A cool breeze rustles leaves overhead equally families telephone call out to one another through the forest, punctuated by the repose sound of walnuts dropping to the woods floor. These are the forests of Arslanbob, an uncommon landscape in a country more famous for being 90% mountainous. And for two months each fall, these forests also become the social and economic centre of Arslanbob, as villagers move to the forests en masse.

Travellers to Kyrgyzstan are more ofttimes drawn past horse-riding nomads and remote mountain lakes than to the small-scale peaceful pockets of forest in the south of the state, but in Arslanbob, the combined entreatment of splendid landscapes and hospitable local culture has been quietly attracting a few travellers to the village and its surrounds.

An unshelled walnut sitting on brown leaves on the forest floor © Stephen Lioy / Lonely Planet

Legend states that Kyrgyz walnuts travelled with Alexander the Great's armies to be planted as the start walnut trees in Greece © Stephen Lioy / Lonely Planet

Community-based tourism in the forests of Arslanbob

In belatedly September or early October each year, a handful of international visitors wander through the village. They're here not for trekking in the surrounding Babash-Ata mountains (it's too late, likewise cold) or skiing the backcountry slopes that will be covered in snow inside a few months. They've come for Arslanbob's almanac walnut harvest. The traditional harvest has been repeated over hundreds of years: villagers spend days in the forests, finished off with meals amongst friends and family, or long evenings of drinking tea. Many village residents spend months at a time in the forests, where daily life revolves effectually the trees – collecting walnuts, preparing them for sale in local markets and carting them off to the village to make a profit.

A local villager climbs a tree to help knock walnuts to the ground © Stephen Lioy / Lonely Planet

A local villager climbs a tree to assist knock walnuts to the footing © Stephen Lioy / Alone Planet

Arslanbob is located in the center of Kyrgyz republic, at the end of a long road out of Jalal-Abad, the state'south 3rd-largest city. The hamlet'southward surprisingly decorated eye buzzes with locals streaming in and out of minibuses and shared taxis, calls to prayer from the hamlet mosque. The din of shoppers bargaining with vendors murmurs down a line of shops forth a small route that crosses the town's namesake river to the main bazaar. Wander downwardly any street, though, and this buzz gives way to the peaceful sounds of a rural village.

Arslanbob's tourist-facing identity is built on that hamlet vibe, and the local community-based tourism (CBT) office emphasises that. The role has numerous social projects in Arslanbob – from installing park benches to setting up ski courses and running bike races. The CBT thinks tourism should help spread income across the local customs, and visitor experiences in the area are built on this premise through a long roster of villagers interested in working with tourists. Travellers stay in family-run guesthouses and eat dwelling house-cooked meals. Local guides provide excursions to nearby mountains and lakes. And in autumn, as the walnut harvest starts, visitors venture deep into the forests to experience this local tradition first-manus.

A Kyrgyz family poses in front of a makeshift green tent, with a picnic of bread on a blanket in the forest © Stephen Lioy / Lonely Planet

Local patriarch Anvar and his family, who earn income harvesting walnuts in Arslanbob © Stephen Lioy / Solitary Planet

Life with a local family

Hosting travellers here are locals like Anvar, whose family plot of land is effectually an hour'due south walk from the centre of Arslanbob. Each morning time, before the sun has even crested the surrounding mountains, the children have already left the family tent to start searching for walnuts that have fallen from the branches overnight. After breakfast, most ofttimes local borsook (fried breadstuff) with fresh cream, the young boys will climb to the high limbs of these trees and apply the whole of their insubstantial torso weight to shake fifty-fifty more of the basics free. This sound of walnut husks bouncing from bough to bark to forest floor punctuates the twenty-four hour period at irregular intervals from every direction. Equally the boys finish swaying up in the branches, down below the daughters of the family move in to fill up sacks with the fallen fruits. While a slow year might simply see 500kg collected, a good harvest can bring in more than triple that. Either way the pocket-sized additional income from hosting travellers, whether offering a place to stay or merely a midday meal, contributes to the thin profits that Anvar's family will count on to see them through the winter flavor.

Traditions of hospitality

Playing host to travellers and passers-by is a long tradition in Arslanbob – many merits equally a sort of origin story that Alexander the Great's soldiers tarried here. Wounded and weary, the tale goes that they rested and hunted in these forests before resuming their long journey dorsum to Europe – pockets filled with basics that would plant Hellenic republic's first walnut forests. Whether the legend is true or not, modern tourists seek much the same: residue, and a chance to immerse themselves in local life.

Life in the forest is simple, and visitors should look few services or infrastructure. But waking upwards to share meals with a family and bring together in their wandering through the forest each mean solar day does bring many opportunities to connect with local civilisation. Laughs as a youngest son climbs high in the copse. Economic insights on how the unshelled fruits become a currency, accepted for trade at temporary stores that bound upward along the forests' dirt roads. This in plow provides basic commodities for which families would otherwise accept to return to the village.

A tourist rests on a hilltop above the forests of Arslanbob with the mountains of the Babash-Ata ridge in the background © Stephen Lioy / Lonely Planet

A visitor explores the countryside near Arslanbob, with the mountains of the Babash-Ata ridge in the groundwork © Stephen Lioy / Alone Planet

The other lingering reminder of these months in the forest, Anvar says with a smiling, is his family unit's hands. Dyed brown from the constant picking and shaking and peeling, the color of these oily shells will linger long into the winter as a souvenir of the annual walnut harvest, staining the skin of tourists and locals alike as they alive together amid the trees. Visitors looking for an authentic cultural experience will discover every bit unique as this local tradition hidden among the forests of Arslanbob.

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Arslanbob is located in southern Kyrgyzstan, 3½ hours' bulldoze or double-decker ride from Osh. The local CBT office can arrange walnut excursions during the autumn harvest season, too as treks, horse riding, camping ground and homestays with local families all year round.

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