Qué hacer en Kazajistán

Kazakhstan is the ninth-largest country in the world, a landlocked land of steppe, desert and mountains. Almaty, the largest city, lies beneath the Trans-Ili Alatau range, with the wooden Zenkov Cathedral, the Green Bazaar and Medeu, a high-altitude skating rink, below the Shymbulak ski area. Astana, the capital, rises from the northern steppe with mirrored towers and the Bayterek monument.

East of Almaty, Charyn Canyon cuts red-rock walls through the plain, and the Kolsai Lakes and Kaindy Lake, with its drowned spruce trunks, lie in the Tien Shan near the Kyrgyz border. Shymkent, in the south, is a city of bazaars and gardens, and Turkestan has the great mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi. The Baikonur Cosmodrome, in the central desert, launched the first satellite and the first person into space.

Beshbarmak, boiled meat over noodles in broth, is the dish of hospitality, with kazy, a horse-meat sausage, and kumys, fermented mare's milk. Tea comes with baursak, fried dough puffs. Many families still keep yurt traditions, and Nauryz, the spring new year, is celebrated in March. Winters are bitterly cold on the steppe, and the mountains are best from June to September.