The Best of Almaty: A 3-day Itinerary

Check in to your hotel (one of the recommended ones).

• Intercontinental Almaty is smack bang in the city center with eateries all around.

• Ritz Carlton Almaty is located in one of the most posh areas of the city—The Al Farabi Avenue. If ultimate luxury is your thing, check in here.

After spending a few hours at the hotel, explore Arbat Street, roughly a 20-30-minute drive depending on traffic from Ritz Carlton. Arbat Street offers a vibrant street with cafes, coffee shops, and restaurants. Nice for a romantic walk around it. Have some Italian food at Mamma Mia and visit Sicilia Coffee for an Instagram-worthy shot. If you love Doners, then try one at Doner Na Satpayeva.

Arbat Street is one of my recommended places for the first day because you need a relaxing time on the first day of the trip after a flight, and this spot is just perfect for that. If you visit on New Year’s/Christmas like I did, it is absolutely lit and beautiful.

Big Almaty Lake: The most prominent of all locations in Almaty. In winters, it’s all frozen; in summers, it’s all blue. A must-visit for sensational photos, memories, and drone shots. Hike up to the lake or take an e-bike from Ayusai Visitor Centre or book a full tour with car, it’s all up to you.

The Big Almaty Lake Tour is a half-to full-day visit depending on how you choose to do it:

• By car. A half-day tour (6 hours): If you book a day tour using your private car, it includes pick and drop from the hotel. You will be taken to a check-point first where you need to drop and pick up a different car (included if you book a car tour) or hike from that checkpoint. Once you reach Big Almaty Lake, you can spend an hour at max during winters because it’s freezing cold. In summers, you might be able to extend that to 2–2.5 hours. Take stunning photos, use drones.

• By hike: From the checkpoint, it’s a 5–6 hour hike up to the lake, which can be extremely tough in winters but doable in summers.

• By e-bike: You can also rent e-bikes from Ayusai Visitor Centre, which is before the check-point. E-bikes might not be available during winters.

When coming back, you can stop at Ayusai Visitor Centre, where you can sip a coffee or a hot chocolate and have lunch with lots of Kazakh food at Cafe TARY. The cafe also has a bookstore inside and has beautiful views of the snowcapped mountains.

You can then be dropped back to your hotel. In the evening hours, you can explore the Essentai Mall for some luxury shopping, which is right next to the Ritz Carlton hotel.

This is a full-day tour (12 hours) from pick-up to drop-off. It involves three levels of Shymbulak Ski Resort, exploring Dostyk Avenue, Zenkov’s Cathedral, and Koktobe. The drive from your hotel to the Shymbulak Base station is a 40–45 minute drive depending on where you are staying in the city center. Once you reach the base level—Level 0 at 1,600 meters—take some photos and then board the bus (included in the tour) to the cable car station.

The cable car is 20 minutes long and takes you to Level 1, situated at 2200 meters above sea level. Probably the most vibrant of all levels, as it has shops, restaurants, cafes, and lots to eat and explore. If you’re a skier, then there you go. Level 1 to Level 2 (at 2850 meters) is a 7-minute cable car ride followed by another 7 minutes to Level 3 (at 3200 meters above sea level).

The ski from Level 2 to Level 3 is steep and covers 1000 meters in length. If you’re a newbie, you require five days of training at Level 1 to be able to do that skiing. If professional, just go about it from the word go.

At Level 1, there’s Paul Bakery, Gusto Italian, and a lot more. You can eat and drink whatever you want. There's also a Kazakh restaurant.

You can spend 3–4 hours (if NOT skiing) easily across the three levels. Levels 2 and 3 are mostly for photos and drone coverage, but there’s a hotel called Tenir at Level 3 where you can book cabins and stay at 10000 feet above sea level!

There’s also a road from Level 0 to 1, which you can take and drive up to Level 1. There are several hotels on that route, which you can again choose to stay in.

Once finished at the Shymbulak Mountain resort, you will be taken to Dostyk Avenue for some wonderful Christmas lights (if you visit at that time of the year). You can spend 30–40 minutes there, have some coffee and tornado potatoes at various stalls located there. From there, you can visit the famous Soviet Zenkov’s Cathedral, which I personally chose to skip. Post the cathedral, there’s another cable car from the city to the Koktobe Mountain, which mostly has sweeping views of Almaty—which again I skipped!

This is a fantastic full-day tour and a MUST-DO in Almaty.