The sunken forest
Standing trunks.
Anastasia Samoilova — CC BY-SA 4.0 · t_y_l — CC BY-SA 2.0 · Gafur adm — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dots foto — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Alfira Khissamutdin — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Insta.ddaanni1l — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Bok — CC BY-SA 4.0 · t_y_l — CC BY-SA 2.0
A strange and beautiful mountain lake at about 2,000 m, where the bare trunks of dead spruce trees still stand up out of turquoise water after more than a century, earning it the name «sunken forest». Kaindy means «birch lake» in Kazakh. The lake formed after the 1911 Kebin earthquake, when a huge limestone landslide dammed the gorge; river water filled it and drowned the forest. The cold water preserves the trunks, which are furred with algae below the surface, while their tops have lost branches and bark. It is about 400 m long and nearly 30 m deep, its blue-green colour coming from limestone. In winter it freezes, drawing ice divers and trout anglers, as is often reported. It lies within Kolsai Lakes National Park, with a small entry fee, per visitor guides, and the last stretch is rough, needing a 4x4 or a walk. It is about 11 km from Saty village, so it pairs with the Kolsai lakes.
Standing trunks.
From limestone.
Down to the lake.
Kolsai Lakes National Park, east of Saty village
A landslide after the 1911 earthquake dammed the gorge and flooded a spruce forest; the cold water still preserves the standing trunks.