TARAZ. KAZINFORM Local legends say that in the Kok-Kol lake (Merken region) lives the spirit of the waters Aidakhar, which takes the form of a huge snake, from time to time makes chilling sounds and drags birds and animals under the water.
“There were eyewitnesses,” the director of the State Historical and Cultural Reserve-Museum “Monuments of Ancient Taraz”, the famous Zhambyl historian and ethnographer Taken Moldakynov, said in an interview with Kazinform correspondent, “who claimed that they saw in this bottomless lake a huge snake about 10 - 15 meters. Swimming in this lake is prohibited. But it is believed that at the moment when the "snake" rises to the surface, the water becomes healing and you can draw it."
Hydrologists from different countries have long been interested in the Kok-kol lake located in the picturesque mountainous Karakistak valley, included in the list of anomalous zones in Kazakhstan. Apart from legends, the lake has a number of truly anomalous physical properties.
So, the water in this reservoir is always crystal clear, despite the fact that not a single river or stream flows into the lake or flows out of it. The water surface does not at all give the impression of stagnant and swampy. There is another incomprehensible phenomenon on the lake - the water suddenly begins to curl into funnels or let out a long strip of ripples, which creates the feeling of a long animal moving under water.
Hydrological scientists explain these anomalies quite simply and routinely. Kok-Kol is of glacial origin. In moraine sediments of rocks, gullies, canals, underwater caves are possible, the presence of which explains the "bottomlessness" of the lake, the sudden appearance of funnels sucking in all objects, strange buzzing sounds.
As for the healing properties of the water of Lake Kok-Kol, this fact is also confirmed by scientists. From time to time, water is drawn into the bottom cavities filled with minerals, saturated with them, and then thrown out to the surface.