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Moynaq and the ship cemetery

A former fishing port on the Aral Sea, now far from the water, where rusting boats lie on the old seabed and a local museum tells the town's story.

NatureAbout 1 hour to see

About the place

Moynaq was once a port and fishing town on the southern shore of the Aral Sea, with a cannery that processed the catch. From the 1960s, water from the Amu Darya and Syr Darya was diverted on a large scale to irrigate cotton, and the sea began to shrink. Over the following decades the shoreline moved far away from the town.

Today a line of fishing boats rests on the sand below the former shore, on what used to be the seabed. Above them, a memorial and a small museum show photographs, paintings and objects from the years when Moynaq lived from the sea.

This is a place where people still live with the consequences of the sea's retreat, including the loss of work, dust storms and health problems. Visit with that in mind, take your time in the museum, and treat the boats as a memorial rather than a backdrop.

Sources (1)

  1. 1.Wikidata

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