Kulikalon Lakes

LakesFann Mountains,Tajikistan

A basin of glacial lakes at 2,800 metres in Tajikistan's Fann Mountains, under a five-thousand-metre granite wall, beside the last stands of high juniper.

September·Peaking now

Jul–Sep

The full season: passes clear, the loop over the Alaudin pass runs, and families' camps ring the far shore with goats, cattle and donkeys. Afternoons warm the shallows enough to swim — rare this high — though nights still drop toward freezing.

Year-round The lakes, the juniper woods and the Kulikalon Wall stand all year; snow shuts the basin from November to May.

The Kulikalon Lakes are a basin of glacial lakes at 2,800 metres in the Fann Mountains of northwestern Tajikistan, under the Kulikalon Wall, a face of granite that rises to five thousand metres on the peaks of Chimtarga and Maria, beside the last stands of high juniper, and they are the first night of the classic trek from Artuch over the Alaudin pass, camped on grassy flats a few steps from the water among the summer camps of the herders. Two glacier tongues built the basin, and the lakes lie in the hollows they left, the main lake turquoise and shallow at the edges with the wall standing straight up behind it, and a short side trail climbs to Dushakha, two connected pools in a stonier, higher basin that few trekkers bother with; the gnarled archa along the shore is juniper that grows so slowly that a trunk of an arm's reach may have stood for centuries, the last of the high forest that firewood has taken elsewhere in the range, and the meltwater off the Chimtarga glacier and the snowfields of the wall fills the basin highest in early summer, while snow can block the passes into June. The trail does not end at the lakes but carries on over the Alaudin pass at 3,860 metres to the Alaudin lakes on the far side, the loop that is the heart of the Fanns. Families from the villages below Artuch drive goats, cattle and donkeys up to the basin for the summer, camping on the far shore in felt yurts and stone huts until the first snows push them down, milking the goats and drying qurut on cloths in the sun, and the trekkers buy bread and kefir from them. Almost none of the birds that make the lakes matter are waterbirds, since the scree and the juniper hold the snowcocks, the accentors and the finches of the high Pamir-Alay. Kulikalon is a bowl of lakes under a wall of stone, and the herders share it with the trekkers for a summer.

Worth knowing

Good to know

Everything starts at the Artuch alpine camp at 2,200 metres, reached by shared taxi from Panjakent — the lakes lie six kilometres and 600 metres of climbing above it.
Aim for late July to early September, when the passes are clear. Nights at 2,800 metres still drop close to freezing in high summer, so carry a proper sleeping bag.
Kulikalon is shallow enough to swim in, which is rare this high — the shallows warm through the afternoon, unlike the icy glacier-fed lakes over the Alaudin pass.
The near shore fills with tents in August. Walk twenty minutes round to the northern bays, where rock spurs cut the shoreline into private coves that most groups never reach.
Filter every drop you drink. Hundreds of animals graze the shoreline pastures all summer, so lake and stream water needs treating even where it runs clear over stones.

Things to do

1
Carry on over the Alaudin pass
The trail does not end at Kulikalon. From the far shore it climbs to the Alaudin pass and drops into the next basin, where the lakes take their meltwater straight off the glaciers. Donkeys still carry the gear for trekking parties over the same crossing.
2
Pitch a tent on the Kulikalon shore
Flat grassy patches beside the water make the finest wild camping in the Fanns, a few steps from the lake. In the evening the granite face of the Kulikalon Wall loses its colour long before the water does, and the only sound left in the basin is the grazing herds.
3
Detour to the twin Dushakha Lakes
A short side trail leads to Dushakha, two connected turquoise pools in a stonier, higher basin than the main lake, and few trekkers make the extra climb. A steep pull above them gains a ridge looking straight down on both, with ice still lodged in the shaded hollows of the wall opposite.
4
Watch qurut drying at a summer camp
The families camped along the far shore milk their goats and cows here all summer. Much of that milk becomes qurut: sour yoghurt, salted, rolled into hard white balls and dried in the sun to keep for winter. The balls sit out on cloth beside the tents through the middle of the day.

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