Petropavl

Petropavl grew from a fortress founded in 1752 on the Ishim river as part of a line of frontier posts, and it became a customs and trading town on the route between Siberia and Central Asia, which left it with a merchant quarter of nineteenth-century brick and timber buildings, carved wooden houses, mosques and churches. The Trans-Siberian main line runs through it, and it is the northernmost city in the country, closer to Omsk than to Astana, with a correspondingly severe winter. The regional museum, the Podgora old town below the bluff, the wooden architecture and the riverbank are the sights. Lake Pestroye and the birch forest country lie nearby.

What you actually see

• The merchant quarter - the nineteenth-century brick and timber buildings.
• Carved wooden houses - the decorated timber architecture of Podgora.
• The regional museum - the collections on the north and the fortress.
• The Ishim river - the water below the town bluff.

When to go

May to September; winters here are among the coldest in Kazakhstan, with long deep frost. Summer is short and warm. The town is quiet year round and museum hours shorten in winter.

Honest expectations

Much of the historic timber housing is in poor repair and some is being lost. The city is remote from the rest of Kazakhstan and mostly visited in transit on the rail line. Museums label in Russian and Kazakh only. Winter conditions are severe.

Nearby

The Russian border lies north; Astana is south.