it on a pushbike and with an alpaka raft.

"There is no road between Inylcheck and Kara Saj, the maps are wrong or very outdated."

Satellite photo's clearly show a track that has been used by 4 wheeled vehicles. The power line also indicates access. This is the track that is shown on OSM. As mentioned I am not aware of condition, but it could be rough going with river crossings.

I have started to add the power line. It actually has its own set of tracks in many places.

When are you going to be there Estrybos?

KP

I will pipe up here and enter the discussion.

I have drawn a track based on sat images (google, bing, yandex and others) from Barskoon via Kara Say and Enilchek to Ak-Bulak / Ak-Bulun where the main Enilchek road begins about a year ago. Havent had anyone test it out yet but Kito of this forum will probably guinea pig it for me this summer.

Some short sections are not 100% clear. And there is no fuel for just over 400 km from Barskoon to beyond Ak-Bulun. There is one crossing of a major river (Uchkel) and many crossings of high altitude river beds that will flood in the rains. There are three passes above 3800m, and lots of kilometres of what looks like very rarely used double track that will be challenging either on a loaded dirtbike or well prepped 4wd. There are very few signs of humanity between Kara Say (41.569 77.903) and Enilchek.

From Barskoon to near the Kumtor Gold Mine the road will be in excellent condition since the gold mine is the single biggest contributor to KG GDP. Further on to Kara Say the road seems reasonable. (Panoramio - Photo of Jürgen Grösel, Kirgisistan Juni 2012)

Do take a GPS so you know what to do when you come to forks in the road (Panoramio - Photo of Jürgen Grösel, Kirgisistan Juni 2012)

The track seems decent as far as the Kara Say river crossing (
Panoramio - Photo of Мост через Кара-Сай 2009г.)

Beyond there is probably an old military 4WD track and any military you encounter are unlikely to be happy to see you.

I would not treat this section of the track lightly (KaraSay River crossing to Enilchek). I would carry some form of sat communications, fuel for well over 400 km when you leave Barskoon, and as for motorcycles, I would be very cautious of doing it alone.

I would also take a planned track on a GPS cause getting lost cause you cant find the track would be bad.

I would also refer you to panoramio.com where there are some interesting pics on the route.

Panoramio - Photo of Sarychat–Ertash

Panoramio - Photo of Sarychat–Ertash

Here is one illustrating the quality of the track.
Panoramio - Photo of Ottukh camp - Лагерь "Огниво"

For that better take horses, not motorbikes
lonely traveller

For the better of what?

This seems abit like your post/opinion about motorbikes travelling through Bartang valley would spoil it ?

I've been in Enylcheck in summer 2014: they told me there's no road to go west to KaraSay. You can get detailed info by Turkestan in Karakol, write at Sergey psi61@mail.ru
Have fun!

There isnt a road.

but there is a track

looks like a nice places
i just checked some satelite maps and it seems there might be two possibilities, one more north and one more south

but on both tracks there are sections where i'm not sure if its possible to pass
the water level might also be a problem, does anybody know what's the best time? I will be there in July...

@colebatch
might it be possible for you to share the track?

i can share the track (see attached in garmin gpx format - use GPS Visualizer to convert to KMZ google earth format), but then I ask anyone who rides it to email their actual ridden track and send me some key commentary regarding the track on wcolebatch (at ) gmail .com or on this thread.

It would certainly be useful for future adventurers.

Walter

thanks for the track
it looks like it might be possible, but it all comes down to the water depht
I'm really keen to try it, if you make a little fuel depot it's also no problem if you have to turn around after 70% of the track

@estrybos
when are you going to be in that region? I would prefer to not try it all by myself...

The last couple of weeks I spend many hours updating and adding to OSM including for this area. It is amazing how many other tracks there are, but most of them dead end at farms. I did not see see a second thru route. Let me know where you may have found a second route.

There are two side trips from the "main" Kara-Sai - Inylchek track: to Uch-Koshkon (N41 49 53.6 E78 39 37.7) and beyond, eventually dead ending and going South from Kara-Sai, also dead ending. I found a couple of interesting looking tracks that are now added on OSM.

Fuel remains a problem for motorcycles unless there is somebody in Kara-Sai is willing to part with fuel. That would open some opportunities.

Besides fuel and water crossings the tracks themselves may be a problem as well, they could be real rough. Some look like they are used very infrequently. Going thru dry river beds full of big rocks can be really challenging as well and there are some places where you have to follow them for some distances.

I hope to be in the area late August - early September to poke around. My main travel target area this summer is the Pamirs though since i missed it in 2012. I edited / added a lot around the Zorkul Lake area. If that does not work out due to permit issues the area South of Barskoon it will be. That dead ended for me in 2012 as well due to a washed out bridge.

Who has gotten a permit to go beyond Kara-Sai and if so where?

From Inylcheck supposedly a permit it be asked for somewhere in Karakol, has anybody done so?

KP

And I guess if you are going to go that way, and can take an extra 90 km worth of fuel again, then the 45 km detour to Lake Petrov at the end of the Petrov Glacier right next to the Kumtor mine, might be worth doing:

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/o...l/63313611.jpg

Here's the track (actually a dirt road) for that:

Did anybody hassle you after the big "DO NOT GO PAST HERE" sign for the mine at the turnoff to the South for the back road to Kara-Sai? (N41 52 22.7 E78 06 07.5)

I found another good source for KG maps: Üch-Koshkon Map - Kyrgyzstan - Mapcarta

Mapcarta shows all kinds of tracks that I have not found anywhere else. You need to be zoomed in quit a bit but then they show up.

KP

Hi, the discussed track Inylchek-Karasay I travelled in august 2013. As Chri8 wrote, there is no drivable road/track, only fragments! In my opinion it's impossible with motorbikes. Some critical points:

1. crossing Terekty river
Not the big river, but with strong current. A russian bike group before us were not able to cross it, so we avoid it and used the road south of Inylchek and crossed Sary-Djaz river on a rope-cage (behind the hot springs).

2. crossing Uch-Kol river
Big river with strong current. Passable only during dry weather (low water level). We had a long rainfall two days before and were not able to cross this river without a boat. We used an Alpacka Raft.

3. last section blocked by landslides. It's the most difficult part, because only footpathes (animal/horse tracks) pass over. At the end we saw an alternative track on the other side of Uch-Kol river, but to reach it, it's necessary to cross Uch-Kol two times additional. See below, I attached some photos and one map of this section.

That is great feed back from somebody who actually has been there. It sure looks like you had your share of a true adventure.

I am not surprised by the section you show as virtually impassable. The only thing visible on sat photo's is a river bed and possibly mandatory crossing of the river. (or go, as you seem to have done, up on the hills and find cow tracks)

What is shown across the river are the maintenance roads for the power line. Besides having to cross the river twice the power line "road" also looks very problematic in places. It also seems that track dead ends where the power line eventually crosses the river again.

Again, thanks for your post.

thanks for the info, looks like it's worth a deture

i think they just use the normal google maps files, am i wrong?

thank you very much for this info!
are all your pictures from the last section (3.)?
this looks not really rideable, but the riverbed is quite wide at this point...so maybe if there's not much water you could take the riverbed

or take some truck tubes :thumbup1:
http://0.tqn.com/w/experts/Physics-1...maha-don-t.jpg

bu that doesn't sound like a good idea if you riding only by yourself
nevertheless, i hope i can check it out in july

What I showed on the photos is only the difficult section, where we pushed our bikes over landslides and hills on animal tracks. Only the first one was taken before, when we crossed an eroded point on the wasted road.

The fragments of this old track are drivable on many kilometers, but there are also many points with deep erosion channels, sometimes like little canyons. To climb or round them was not easy as well (see below photo 4). Also the Uch-Kol nibble on some sections (photo 3). And going through the river bed is not the fun because of big stones (photo 2).

It would be interesting, if someone can find a way to pass this valley with motorbike, but as I wrote at the beginning, it seems impossible in my eyes. We needed 5 days from Sary-Djaz river to the end of Uch-Kol valley. In that time we didn't meet any people. If you try this, think about the way back! Because we planned to continue along the Chinese border to Torugart, we had food for two weeks (our fuel beer) and no time pressure.

It is my plan for this year as well. I will be there on light bikes with friends who have good skills. But looking for the pictures... I am not sure we can do it. We follow Russian bikers (with bicycles) on Kegety pass and it was difficult terrain. Anyway we will try in July.

maybe we can try it together? I will be in this region mid July and riding a DRZ400

and i would prefer some company on that kind of trailbier

There may actually be an interesting alternate trip if the main road is impassible. At N41 42 19.4 E78 24 43 there is a track that takes off to the South and East. It winds up in a place called Pikertyk and goes on to Uch-Koshkon at N41 49 53.6 E78 39 37.7 and from there back to the main Kara-Sai - Inylchek road. It seems mostly to be a decent track, but there may be plenty of short sections that will be difficult or impassable.

While tracing this road onto OSM I thought for a while it might bypass the bad main road section, but unfortunately it does not. I have not found a way, except for the power line road on the North side of the river. Not so sure if it will be any better.

From Barskoon it looks like to be a 250 mile round trip. Wouldn't it be nice if we could stash a drum of fuel in Kara-Say.

Another take away from the pictures: it is easy to underestimate the rivers one can run into. What appears to be a minor stream could be a significant / impossible effort to cross.

Moen, Mapcarta vs Google: Yes Mapcarta is overlaid on Google maps, but additional information is shown and it seems it easier to find the tracks.

Can anybody shed light on where to get a permit for this region?

I will organize permit in Bishkek Karl. And of course I will help you to get it...

cheers

Chris

Moep, I will contact you soon. We are still with bikes in South America.

ok, have a nice trip!

I dont suppose you have a GPS track ? or can you geolocate (within 10-20 metres) your pics of the difficult section?

That would be useful in planning.

Walter,

I saw you never got an answer, but i believe the difficult section starts at N41 53 39.1 E78 39 04.8 and goes East from there. He talks about crossing the river a couple of times and a road across the river. This matches this coordinate. I believe it goes on 4 miles where you ride thru the river bed and were you have to cross the Uchkel several times. I marked this section on OSM and the road across the river as well.

Hello Walter,
I didn't watched this forum for long time.. If you're still interested, I attached our gps tracks from the whole valley (hot springs behind Enilchek until pass Ishegart). The difficult section, where we climbed up the animal pathes was on day 6 to 7 (far from the river bed). There a fresh landslide blocked the continuation of a marginal driving track. If you come from east, you should go into the river bed, before going up (maybe here: 41.902257 N, 78.723573 E) and cross the river to the opposite track. If you come from west, you could reach the opposite track by crossing the river here: 41.895421 N, 78.664795 E.

Vagabond, it was fun watching your obvious struggles by means of the GPS tracks on sat photos. Thanks for adding those tracks.

My Mapsource had trouble reading the GPX files, but I GPSBabel'd them per the attached.

By the way, this Ukrainian bike group tried your planned route from Enilchek in 2007:
dneproveloklub.dp.ua/otshety/Tyan-Shan/6ks-07-07/T-SHan-6-2007.htm

They were not able to cross the Terekty river and went up into the mountains to reach the Uch-Kol valley via Terekty pass - completely offroad! They came out at the Bash-Kol mountain lake and it seems, they crossed the Uch-Kol river before reaching the tributary river from north (probably here: 41.894006 N, 78.673009 E)

Another Russian bike group passed the Uch-Kol valley successful in april 2002, because of low water level in end of winter. But the mountain passes were still under snow at that time:
www.isakov.narod.ru/otch/kirgizia1047.htm

Season is slowly over, any news on this route? Has anyone managed to do it? :mellow:

i wasn't able to do it this year
my tadjik visa wasn't valid long enough so i didn't had the time to check it out..

This year water was high, we had paermit but not enough time and power to try. We started from opposite direction and crossed Kara Say and reached Bedel Pass. Of course we were told by the locals there is no road to Inylchek but there is an option... We will try another and another time.

Hi all, I have heard by chance of your discussion here.

The road from Engilcheck to Kara Say 100% no chance with the motorbike! In July or August, the Merzbacher lake breaks under the glacier out, and there are then cracked water masses for about 4 to 5 days along the Engilcheck river. Then it is absolutely life-threatening to stop near the river!

Please try it not at all !!

I have been in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan since 2006 every year between 8 and 10 months and know the country and the people very well in the region. The Tian Shan, Alai and Pamir mountains I know almost like my back of hand.

Here you can explore a list of pass roads I have already driven all.

Gebirgspässe & Passstraßen - Tian Shan-, Alai- und Pamir Gebirge

I know that now one or the other will immediately be upset that there is a motorcycle forum here. But I have much more info on my Quad website. Sorry!

Motorradreisen Motorradtouren Kulturreisen

If someone needs information from the region, I am happy to help.

I'm not a bidder, but If I was a bidder, I would not say "100%" never, and I would not bid one cent against them, when I'm talking about those guys from Poland ;-)

Any news on route Kara-Say to Engilchek from 2018?

Hi there

our local drivers asked among russian hunters and off-roaders in Kyrgyzstan who know the region between Engilchek and the Kumtor gold mine.
Some of them made it all the way through, but with good 4x4 jeeps and experienced drivers. They say that there are some rivers with to high water levels for motor bikes.
The only option is to go as late as possible in the season. In autumn, the water level is low as there is less glacier melting as in summer.
However, if there is a low water year, it might be worth to try ones more . . .

Peter

Bash-Kol Lake from Kara-Sai
 

Hi all,

Interesting thread you've got going, thanks for all the info so far.

I'm planning a mountaineering exped for summer 2021 and would like to reach the southern valleys of the Kuiluu Range. Some of you have made it pretty clear that Kara-Sai => Engilchek isn't possible, but is the road be good enough to get a 4x4 from Kara-Sai to Bash-Kol lake (41.910959, 78.7480981)? From what I've read, the most difficult section seems to be closer to Engilchek, but perhaps I'm being too optimistic. Another problem would be crossing the UchKul river to then walk north into the Kuiluu range - any suggestions?

Thanks in advance!
Calum

A friend of mine (4WD guide from Karakol) did the route late last year. He reported that he had to make several crossings of the Uch Kol river. Here is one: https://youtu.be/hSKq39pdwEg

Its doable for seasoned 4WD guys subject to water levels (September probably best). Advise you take a guide. Taking this guy would be recommended as he has done it: https://www.youtube.com/user/vadimzangiev/videos