Mountains of Almaty: brief description

Almaty until 1997 was the main city of Kazakhstan, today it is the unofficially recognized southern capital of this state. A remarkable city has retained the qualities that were formed in it during the period when it was the center of the republic. He still has not lost its attractiveness and charm. The mountains of Almaty play a special role in this - an amazing creation of a magical nature. About them and will be told in this article.

Almaty: general information

The beautiful city is located at the very foot of the Zailiysky Alatau Mountains, located on the extreme south-eastern part of the republic. This site represents the northern ridge of the great Tien-Shan, which rises from 600 to 1,650 m above sea level.

In Almaty the climate is sharply continental, due to this the air temperature changes sharply even during the day. There are several small rivers running through the territory: Malaya, Bolshaya and their tributaries. The mountains of Almaty are a special pride and the main natural attraction. The name can be found below.

The former capital is the most important state center (scientific and cultural). Also, the city is also the sports capital of the state. It should be noted that it was in 2011 that the Asian Winter Games took place. Below, let us consider which mountains in Almaty have the highest altitude.

A little about the mountains of the Northern Tien Shan system

This is the most visited mountainous territory in Kazakhstan because of the proximity to it of a large metropolis. Due to the wide opportunities for the development of various types of tourism, this area is called the Ile-Kungeyskaya TRS (tourist-recreational system), which includes the following ridges: Zhetysu Alatau and Ile Alatau.

Below is more detailed information, we will consider the description, the name of the mountains in Almaty.

Kok-Tube

From the Kazakh language this name translates as "Green Hill", and in the middle of 1900 it was called "Verigina Mountain". Almost at the foot of the city are residential areas of Almaty. The mountain itself has a height of about 1130 meters above sea level.

Kok-Tube is not only a natural landmark of the city, but also a place of state importance. On its slopes towers the television tower of Almaty (372 meters). To climb the mountain, you can use the car or cable car, built in 1967.

Ile-Alatau

Which mountains in Almaty are popular today? Among them Ile-Alatau. It has steep slopes in the north and is flat on the southern side. And the northern almost in its entire length in front of the plain goes to a kind of hilly "counters", and the southern slopes gradually descend into the Kazakh mountain valleys of Chilika and the Kyrgyz Chon-Kemin.

For Ile-Alatau, the characteristic features of the relief are deep gorges and long moraine groves in front of the glaciers, which greatly complicates approaches to them.

Kungey-Alatau

With its northern slopes Alatau descends into the valley of the river. Chilik (Zhalanash valley), eastern - to the river. Charyn. Its valleys are distinctly flat, but the slopes are as steep as on Mount Ile-Alatau. The southern ones descend to the lake Issyk-Kul (Kirghizia).

The peculiarity of Kungey-Alatau is rather high alpine plateaus, which abruptly cut off towards the Chilik River. In the south the mountains are framed by snow-ice peaks reaching up to 4,000 meters or more in height.

In conclusion about other features of the mountains of Almaty

The mountains of Almaty have their own uniqueness. In the ridges, located to the north of the main (Kungey Alatau), there are peaks exceeding it in height.

For example, in the Taldy gorge there is a peak of Kyz-YmShek with a height of 4024 m, while the height of the main ridge does not exceed 3830 m (in the upper Taldy). And the distance from the top of Kyz-YmShek to the main ridge is 8 km. Moreover, the main range reaches a height of 4000 meters only in the valley of the river Karakia, which is located 25 kilometers west of Taldy.

The mountains of Almaty also have their own climatic features. Quite strong differences are observed in the regional peculiarities of the climate of the Kungey-Alatau and Ile-Alatau ridges.

On the second ridge, most of the precipitation falls on the territory of the interfluve between Malaya Almatinka and Talgar. The driest is the western zone of Ile-Alatau. This is especially evident in the winter season. All this affects the temperature regime.

In Kungey-Alatau, the amount of winter precipitation (snow) is much less than in the mountains of Ile-Alatau. Summer weather is about the same.