The diary of a Scot in Amsterdam

Before reaching Almaty, we decided to try one last off-road adventure. I had heard about something called the “singing sand dune”, which is pretty much as the name suggests. It is a huge mound of sand which produces strange noises. Or at least that is what I have read, since we have unfortunately not actually succeeded in seeing, or indeed hearing, it.

The dune lies on the northern shore of Lake Qapshaghay, which is not directly on the way to Almaty. What we decided to try and do was to approach it from the north, via the Altyn-Emel mountains, a plan which looked quite sensible on paper but which was anything but in reality.

We began by heading off the main road east of the town of Saryözek, before slowly climbing to a height of over 1400m above sea level via a series of narrow, twisting tracks which lead up into the hills beyond the village of Qoyanqöz. It was here that we encountered the first real mountain-climbing of our trip, heading up steep slopes before hurtling down into deep valleys, only to have to climb all the way back up the other side. We spent a whole day doing this, getting lost along the way, and had covered a distance of only 30km when we finally found our way to Zhuzasu Pass, a steep and narrow cleft in the mountains which would have taken us all the way down to the shore of the lake some 1000m below, and thence to the dune.

But here, halfway down the pass, we were suddenly confronted by a most unexpected and vexatious problem: a locked barrier stood across the narrow dirt track, next to which was a small wooden house. A small, overweight woman emerged from the house and informed us that we could not pass without a permit. She was unable to tell us where we could get such a thing, besides that it was at the “office”, and any thoughts we had of defying her and making a run for it down the pass were dissuaded when she produced a walkie-talkie and began trying to make contact with authorities unknown. As if to offer some sort of consolation, she invited us into her little hut for tea, an offer which we accepted as there seemed to be no point in refusing out of spite. An awkward silence reigned as we sat drinking our tea and shooing away wasps and flies.

It was by then quite late in the day. We therefore decided to set up camp nearby, so as to make clear that we were not going to go away, and try again the morning.

When we awoke, we discovered that her husband and two large sons had returned, totally removing any chance of heading to the dune without permission. No amount of pleading or negotiation would persuade them to let us past, and leaving us with no alternative but to head back up the pass. This was very disheartening, especially since it had taken us two days to get there and would likely take the same amount of time to return to the main road to Almaty.

I guess that after the success of our earlier off-road gambles, it was time for our luck to run out. It is still quite frustrating though after scaling mountains, finding our way along seemingly endless and constantly diverging tracks, and finally being almost in sight of our destination, to be defeated by an old woman with a walkie-talkie.

Still I have no regrets about this little adventure. We saw some beautiful scenery in the mountains, which in themselves gave us some good practice for all the climbing that will have to be done in China. It is very encouraging to know that we are capable of such things.

And in any case, there is something to be learned from failure too. It is all very nice when you take a risk and it pays off, but a different sort of resilience is needed when you are faced with having to admit defeat. Or otherwise put, it is important to recognise which battles are important and which are not. Our priority at this stage is to get a visa for China, a process which would not be helped by run-ins with the authorities here. The singing sand dune will have to wait for another time.

Not long after reaching the top of the pass, we came across some friendly herders who were able to point us in the direction of a dirt track to the village of Qarashoqy. One even rode alongside us for a while to make sure we were heading in the right direction. This alternative route back to the main road meant that as well as avoiding the very demotivating experience of having to completely retrace our earlier steps, the distance to Almaty was reduced by a whole day. Definitely a silver lining to the cloud which we were then under. What followed was another gruelling day of ups and downs over the steppe, not aided by Astrid getting a flat tyre in Qarashoqy – unbelievably her first of the whole trip. Worse was that our pump then fell to pieces, which would have been a disaster had we not been in a village at the time. As it happened, we were talking to the mayor at the same moment, who quickly rounded up a pump for us to use. Yet another person to add to the long list of those who have gone out of their way to help us during the last few months.

The next day we headed at great speed along the busy motorway to Almaty, reaching the outskirts of the city as night fell. On Sunday morning we finally reached the centre, almost three weeks and 1500km after leaving Astana. Needless to say, we were very grateful indeed to be able to check into a hotel, get clean, and fall asleep in the heavenly comfort of a real bed.