Beyond Jalpak Tash

From Karakol, we drove 40 minutes to Ichke Jergez for a night with a wonderful local family, and then surfed the back of a flat-bed truck up an already melted-out mud road to the start of an hour long tour to the yurt, known as Jalpak Tash. The location is pretty much unbeatable, all things considered, from the views of the mountains above to the lake below.

Don’t Prang in Your Beshbarmak

Outhouse Backflip Intense warming & a few avalanches made for some of the most fun, smoothest pow skiing I've done in a long time, which is what this video features. I apologize to anyone looking for sickter-richter huck-tack-u-lar GoPro footage, but I had just as much fun with this crew on this terrain as I've had doing anything else in Central Asia, and that's all that matters.

Gunung Lawu (Mount Lawu) – Rainy Season

The time I spent in East Java was undoubtedly incredible because of the friendly people, wonderful food, and being able to see where one of my best friends has been living for almost two years now. But to be able to climb Lawu and see such an incredible sunrise next to a great friend transformed the experience into something like that first trip to Cologne n 2005; it was a trip that increased my passion for both international travel and my love of mountains further than ever before.

Bugaksan & Seoul’s Nature

Later on, as I dined on kimchi fried rice in Samcheong-dong, I reflected on my little layover hike, and realized that Seoul is a pretty great place, with its wonderful architecture, pleasant nature escapes, and very nice people. I will gladly return if given the opportunity in the future, and I would love to explore more of the nature of South Korea in the future.

Пик Амангельды (Amangeldi Peak) – Autumn

Turns out I was to stay on the second floor of the shack, which turned into a night from hell. Russians and Kazakhs have a firm belief that heaters need to be on full blast at all times, and windows should never be opened for any reasons (this is also causing some sweaty problems at my apartment in Almaty). It was a long night between trying to sleep in a sauna and the sound of mice scurrying in the walls.

Big, Militarized Almaty Lake

The date was September 2nd. This was an important date for me because my visa, as well as the visas of my hiking companions (all three were foreign students) expired on September 1st. In addition, none of us actually had our passports because our new visas, and therefore our passports, were in processing with the immigration police. This information was telepathically realized between the four of us after seeing the gun, and after a few quiet conversations about it, we all started to feel pretty uncomfortable in the given situation.