Kazakhstan: Inside Almaty’s Musical Instrument Museum
The Museum of Folk Musical Instruments, Almaty, Kazakhstan
It was our first day in Kazakhstan — our first time in the country, in fact — and we had spent the morning with our guide Indira working through some of Almaty’s other sights before arriving at Panfilov Park in the afternoon. Indira was brilliant, the sort of guide who seems genuinely delighted that you want to know things rather than just be pointed at them, and she had been nudging us gently towards the museum all morning. Karen spotted the building before I did — a handsome old wooden structure near the park’s eastern edge, sitting there looking slightly incongruous among the Soviet-era surroundings, which is exactly the sort of thing that makes you want to go inside.
🏛️ The Building Itself
The museum is housed in a building that dates to 1908, designed by a local architect called Andrei Zenkov, the same man who designed the Ascension Cathedral just a short walk away in the same park. Where the cathedral was built without a single nail — an engineering achievement that still gets trotted out whenever anyone visits — the museum building is a more straightforward bit of Russian wooden architecture of the period, a rectangular structure clad in boards with tall windows and rather elaborate carved wooden decorations on the facades. In 1979, during a renovation, craftsmen added Kazakh national patterns to the wooden carvings: the “agash” (tree of life), the “shynzhara” (running waves) and a couple of others, which gives the exterior a pleasingly mixed heritage, part Russian colonial, part Kazakh.
The city itself was known as Verny in those days, a Russian military outpost that had grown into a proper town after the Russian Empire pushed into Central Asia from the middle of the nineteenth century. The building served as the Officers’ Assembly Hall, a place for military ceremonies and state receptions run by the administration of the Turkestan governor-generalship, which covered an enormous chunk of Central Asia at the time. After the Soviet Union took over, it became the House of Officers, and carried on in that role until 1980, when it was converted into a museum. It opened formally in the spring of 1981, though it was not until 1990 that the museum was given its current name, after the great Kazakh composer Ykylas Dukenuly.
The building was listed as a monument of art, architecture and history in 1980, and in 1993 it was included in the Almaty State Historical-Architectural and Memorial Reserve, which covers the historic core of what used to be Verny. A restoration was carried out between 2012 and 2013, which the more honest sources on the subject note also managed to change the interior almost completely, losing most of the original fittings in the process. These things happen. The outside, at least, still looks very much the thing.
Outside the entrance stands a sculpture of a narkobyz, a large Kazakh bow instrument, which gives you a reasonable hint of what’s coming.
🎵 Who Was Ykylas?
The museum’s full name is the Ykylas Republican Museum of Folk Musical Instruments, and since his name is above the door it seemed worth finding out a bit about him. I did so that evening rather than in advance, as usual.
Ykylas Dukenuly lived from around 1843 to 1916, and he was a composer and performer who became one of the most important figures in the history of the kobyz, the ancient two-stringed bowed instrument of the Kazakh people. By the time Ykylas came along in the nineteenth century, the kobyz was in serious trouble. It had long been associated with shamanism and ritual practice — the instrument of the baksy, the Kazakh shaman — and as the old shamanistic traditions faded, the kobyz fell out of use along with them. At the beginning of the twentieth century it was barely played at all, and Ykylas was, by most accounts, the last great master of the classical kobyz tradition of his era. His compositions and his playing essentially kept the instrument alive at a time when it might otherwise have died out completely. The museum being named after him is a statement, more or less, that without people like Ykylas, there might not be much to put in a museum of folk music at all.
🪗 The Collection
The collection runs to over a thousand items, covering sixty types of Kazakh national instrument alongside a broader selection from the wider Turkic world and beyond. The initial collection was put together from instruments gathered by ethnographers and musicians travelling across Kazakhstan in the twentieth century, some of them dating back to the seventeenth century, and several of them belonging to famous singers, composers and performers of the past.
The museum is arranged across several halls, and we worked our way round them in rough order, which I would recommend as the arrangement has a sort of logic to it once you’re inside.
🪕 The Hall of Turkic Peoples’ Musical Instruments
This room covers the shared musical heritage of the Turkic-speaking world, which is considerably larger than most people in London would immediately guess. There are twenty-seven instruments here from fourteen Turkic-speaking countries, laid out in a way that makes it quite clear how much common ground there is between the musical traditions of peoples spread from Kazakhstan in the northeast right across to Turkey in the west. The displays include instruments from Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan and several others, and the family resemblances are obvious once they’re pointed out.
The Turkic peoples are among the oldest inhabitants of the Central Asian steppes, and their musical traditions run back well into the pre-Islamic period, carried along by nomadic cultures that left very little in the way of written records but a great deal in the way of oral tradition. The dombra and the kobyz are the two instruments most closely associated with the Kazakhs specifically, and there are close cousins of both on display here from neighbouring peoples.
🎶 The Dombra and Kazakh Oral Tradition
There is a lot of dombra in this museum, which is entirely appropriate since it is, without much argument, the national instrument of Kazakhstan. It is a long-necked, two-stringed plucked instrument with a pear-shaped body, and the Kazakhs have been playing it for a very long time. Some researchers put its origins back four thousand years or more, and similar instruments appear in archaeological evidence across the steppe going back to the medieval period at least.
What made the dombra so central to Kazakh culture was its role in oral tradition. The Kazakhs were a nomadic people until well into the twentieth century, and they kept their history, their epics, their laws and their genealogies alive through memory and music rather than written texts. The professionals responsible for this were the akyns — poet-improvisers who performed in musical contests — and the zhyrau, who sang epic poetry to dombra accompaniment. A household without a dombra, the old saying went, was a household inviting misfortune, and every yurt had one hanging on the wall.
The great dombra composers of the nineteenth century are the ones whose names still come up whenever Kazakh music is discussed: Kurmangazy Sagyrbayuly (1818–1889), whose compositions are still played constantly and after whom the national folk orchestra is named; Tattimbet Kazangapuly (1815–1862), who developed a separate eastern tradition of playing; Dina Nurpeisova (1861–1955), whose career stretched from the pre-Soviet era to well into the Soviet period and who became one of the most celebrated performers of the twentieth century.
🎻 The Kobyz Hall
This was the room I found most interesting, partly because the kobyz is the stranger of the two main instruments and rather less straightforwardly appealing on first acquaintance.
The kobyz is a bowed instrument, held downright rather than across the body, with two strings traditionally made from horsehair. Its origins are traced in legend to a figure called Korkyt Ata, a semi-mythical shaman and musician said to have invented it while searching for a way to defeat death — which is either the most Kazakh possible way to invent a musical instrument, or simply the most human. The instrument has a warm, resonant, slightly mournful sound that the museum’s displays describe, with a pleasing lack of sentiment, as “able to cry with the voice of a lost camel.”
For centuries the kobyz was inseparable from shamanic ritual. The baksy used it in healing ceremonies and as a way of communicating with spirits, which meant that when shamanism began to decline under Russian imperial pressure in the nineteenth century and later Soviet anti-religious campaigns in the twentieth, the kobyz nearly went with it. This is where Ykylas Dukenuly’s importance comes in: his secular compositions took the kobyz out of ritual context and turned it into a concert instrument, giving it a future that outlasted the traditions it had originally served. He died in 1916, just as the Soviet era was about to begin, and it was left to his successors to carry the instrument forward through considerably more turbulent times.
The hall has detailed information about the history and construction of the kobyz, including examples of the various forms it has taken over the centuries.
💨 Wind and Percussion Instruments
This section covers a wide range of instruments that sit somewhat outside the main narrative of dombra and kobyz, but which together tell a more complete story of Kazakh musical life.
The wind instruments include the sybyzgy, a reed flute played with circular breathing, which produces a particularly haunting sound; the sherter, a form of fiddle; and the syrnai, a fipple flute. The percussion instruments include the shankobyz, a jaw harp made of metal or bone, which turns up across an enormous range of cultures worldwide, suggesting that humans have independently invented the jaw harp more times than anyone has quite managed to count.
There are also instruments associated specifically with shamanic practice, including the dangyra, a frame drum used by the baksy. The museum’s treatment of these is careful and scholarly rather than sensationalist, which is probably the right call in a country where most of the population is Muslim and the shamanic traditions are a matter of pre-Islamic history rather than living practice.
🌍 The Hall of World Instruments
The last hall we went through covers eighty-one instruments from twenty-seven countries across the world, which gives the whole visit a pleasant sense of perspective after spending most of it in a specifically Central Asian context. The breadth of the collection here is enough to prompt a bit of informal comparison between how different cultures arrived at similar solutions to the basic problem of making music, which I found pleasantly absorbing for considerably longer than Karen thought it warranted.
The displays include instruments from Southeast Asia, East Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Europe, and are accompanied by short explanations of each instrument’s context and tradition, most of them available in English, which was a relief.
💭 Reflections
The museum took us a good ninety minutes, which felt about right — enough time to go around everything properly without hitting a wall of information fatigue. It is a compact museum rather than a grand one, but it punches above its weight in terms of what it actually puts in front of you, and the combination of the historic building, the genuine antiquity of some of the instruments, and the sheer strangeness of hearing about a culture where the entire history of a people was stored in the memory of musicians rather than written down anywhere is rather affecting once it sinks in.
Planning a Visit to the Museum of Musical Instruments
🎵 Ykylas Museum of Folk Musical Instruments, Almaty
| 📍 Address | 24a Zenkov Street, Park of 28 Panfilov Guardsmen, Almaty |
| 🕖 Opening Times | Tue–Sun, 10:00 AM – 7:00 PM. Closed Mondays. | 🌐 Website | kazakhstan.travel/en/attractions/407 |
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| 📞 Phone | +7 727 272-43-21 | Not publicly listed |
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🎟️ Entry Fees
| Adults | Concessions / Children |
|---|---|
| Up to 3,000 tenge | From 300 tenge |
Exact tiered pricing (students, pensioners, schoolchildren) is not published online — confirm at the door or by phone.
🚶 Getting There
The museum is inside Panfilov Park (Park of 28 Guardsmen), near the park’s eastern edge on Zenkov Street. It is a short walk from the Ascension Cathedral.
By Metro: The nearest station is Zhibek Zholy on Line 1; from there it’s roughly a 10–15 minute walk north through the city centre.
By Bus: Several city bus routes stop along Gogol Street and Kabanbai Batyr Avenue, both of which border the park.
On Foot: If you’re already visiting the Ascension Cathedral, the museum is immediately to hand — the two buildings share the same park, and the museum’s entrance is visible from the cathedral forecourt.
By Taxi / Rideshare: Yandex Go and inDriver both operate widely in Almaty; the address to give is 24a Zenkov Street or simply Panfilov Park.
Getting to and Around Almaty
✈️ Getting to Almaty
By Air: Almaty International Airport (ALA) is the busiest and largest airport in Central Asia, situated around 15–20 kilometres northeast of the city centre. It received a major upgrade with the opening of a brand-new international terminal in June 2024, which now handles all international arrivals and departures, while the older terminal has been repurposed for domestic flights. Air Astana, the national carrier, operates a wide network of international routes alongside Turkish Airlines, Lufthansa, Korean Air, China Southern and many others; the airport is well connected to the Middle East, Europe, East Asia and across the former Soviet states. Domestic routes link Almaty with Astana (around 1 hour 40 minutes), Shymkent, Aktau, Aktobe and other Kazakhstani cities several times daily, operated mainly by Air Astana and SCAT Airlines.
- Website: almatyairport.kz
By Train: Kazakhstan Temir Zholy (KTZ), the national rail operator, runs services into Almaty’s two central stations. Almaty-2 is the main terminus, located in the city centre and the arrival point for most intercity and international trains; Almaty-1 sits about four kilometres further out and serves some regional and lower-class services. The overnight train from Astana is a well-used option for travellers combining the two cities — journey time is roughly 12–16 hours depending on the service, with sleeper berths available. KTZ also operates high-speed trains on the Almaty–Astana corridor several times a week. In a more unusual development, an international tourist train running the Xi’an–Almaty route along the historic Silk Road corridor launched services in 2025 and has been running regularly since June 2026 — a memorable way to arrive from China.
- Website: tickets.kz (for KTZ bookings)
By Bus: Long-distance coaches connect Almaty with Astana (around 17–20 hours), Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan (roughly 4–5 hours), Shymkent and other regional cities, departing from the Sairan Bus Terminal in the west of the city. Coach travel is cheap but slow over Kazakhstan’s long distances; the train or a domestic flight is generally the better option for anything beyond a regional hop.
🚌 Getting Around
The Onay! Travel Card: The most useful thing a visitor spending more than a day in Almaty can do is pick up an Onay! card, the city’s unified contactless transport card, valid on buses, trolleybuses and the metro. The physical card costs around 500–800 tenge and comes loaded with one complimentary ride; it can be topped up at Qiwi payment terminals around the city, through the Onay app, or via Kaspi and Halyk banking apps. A virtual card can also be created free of charge within the Onay app, linked to an international payment card, though the physical card has the practical advantage of working in the metro where there is no internet connection. Cards are sold at some kiosks near the airport, at railway stations, newsstands and mobile phone shops — they cannot be purchased at metro stations themselves, so it is worth tracking one down before making your first metro journey. Note that some foreign cards and non-Kazakhstani phone numbers can encounter problems registering with the app; the physical card is the reliable fallback. Fare with an Onay card or contactless bank card is around 120 tenge per ride; cash paid directly to the driver costs 200 tenge.
- Website: onay.kz
- Apps: Onay! (iOS and Android), for card management, top-ups and live bus tracking
🚇 Metro: Almaty’s metro opened in 2011 and is the only operational metro system in Kazakhstan, and the second in Central Asia after Tashkent. It runs as a single line (the Green Line) running roughly north to south, covering 10.3 kilometres with nine stations through the city’s central and southern districts. It is clean, fast, reliable and, during rush hour, considerably quicker than being stuck in a bus in Almaty’s traffic. The metro operates from 06:20 until midnight, with trains running every five to ten minutes during peak hours. One practical limitation: the line does not connect to either main railway station or to the Sairan Bus Terminal, which requires using a bus or taxi for those connections. A new station at Kalkaman is planned for 2027 as part of ongoing expansion works. The fare is around 120 tenge with an Onay card.
🚌 Buses and Trolleybuses: The bus network is the workhorse of Almaty’s public transport, with over 130 routes covering the city comprehensively. Almaty is also home to the only trolleybus system in Kazakhstan, with nine routes serving the southern, eastern and western parts of the city. Bus lanes in the centre help speed things along during rush hours, though traffic congestion remains a significant issue, particularly on the main east–west corridors in the morning and evening. The City Bus and 2GIS apps are both excellent for planning routes, checking real-time arrival times and navigating transfers. Payment as above — Onay card, contactless bank card or cash to the driver (more expensive).
- Apps: City Bus (iOS and Android); 2GIS (2gis.kz)
🚕 Ride-Hailing — Yango, inDrive and Bolt: Almaty has a lively ride-hailing scene, and for most visitors it is the most practical option for getting around, particularly for journeys that don’t fall neatly on the metro line. Yango (operated by Yandex) is the dominant app, works reliably in both Almaty and Astana, accepts international payment cards and offers several service tiers from economy through to business class. inDrive (formerly InDriver) operates on a fare-negotiation model where the passenger proposes a price, which typically comes out 10–25 per cent below Yango for the same journey; it works well on familiar routes but adds a little friction. Bolt is a third option and worth having as a backup. All three track rides in real time, display driver details and are significantly safer than hailing an unmarked car from the street. Uber merged its Kazakhstan operations with Yandex some years ago and no longer operates independently here.
- Apps: Yango (yango.com), inDrive (indrive.com), Bolt (bolt.eu)
🚖 Taxis: Conventional metered taxis are available at the airport, outside major hotels and near metro stations, and are broadly comparable in cost to the ride-hailing apps. Agree on a price before setting off if hailing one from the street rather than ordering through an app, as not all street taxis use meters. Official taxi ranks at the airport offer fixed-price transfers to the city centre; the journey takes around 20–40 minutes depending on traffic.
🚗 Car Hire: Several international and local rental companies operate at Almaty International Airport and in the city, including Hertz and Avis alongside local operators. A standard compact car typically starts from around 12,000–18,000 tenge per day. Drivers must be at least 21–25 years old depending on the company. Driving in Almaty is generally manageable once you are clear of the centre, though the city’s traffic jams — particularly during morning and evening rush hours — can be severe. The road network within Almaty is well maintained, and Kazakhstan’s main intercity highways are generally in decent condition. An international driving licence alongside a national licence is advisable for foreign visitors.
🚲 Almaty Bike: Almaty has a public bike-sharing scheme, Almaty Bike, with around 50 docking stations and 270 bicycles spread across the city. Bike lanes have been expanding in the central districts in recent years, though the network is still developing and cycling on some roads requires a degree of confidence. The service operates seasonally through the warmer months and is most useful for short trips around the centre and the city’s parks.
- Website: almatybike.kz
- App: Almaty Bike (iOS and Android)
🗺️ Navigation: 2GIS is the local navigation app of choice and is substantially better than Google Maps for Almaty’s street-level detail, public transport routing and business listings. It works offline, which is particularly useful. Download it before you travel.
- Website: 2gis.kz
The Best Time to Visit Almaty
Almaty sits at the foot of the Tian Shan mountains in south-eastern Kazakhstan, at an elevation of around 700–900 metres. The city experiences a sharply continental climate — hot, dry summers, bitterly cold winters, and brief but vivid spring and autumn seasons. There is no single “best” time that suits every type of traveller, but each season has a distinct character worth knowing before you pack.
🌸 Spring (March–May)
Spring arrives tentatively in March, when snow still covers the upper slopes and nighttime temperatures regularly dip below freezing. By April the city transforms: the famous apple orchards — for which the city’s name, Alma-Ata, means “father of apples” — come into blossom, and the parks along Alatau and Panfilov turn vivid green. May is arguably the most beautiful month, with mild temperatures of 15–22 °C, clear skies, and the mountains still snow-capped above a lush green valley.
Spring is an excellent time for city exploration, hiking at lower elevations, and visiting the Big Almaty Lake while the roads are open and the crowds absent. Expect occasional afternoon showers in April and May — standard Central Asian spring rain that clears quickly.
What to pack: A mid-layer fleece or light down jacket for cool mornings and evenings, a waterproof outer shell, comfortable walking shoes, sunglasses and high-factor sun cream (the altitude increases UV exposure), one or two lighter layers for warm afternoons, a small daypack for half-day hikes.
☀️ Summer (June–August)
Summer is Almaty’s warmest season, with July temperatures averaging 25–30 °C in the city, occasionally pushing above 35 °C during heatwaves. The heat sits at lower elevations, but the mountains are refreshingly cool, making this the prime season for serious trekking — routes to Shymbulak, Medeu, and the Tian Shan high trails are all accessible. The Medeu outdoor skating rink becomes a leisure park, cable cars run to maximum altitude, and the city’s outdoor café culture peaks.
Summer is also peak tourist season, so hotel prices are higher and popular trails are busier. The city can feel dusty and hazy during dry spells, and air quality occasionally suffers.
What to pack: Lightweight, breathable clothing for the city, a warm fleece and windproof jacket for mountain days, sturdy hiking boots if trekking, a sun hat, sunglasses and high-factor sun cream, insect repellent for wooded trails, a refillable water bottle, a light rain jacket for afternoon mountain storms.
🍂 Autumn (September–November)
September and October are exceptional months in Almaty. The air clears, temperatures settle into a comfortable 12–20 °C, and the city’s many parks and tree-lined boulevards turn gold and amber. The Kok-Tobe hill and Panfilov Park are particularly striking in autumn colour. Markets overflow with produce — pomegranates, apples, walnuts, dried apricots — and the harvest season brings a convivial energy to the bazaars. Hiking conditions remain excellent through October, with stable weather and fewer visitors on the trails.
November marks the turn: temperatures fall sharply, the first snows dust the peaks in early November, and by month’s end the city itself may see its first snowfall.
What to pack: Mid-weight layers for warm days and cool evenings, a wool jumper or fleece, a packable down jacket for late October and November, waterproof shoes or ankle boots, a scarf and light gloves for October evenings, a tote bag for bazaar shopping.
❄️ Winter (December–February)
Almaty’s winter is proper Central Asian cold: average January temperatures hover around −5 to −10 °C, with periodic drops to −20 °C or below. Snow blankets the city from December through February, and the mountains behind it become one of Central Asia’s finest ski destinations. Shymbulak Ski Resort, reachable by gondola from the city, offers pistes at 2,200–3,200 metres with reliable snow and comparatively modest crowds by European standards.
Winter is ideal for skiing and snowboarding, and the city takes on a handsome, frosted character under snow. Ice skating at Medeu — the world’s highest outdoor skating rink — is memorable in cold, clear weather. However, smog can be a problem in winter due to temperature inversions trapping vehicle emissions, and daylight hours are short.
What to pack: A heavy winter coat rated to at least −20 °C, thermal base layers top and bottom, wool or fleece mid-layers, waterproof insulated boots, thick wool socks, a hat covering the ears, a scarf and warm gloves or mittens, ski wear if visiting Shymbulak, hand warmers for long periods outdoors.
📊 Season at a Glance
🏆 Overall Best Time to Visit
If forced to name one period, late April through May and September through mid-October represent Almaty at its most welcoming. The weather is reliably comfortable rather than extreme, the city is alive with colour — blossom in spring, gold in autumn — and the mountains are accessible without requiring specialist gear. Shoulder-season visitors also benefit from lower accommodation prices and quieter trails. Skiers aside, there is little reason to choose midwinter, and those sensitive to heat may find July and August in the city tiring. Spring and autumn are when Almaty reveals its character most generously: a cosmopolitan Central Asian city set against snow-dusted peaks, with good food, open air, and a pace that rewards unhurried exploration.
Where to Stay in Almaty?
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ The Rixos Almaty
The Rixos Almaty is the sort of hotel that makes you feel slightly better about yourself just by being in it, which is presumably part of what you’re paying for. Set on Seifullin Avenue in the heart of the city, it is a thoroughly accomplished operation: 335 rooms and suites finished to a standard that leaves very little to complain about, a full-service spa and wellness centre that we found ourselves using more than planned, multiple restaurants covering everything from Kazakh national dishes to Continental favourites, and a rooftop pool that offers mountain views of the kind you’d normally have to hike for. The service is attentive without being intrusive — a balance that is harder to achieve than it sounds — and the location puts you within easy reach of the main sights on foot or by short taxi. The conference facilities are extensive, which means the hotel sees a fair amount of business travel, but this doesn’t detract from the experience. It consistently tops the ratings charts in Almaty, and we can see why.
⭐⭐⭐⭐ InterContinental Almaty
The InterContinental Almaty on Zheltoksan Street is what you want from a reliable international four-star: consistent quality, professional staff, a central location, and the mild reassurance of a brand you’ve encountered before and didn’t hate. The 303 rooms are well-appointed and well-sized, the beds are the sort you wake up in feeling that things are going to be fine, and the breakfast is genuinely good rather than the dismal buffet experience that blights so many hotels of this type. There’s a fitness centre, a swimming pool, and a restaurant that does perfectly respectable international cooking. The staff speak English comfortably, which when you’ve been navigating Kazakh and Russian all day is more of a relief than it should be to admit. It’s been one of the most popular hotels among foreign visitors to Almaty for several years running, which tells you something about the combination of quality and dependability it offers. Not the most characterful place you’ll ever stay, but dependable in the best sense of the word.
⭐⭐⭐ Mercure Almaty City Center
The Mercure Almaty City Center does exactly what a good three-star should do, which is to say it offers clean, comfortable, well-located accommodation at a price that doesn’t require a lengthy conversation with your bank. Part of the Accor group, so you know roughly what to expect in terms of room layout and standards, it sits in a convenient central position and has built up a solid body of positive reviews from travellers who appreciate practicality without frills. The rooms are not enormous but they’re thoughtfully fitted out, the wi-fi works reliably (which matters more than most hotel marketers seem to appreciate), and the staff are helpful. Breakfast is included in many rates and is perfectly decent. It lacks the mountain views and rooftop pools of the five-star options, obviously, but it more than compensates with value for money and an ease of operation that takes the stress out of travelling somewhere unfamiliar. For anyone spending a week in Almaty and wanting a sensible base from which to explore rather than a destination in itself, this is a very solid choice.
⭐⭐ Hotel Kazakhstan
The Hotel Kazakhstan is one of the great Soviet-era monuments of Central Asian hospitality, which is not quite the same as saying it’s luxurious. The 26-storey tower on Dostyk Avenue is one of the most recognisable buildings in the city — you can see it from most of Almaty, which makes navigation considerably easier — and while it has been refurbished over the years, it retains a certain period character that we found rather charming. The rooms are simple and functional, the decor is not going to win any awards, and the plumbing occasionally has its own ideas, but the staff are friendly, the location is exceptional (you’re walking distance from the cable car to Kok-Tobe and close to most of the main sights), and the prices are genuinely reasonable for what is, after all, an address with genuine history. Budget travellers who want a private room rather than a dormitory, and who would like to stay somewhere with a bit of a story, will find the Hotel Kazakhstan a perfectly adequate and oddly memorable choice.
Almaty Backpackers
Almaty Backpackers is the city’s best-known hostel and has been the first stop for independent travellers and overland adventurers rolling in from the Silk Road for many years. It occupies a residential building in a central location and has the comfortable, lived-in atmosphere of a place that knows what its guests actually need: helpful staff who know the city well and will happily tell you the best way to get to Big Almaty Lake or where to change money sensibly, dormitory beds that are clean and have decent lockers, a common room that actually encourages people to compare notes rather than stare at their phones, and a kitchen where you can sort out a meal when your budget requires it. It’s the kind of place where you end up staying longer than planned because someone at breakfast told you about something you hadn’t considered going to see. It consistently gets strong reviews for value and for the quality of information you can pick up just by talking to the staff and other guests, which in a city that is still relatively unfamiliar to most Western travellers is worth a considerable amount
