City tour of Karakol

The city of Karakol has many faces. For many, the most interesting is the old quarter, located south of the busy Toktogul Boulevard. You will meet only a few people here and traffic is sparse here. You can stay here in beautiful old tsarist buildings, such as this Neofit hotel.

Next door is another historic building of the museum in Karakol. If you have a moment you can go see the historical finds from this area.

There are many historic houses from the late 19th century in the old quarter. Typical are pale blue shutters and a covered entrance to the house. Under the roof are carved ornaments made of wood. Unfortunately, the roofs are no longer original. They are usually unsightly sheet metal or corrugated sheet metal.

Just a short distance away is the most important monument in Karakol – the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. It is surrounded by a high fence, but the pavilion in the form of a garden combined with a field is freely accessible. The cathedral itself is very picturesque.

The last significant building in the old center is a huge merchant's house by local conditions. However, it would need to be renovated a bit.

After walking through the old quarter, you can take a moment on the brutal Soviet architecture, for example in the form of a university.

Practically, as in any major Kyrgyz city, Lenin's statue cannot be missing.

The largest park in the center is popular with locals, but very rugged. In the days of greatest glory, when the vegetation was maintained and the fountains worked, it could have been quite nice here. But it is true here, as in almost the whole of Kyrgyzstan, that what is built is no longer repaired, so it naturally decays.

You won't be surprised that there are other monuments near the park, which already looks a bit like a younger forest.

Another monument of the hero, you will find directly at the main artery of Toktogul in the also overgrown park.

The last important monument of the city of Karakol is the Dungan Mosque more than half a kilometer from the center to the north. The mosque is unique in that it was one of the few surviving by the Bolsheviks and also in that it looks more like a Buddhist temple.

Overall, however, Karakol, like most Kyrgyz cities, does not look very picturesque. There is a lot of dust everywhere and the edges of the streets are overgrown with weeds.

However, Karakol is famous for its beautiful scenery in the form of the Těrský Alatoo ridge rising south of the city – the destination of most visitors to the city.