Song Kol Lake

Our first "tourist activity" in Kyrgyzstan was a trip to the Song Kol Lake jailoos. A jailoo is a high altitude summer pasture where sheperds bring their livestock for grazing in the summer months. Shepherds still live in traditional yurts and housing tourists seems to have become an income supplement for many families. When it's not raining, the views of the lake are beautiful, but at an altitude of over 3000m the temperature drops the minute the sun sets or disappears behind a cloud.