Great day with beautiful views of the mountains!

The reason we chose this hostel located on the southern outskirts of the city of Bishkek is because the mountainous Ala-Archa National Park is also located south of the city. And there are some nice walks you can do right from the hostel itself.

So yesterday, we packed some snacks and took off into the foothills...

It was a beautiful day... gorgeous blue sky, with a high of about 17C (63F). Perfect.

It didn't take long to get our first view of the mountains.

We've been so lucky with the weather on this trip. It's been generally warmer than we expected, and we haven't had much rain, although there is a storm expected to come through overnight tonight, and extending into tomorrow morning. But the forecast for Almaty for the next week also looks good.

Looking back at the city, there are so many new apartments being built.

The mountains in the background are across the border in Kazakhstan.

A nice breeze is keeping the Kyrgyzstan flag flying.

We saw a lot of horses along the way.

Ruth, looking back at the city.

You can see a layer of smog from up here, but when you're actually down there you don't notice it.

Giant Kyrgyzstan flag.

Now we're getting some beautiful views!

A couple of guys went by us on horseback.

There was a huge fertile looking field on the left that had been recently plowed.

Ruth took this photo of me while I was taking the photo above!

Heading back down.

Me, and the big flag.

Our route back to the hostel took us through this gated community of fancy homes.

We saw at least one embassy license plate.

We did about 11 kms (7 miles) in total. 

If you're ever in Kyrgyzstan, do not buy this beer!

Nasty stuff...

Another gorgeous day in the forecast today, so we are off to do some more hiking... this time a little closer to the national park.

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