Turkistan is one building and the country around it. Give day one to the Azret Sultan reserve: the Yasawi mausoleum and its bronze Taikazan, the Hilvet underground mosque, Rabiga Sultan Begim and the bathhouse, then Keruen-Saray's canals after dark. Day two, hire a driver for Sauran's walls and Otrar, stopping at Arystan Bab, where pilgrims traditionally begin. Go in spring or autumn: July runs well past 35°C.
Turkistan is Kazakhstan's pilgrim town. Timur's unfinished mausoleum for the Sufi poet Khoja Ahmed Yasawi stands over a walled old town, Keruen-Saray's canals and caravanserai hotels sit in front of it, and the Silk Road ruins of Sauran and Otrar lie an hour's drive out on the steppe.
Timur's mausoleum for the Sufi poet, left unfinished at his death in 1405 and a UNESCO site since 2003. The brick dome over the central hall is the largest in Central Asia; come early, before the tour groups and the heat.
A semi-underground mosque from the 12th century, used until the 20th, where tradition says Yasawi withdrew to pray. It is small and dim; the reserve ticket covers it.
The 15th-century mausoleum of Ulugbek's daughter, wife of Abulkhair Khan, pulled down in the 1890s and rebuilt in the early 1980s. It stands a short walk from the mausoleum.
A domed 16th-century bathhouse dated to about 1580 to 1590, now a museum. The reserve's combined ticket covers it alongside the mausoleum and the Hilvet mosque.
The Museum of the History of Turkistan fills a 1905 barracks of the Russian garrison, with coins and finds from the mausoleum. Visit it before the reserve and the monuments make more sense.
The mound where Turkistan began: a cross-shaped citadel and Kushan coins of the 2nd century AD, the oldest evidence of urban life in Kazakhstan. Excavations continue, and an archaeological park is being built around them.
A 20.5-hectare tourist town opened in 2021, with hotels, a bazaar and a canal that runs a boat show between them. Go after dark, when the mausoleum is lit across the water.
A 13th to 18th-century Silk Road city whose fortress walls still run 850 by 660 metres, 3 to 6 metres high in places. It is open steppe with no shade, so go early with water.
The city whose governor killed Genghis Khan's envoys and brought the Mongol siege of 1219. Its mosque, palace and wall sections were restored in the 2000s, and the visitor centre has a hall on al-Farabi.
Opened in 1920, one of the oldest museums in the country: four halls of archaeology, ethnography, the Kazakh Khanate and independence, over 88,000 objects in all. Best on a hot afternoon.
A bronze cauldron cast in 1399, held in the Hermitage from 1935 and returned in 1989.
The tomb of Yasawi's teacher, near Otrar; pilgrims traditionally stop here first.
The shrine of Yasawi's daughter, rebuilt in 2014 to 2015 after collapsing in the 1940s.
The tombs of Yasawi's parents in Sairam, where the pilgrim route begins.
The spring new year: yurts in the ethno-aul, kures wrestling, arkan tartu and nauryz kozhe.
The end of Ramadan, marked with family meals and visits to the mosque.
The Day of Unity of the People of Kazakhstan, a public holiday.
Wreaths and veterans' events; a public holiday.
Eid al-Adha; its first day is a public holiday.
A public holiday at the end of the hottest weeks.
A public holiday in the best of the autumn weather.
Marks independence in 1991; cold, quiet and cheap for hotels.
East of the city, with direct flights from Almaty and Astana. Take a taxi into town.
On the Orenburg to Tashkent line. A daily train to Almaty takes about 15 hours; Shymkent is 2.5 to 4.
Buses and shared taxis cover the 165 km from Shymkent in about two hours, the usual link from the south.
Walk the old town and Keruen-Saray. Take a taxi to Gauhar Ana; hire a driver for Sauran, Otrar and Arystan Bab.
Boiled meat over flat noodles with onion broth, the national dish.
Rice, mutton and yellow carrot from the kazan, the default lunch in the south.
Horse-meat sausage, sliced cold for feasts.
Fermented camel's milk, sour and fizzy.
Fermented mare's milk, a summer drink.
Fried dough puffs served with tea at every table.
Meat pastries baked on the wall of a clay oven.
Hard, salty balls of dried curd, sold at the bazaar.
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Kazakhstan
