Charyn

Charyn National Park was created in 2004 in south-eastern Kazakhstan, in Almaty province, and protects some 932 km² around the canyon that the Charyn River has cut into the plateau.

The canyon runs for some hundred and fifty kilometres and reaches more than three hundred metres deep in places. Its most visited section is the Valley of Castles, where erosion has sculpted columns, towers and walls of architectural shapes out of the red sandstone, a landscape frequently compared to the Grand Canyon on a smaller scale.

Its botanical value is equally notable: on the canyon floor, beside the river, a relict forest of Sogdian ash (Fraxinus sogdiana) survives, a species that was common in Central Asia during the Tertiary and that today persists in only a few places. That ash wood, protected from before the park was created, is one of the last in the world. The wildlife includes Siberian ibex on the rock faces, goitered gazelle on the surrounding plateaux and a cliff-dwelling birdlife with golden eagle and falcons.