Kyrgyz horse trekking: How to find a guide with horses and what to expect

As Instagram made it popular in the last couple of years, many people want to travel to Kyrgyztan and ride horses around the high mountains and endless, empty grasslands surrounding them. Still though many people we met while visiting the country were as clueless as we were on how to go about arranging such a trip. Or to be fair, either people were clueless and just trying their best finding something, while there or people spent way to much money prearranging their trip across tour operators beforehand. This is why I want to show you, how you can easily find a horse guide and horses for a cheap price, while making sure that the money benefits the right people.

Traditional yurt camps in the Altyn Arashan valley near Karakol.

Booking your horsetrip with tour operators on the web: DON’T DO IT!!!

Well, it sounds strange, but it is true. When looking on Google for tour operators, there is a wide variety of offers with shiny websites, that will try to sell you well-planned itineraries for your very own special horse trekking adventure. To be clear it is not a scam (or it doesn’t seem to be). When researching for this blog I compared a multitude of packages, that are offered on the internet, and they all definetily will work as it is shown in the itinerary details.

The problem is, most of the money is not reaching the local guides and farmers, that will do the trip with you in the end. For example, I saw a website in my native language, german, where they asked for around 800€ for a 4 day trip, including guide, transport from Bishkek, accomodation, food and horses. As this is faaar beyond what locals charge, I can only assume that the guy managing those websites, gladly pockets the difference (there were an adress and a phone number from Munich given, so I assume that it was not a Kyrgyz travel agency). In the end, none of them offer something, that would be too hard to organize yourself, as most offer tours is well-established horse trekking towns such as Kyzart and Karakol.

The only reason, in my opinion, why one should go with such a tour operator is, when wanting to do a specific trek outside of the main areas, as we tried and essentially failed to find a good itinerary ourselves, while we were there, mainly because it does take considerably longer to organize, as there is not as much infrastructure built up already and a lot of local knowledge is needed to do it safely.

How to plan a budget-friendly horse trekk yourself

This guide is according to our experience. We were in Kyrgyztan for around 1 month and did 2 Horse treks while we were there. The first was to Son-Kul and the second one to Kol Ukok near Kotschkor. As the offers online were far out of our budget, we did it the old school way of trying to find something on the spot while there.

Location

To be frank, organizing a trip yourself is not that easy across the board. It depends on where you go about it. The easiest places in my opinion are Kotschkor/Kyzart and Karakol. We did both our trips from the Kotschkor/Kyzart area. Here, there are a lot of local operators willing to take you into the mountains. In many other places, it can be considerably harder. Other places, where it should be a manageble amount of planning are Sary-Chelek, Bokonbayevo, Jyrgalan or Panda Pass. The last one we sadly could not do, I would highly recommend checking that one out, if you have enough time in the country. This is not to say that those are the only places where you can rent horses and a guide, but those are the ones we know to have some sorts of tourism infrastructure and are definetilty worth seeing. I many places there was just no one offering the service and organizing something yourself is harder if you cannot explain what exactly you want in Russian.

We did not do a horse trekk at each and every location, because we wanted some other experiences aswell. I think doing back-to-back horse trekks for a month would have been a bit boring after a while, as we were not specifically there for that activity. Another disclaimer: We did not visit the south of the country too much, so for information on that you have to refer to other sources.

On our way out of Kyzart and into the mountains

How to get there

You might wonder how you can reach those places, as many are far away in the mountains. Easiest of course would be to rent a car, but I assume that if you read a guide on how to save a couple hundred euros on a horse trekk you are not in the financial position to rent a 4×4 car and do a big roadtrip around the country so here is my guide on how to do it without a car. Most likely, you will start/end your trip in Bishkek, the capital. It is the richest area of the country, has the biggest international airport and is the starting point of many horse trekking tours offered online.

If you land at an odd time of the day or just want to travel a bit slower, stay in Bishkek for a day or two and experience the soviet architecture, the interesting food scene (the rest of the country is far simpler) and the markets. A special recomendation from me would be to visit the horse market on the Osh Bazar. People from far and wide bring their horses here to be auctioned off. It is a truly unique experience.

Interesting soviet architecture in Bishkek

To get into the mountains, you have to take „mashrutkas“, shared taxis or private taxis. A mashrutka is basically a cargo van, that is fitted with as many bus seats as possible. On some routes, there are also smaller shared taxis, when the demand is not that big. You buy yourself a seat in those vehicles and when they are full, they will go. This can take a while, but in many cases, as long as you don’t travel too late in the day, your ride will definetily take place. I would say start around 7-10am or even earlier if you get up early anyways. I can only recommend private taxis, if you are really short on time. To give you an idea, a ride in a Taxi from Bishkek to Kotchkor was 60€ when we visited, while the mashrutka was 3,5€.

If you fancy something special (although it will take longer to reach any of the towns where you can start a horse trek), is to take the train from Bishkek to Balyktschy. It is insanely cheap, the views are gorgeous and they have a special first class carriage, that is really comfortable and designed in a traditional yet modern style. A must for train enthusiasts.

Here is a rough idea of a „network map“ of mashrutkas that are relevant for this post:

This picture is very oversimplified. You can get basically everywhere from Bishkek but other than that those routes shown will be your best bet. To take a mashrutka or a shared taxi, just go to your local bus station/ taxi station. If you do not know where that is in your town, ask the host of your accomodation. They will know. If the distance to the station is not too big, you can walk, but especially in Bishkek the station is far out of the city, so walking is not an option. The easier way is to take a taxi through YandexGo. This is basically like Uber and the prices are set by the App. You can put in where you want to go and the system will find you a driver and tell you the price. Taxis are really cheap on shorter distances, so it is in many cases worth spending 1 or 2 Euros for the ride to the station, to save an hour of grueling walking along dusty streets with your backpacks.

When arriving at the station, aim for the mashrutkas first, if availabe. The taxi drivers will try to get you in their taxi / shared taxi, but if there is a mashrutka to your destination aswell, it will always be cheaper and not considerably slower. Act confident, when talking to the drivers, and make it seem, as if you know the prices to avoid getting ripped off. Generally in 9 out of 10 cases do not haggle. There is always the same price to your destination. Some drivers will ask you for more money if you look dumb and wealthy, so don’t be scared when getting approached by drivers and speak nicely though stay firm, when they ask for an unreasonable amount or ask other Kyrgyz passengers, what they are paying. A common thing is being asked for a „luggage fee“. This does not exist. Do not pay that. If he tried to rip you off the first time, he will most likely offer you the normal price, if you try to walk away, as for him, filling up the mashrutka and getting on the road is more important in the end. If you intend to take a shared taxi to your destination, because there is no mashrutka, always make sure you ask different drivers on how long it will take to fill up, especially if you are the first people waiting. Sometimes the drivers will tell you it may take 30 minutes or up to an hour, though in reality they know that most likely no one else is coming, in order to make you pay for the entire taxi, when your patience runs low. We once tried to take a shared taxi from Kotchkor to Naryn, but as we waited for an eternity no one else came and the driver repetidly asked if we just wanted to pay and start the drive. Later in the accomodation, we got told, that usually there is no demand on that route (the driver assured us there were people coming). If you have to switch to a different mashrutka on the way, make sure, that, when arriving at the stopover, it is not too late yet or you may have to spend the night.

Just how different landscapes can be. This is Fairytale canyon, which we visited on our drive from Kotchkor to Karakol

Securing a guide and horses

Once you have arrived at your destination, you want to get started on your horse trek as fast as possible. Your best bet to do this, is by reaching out to as many guides as possible via WhattsApp. You get the numbers from Google Maps or from local websites. We always planned our horse treks around 2 days before arriving at the intended starting point, so that we could get going once we arrived. We wrote each number we could find our details and made sure that we made clear we wanted a private tour until we got around 10 offers in return. Generally private tours are not more expensive. You will see that some ask for a lot more than others. We travelled during the summer of 2025. Prices for 1 day of horse trekking were as a rule of thumb around 50€, so a 3 day trekk should not be more than 150€ or 15000 Som. Only if you want to do the trek completely alone with a guide it does cost slightly more in most cases. If you are travelling alone, though you do not mind having some company on the trek, ask in your accomodation or hostel. Maybe there are other guests you can share with, so it will be cheaper for all of you.

Make sure you get a good price and choose the best operator. If a message seems to good to be true or does not outline, what is offered completely, ask for more information, or if they still hesitate do not write back to them. We found both of our guides like that and were welcomed by caring and professional local guides each time. Both times they were locals offering this service as a means to stay out of poverty, as many people living as farmers do not seem to make a lot of money. Both guides we had also spoke English (although only minimal, it was enough to communicate the important stuff).

Essentially most offer the same kind of tour. They will give you horses, a guide, accomodation, food and a rough outline of the tour you are about to take. The experiences will not differ too much, as you will share your accomodations in the mountains with people from other tour guides. They essentially book you in with the guys operating the yurts in the mountains during the night and take you to the next yurt camp during the day. A “ Kyzart 3 day horse trekk to Son Kul“ will almost always have the exact same route, though maybe the yurt camp is different or your doing it the other way around, as there are many hosts in the mountains they cooperate with.

Typical yurt camp. As a couple we got one for ourselves. They were heated and had comfortable matresses inside.

What equipment do you need to bring with you?

We did our tours in July, the main season in Kyrgyztan goes from June to September, though if you want, they will take you in the winter aswell. As for the main season, do not expect there to be warm and sunny weather all the time. The mountains are unpredictable and a lot can go wrong. So my advice would be to pack enough layers to keep warm and dry. Our highest yurt camp was at 3000m and the temperatures dropped to 0°C during the night and icy rain paired with strong winds made it feel more like northern Norway than a country surrounded by hot deserts. Though you have to bring enough warm clothes, keep in mind, that you have to limit your luggage to one small backpack as the guide will not have more space to carry any of your belongings (your horse does not have to carry your luggage, as this will make it easier for you to maneuvre the trail). Also keep in mind, that at this latitude, the sun is INTENSE, so bring a lot of sunscreen and most definetily a hat to give you shade. I recommend a combination of both. There are not a lot of trees, most of the landscape is barren grassland and above a certain altitude just rubble and scrubs so no natural shade can be expected. You do not have to bring any food, but keep in mind, that your hosts in the mountains may not be able to tend to special dietary requirements, so get that out of the way, before you start. If you feel worried about bruising from the horses, I advice you to wear clothes that sit pretty tight around your upper thigh, idealy some horse riding pants. I wore hiking pants and always had a little bit of bruising but it was managable. I think if we did 5+ days treks, than I would have really suffered.

Very important: IF YOU DO NOT ASK, THEY WILL NOT GIVE YOU A HELMET. It is absolutely essential to wear one for safety. The next good hospitals are far away and falls from horses do happen to tourists. We witnesses someone falling from his horse, because a dog made the horse nervous. He was ok but he did not wear a helmet. Would he have hit the ground differently, it may have ended worse.

Horse riding with this view is absolutely unforgettable. This is Kol Ukok near Kotchkor.

Do I need to have horse riding experience?

No, you do not, though it helps. My girlfriend has been riding horses for years and was way less exhausted in the end. For me, the guide gave me a quick introduction and then gave me tips along the way. The horses are really well trained, at least in our case they were, so giving commands is pretty easy. They also know to follow the guide so they will go after him automatically if they feel, that you are not quite in control. If a horse happens to absolutely not listen neither to you nor to the guide, he has a small rope and will atttach your horse to his and that way it will stay in line haha.

My ideal route through Kyrgyztan that includes a horse trek

We visited a lot of the north and only a part of the south around Osh, while we visited. My ideal route would look as follows:

Arrive in Bishkek and stay in the city for 2 nights
Continue to Kotchkor and do a 3 day horse trek to Son Kul lake
Take the mashrutka to Karakol and do the Ala Kul lake trek on foot
Visit Aksay and Fairytail canyon and spend a night in Bokobayevo or Balyktschy
Do the long drive to visit Tash-Rabat and Panda Pass(far away but absolutely mesmorizing views, also ideal if you want to do another horse trek)
Return to Bishkek

If you want to visit the south aswell, I would advise you to fly if you have the money. We did the 13-hour journey crammed in a shared taxi to Osh and it was one of the most exhausting drives we took in our live. Hot, loud music, fumes from the engine and arrival at 2am somewhere on the outskirts far away from our accomodation. Though the taxi only costs 20€ per person, flights are also not that expensive. We needed the day after to recover haha.

If you enjoyed this article, feel free to read my other posts regarding travelling on a budget around the world:

travelwithmarius