Karakoyun Pass
The Karakoyun Pass is a pass of about 3,050 meters over the Talas Alatau at the head of the Kara-Koyun Valley, in the Talas Alatau planning zone of the Autonomous Tribal Regions. It carries the only road from the Irad Special Economic Zone into the Chatkal valley: from the Qara-Chik Border Checkpoint at the mouth of the Kara-Buura valley the road climbs the Kara-Buura and Kara-Koyun valleys to the pass and descends into the Chatkal valley, continuing down it to Ala-Buka at the edge of the Fergana Valley. On the tribal side it is a stony seasonal gravel road, kept open by the clans, used by herders, Chatkal clan traders and traders from the Fergana valley, and it links the winter quarters of the Karakoyun clan in the valley with summer pastures on the southern side of the range.[1] The clan's herders drive their flocks over it in early June and back in September, a migration that takes three to four days. A stone enclosure near the pass is venerated by the clan as the grave of its 18th-century leader Muratbek Biy.[2]
References
- ^ ISEZ Department of Geodesy and Cartography (2011). Gazetteer of Geographical Names of Irad. Talas.
- ^ Zhumabaeva, Cholpon (2016). Horses and Herders: The Pastoral Economy of the Talas Alatau, 1930–2010. Talas: Talas State University Press.