Landlocked in the very heart of Central Asia, this old staple on the courses of the erstwhile Silk Road is every inch the wild, unexplored and nomadic place it is famed as. Bishkek, the capital, is just one of the nation’s rare vestiges of urban life; a mishmash of Soviet influences, Turkic bazaars and tsarist builds that spring up where the rolling Kazakh steppe gives way to the mountains. And what mountains they are! Soaring to over 7,000 meters above sea level, they crash into the Hindu Kush and Himalaya – a bulwark between east and west. They are the definitive aspect of the Kyrgyz hinterland, imbuing the country with everything from the ice-tipped peak of Jengish Chokusu, the gorgeous gorges of Ala Archa National Park, the hot springs of Altyn Arashan, and the dusty ridges of Sualiman Too rising from the Ferghana Valley. Kyrgyzstan tour guides also recommend plunging into the earthy teahouses of the millennia-old Osh bazaar, roughing it out in a kurt on the alpine shores of Song Kol Lake, and hiking up through the petroglyphs at Cholpon Ata to access the impossibly beautiful highlands around Issyk Kul. Oh, and the Seven Bulls are a real geological wonder, best enjoyed in spring!