Published: 2026-07-31 | Author: Karl Huang
On 19 December 2019 I drove north from Karamay convinced I was going to watch fishermen haul nets through the ice at Kanas Lake. I was wrong, and the mistake cost me a 240-kilometre detour and most of a day. There is no fishing festival at Kanas Lake, because commercial fishing there has been prohibited for years. The event people are actually searching for happens at Ulungur Lake in Fuhai County, roughly three hours’ drive away. I wrote this Kanas Fish Festival Guide so nobody else burns a winter day driving to the wrong lake.
Here is the short version of the confusion. Three separate things get blended into one search term. First, the Fuhai Winter Fishing Festival on Ulungur Lake, usually opening in the second half of December, where nets several hundred metres long are dragged under a metre of ice. Second, the Kanas ice and snow tourism season, which runs from roughly January and centres on Hemu and Kanas villages with horse racing, sledding and Tuva cultural performances. Third, the folklore of the Kanas “big red fish”, the Siberian taimen that fuels every lake monster story in Altay. All three are worth your time. Only one of them involves fish being pulled out of water.
Quick Reference
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Main event location | Ulungur Lake, Fuhai County, Altay Prefecture, northern Xinjiang |
| Related location | Kanas Scenic Area, Burqin County (approx. 250 km north of Fuhai) |
| Entry fee | Festival ground entry is typically free or a nominal fee; parking around 10-20 RMB. Kanas Scenic Area charges a separate winter ticket, usually well below the summer rate |
| Best time | Mid-December to early January for the ice fishing; mid-January to February for Kanas snow events |
| Elevation | Ulungur Lake approx. 470 m; Kanas Lake approx. 1,375 m |
| Winter temperature | Commonly -20°C to -30°C, with cold snaps below -35°C |
| Role in a trip | A half-day spectacle plus a seafood-style meal, best bolted onto a wider Altay winter route |
What the First Net Actually Looks Like
I reached the Fuhai lakeshore at 09:40 the next morning, an hour before the opening ceremony, with the car display reading -26°C. The lake surface was not a smooth rink but a grey, wind-scoured plain with pressure ridges and drifts, and vehicles were driving straight across it.
The mechanics are older than any tourism bureau. Crews cut an entry hole, then a line of smaller holes stretching several hundred metres. A wooden pole is passed under the ice from hole to hole dragging a rope, and the rope drags a net. A capstan turned by horses, or these days a tractor, winds the whole thing back in. Expect two to three hours from first cut to first fish. Most visitors turn up for the last thirty minutes.
When the net came up around noon, the catch was mostly perch, bream and a few northern pike, thumping onto the ice and freezing solid within minutes. Two things surprised me. One, the sound. There is no roar of a crowd, just the creak of the winch and men shouting short instructions in Kazakh and Mandarin. Two, the auction. The largest fish of the first net is traditionally auctioned off, and prices reported at these events can run into eye-watering figures for what is essentially a big pike. That number is symbolic, not a market rate.
I stayed about ninety minutes and left with cold feet and a five-kilo bag of frozen perch I had no way to cook. Learn from that. The lakeside vendors will grill your fish for you if you ask before buying.
How to Get There
Getting to the event is easier than most people assume, and this section of the Kanas Fish Festival Guide covers the three realistic approaches.
From Urumqi. The straightforward option is the train to Beitun West Station, which takes roughly ten to twelve hours on the overnight service, then a taxi or bus for the final stretch to Fuhai. Flying is faster. Urumqi to Altay Airport is about an hour and a half in the air, and from Altay city it is roughly 130 kilometres by road to Fuhai. Driving the whole way from Urumqi is around 600 kilometres, most of it on expressway, but I would not attempt it in December without winter tyres and a full tank margin. Service stations get sparse.
From Burqin or Kanas. If you are already in the north, Fuhai sits south of Burqin by roughly 130 kilometres. Anyone building a full northern loop should read the Kanas Lake Guide alongside this article, since the lake itself is the reason most people come this far north in the first place.
Local transport on the day. Fuhai county town to the festival site on the lake is a short hop, usually fifteen to twenty-five minutes depending on which shore the event uses that year. Taxis and ride-hailing exist but thin out fast on the morning of the opening ceremony. Every year I have gone, hotels ran shuttle vans or drivers touted seats near the bus station. Ask your accommodation the night before. Do not assume you will flag something down at 08:00 in the dark at -25°C.
Best Time to Visit: What This Kanas Fish Festival Guide Recommends
December. This is the window. The ice needs to reach a working thickness before crews can operate on it, and the opening ceremony has historically landed somewhere between mid and late December. Dates shift by a week or more year to year and are usually announced only two to four weeks in advance through local tourism channels. Anyone researching the best time to visit kanas fish festival events should treat any date they read online as provisional until confirmed locally.
January. Ice fishing continues through the season without the ceremony, so you can still watch a haul, often with fewer onlookers. January is also when the Kanas and Hemu snow programme gets going, which makes a combined trip efficient. It is also the coldest stretch of the year up there.
February to early March. Fishing tails off as the season closes and thaw approaches. Snow scenery in the Kanas valley remains excellent into March, but the fish angle largely disappears.
Summer. Ulungur Lake becomes a beach destination with swimming and boat trips. Pleasant, entirely different, no ice.
My recommendation: target the third week of December for the ceremony, then move north for three days in the Kanas valley. If you can only pick one and you care more about scenery than spectacle, skip the fish and go in mid-January for the snow.
Where to Stay
Budget. Small guesthouses and family-run inns in Fuhai county town run roughly 120-250 RMB a night in winter. Heating is usually solid, since nobody in Altay tolerates a cold room, but hot water can be scheduled rather than constant. Ask before you check in.
Mid-range. Business hotels in Fuhai and Altay city sit somewhere around 250-450 RMB. Altay city has more choice and better restaurants, at the cost of a 130-kilometre drive on festival morning. I have done both and prefer staying in Fuhai the night before, then moving to Altay or Burqin afterwards.
Upper. There is no genuine luxury tier in Fuhai. For anything approaching resort standard you want Burqin or the Kanas scenic area itself, where winter rates at the better lodges can climb past 800 RMB during peak snow weeks. The Burqin Travel Guide goes deeper on that side of the region, including which places actually stay open through winter, because many close between November and April.
Food
The whole point of a fishing festival is eating the fish, and Fuhai does not disappoint. Ulungur Lake cold-water fish is genuinely good, firmer than farmed river fish and with less mud in the flavour.
- Grilled whole fish (烤鱼). Perch or pike, split, salted, cooked over coals. Roughly 80-160 RMB depending on weight. Ordered by the fish, not the portion.
- Stewed fish with noodles (炖鱼). A big communal pot, often with wide hand-pulled noodles laid over the top. Around 100-180 RMB for a table of three or four.
- Fish soup. Milky, peppery, served in enormous bowls. Around 50-90 RMB.
- Laghman (拌面). The reliable fallback everywhere in Xinjiang. Roughly 25-40 RMB.
- Milk tea and nan. 10-25 RMB. Order it hot and often, because you will be outside for hours.
One practical note. Restaurants near the festival ground raise prices on ceremony day and service slows badly around 13:00. I now eat at 11:30 or 14:30 and skip the crush. Prices above are what I paid or was quoted recently, and are rough guidance rather than a menu.
Practical Tips
- Confirm the date before booking flights. This is the single biggest failure point. Local tourism accounts and Fuhai county announcements are the only reliable source, and they publish late. Build a two-day buffer into your trip.
- Dress for standing still, not walking. You will be stationary on open ice in wind. Down jacket rated properly for -30°C, thermal base layers, wool socks, insulated boots. Ordinary hiking boots failed me within forty minutes.
- Chemical hand warmers for your camera. Batteries die fast at -25°C. I keep two spares in an inside pocket against my body and rotate them. Tape a warmer to the battery grip if you are shooting for hours.
- Do not walk onto the ice alone. Follow the marked routes and the crowd. Crews know where the ice is sound and where it has been cut, and a covered hole is not visible under fresh snow.
- Carry cash. Mobile payment works in town, but signal on the lake gets patchy when a few thousand people converge, and small vendors sometimes cannot process payments.
- Fishing at Kanas Lake is not an option. The scenic area is a protected reserve. Do not turn up with a rod expecting to try for a taimen. People have been fined.
- Ask before photographing fishermen. Most are relaxed about it, some are not, and a nod costs nothing. Same rule applies at any Kazakh or Tuva village event further north.
- Book your car with winter tyres explicitly. Urumqi agencies do not always fit them by default. Confirm in writing, and check for an ice scraper and jump leads.
- Register your accommodation properly. Foreign visitors must be registered with local police, which hotels normally handle at check-in. Smaller guesthouses occasionally cannot process foreign passports, so confirm before you arrive rather than at 22:00 in the cold.
Sample Itinerary
Below is the four-day version of this Kanas Fish Festival Guide that I would run again, assuming a December ceremony date.
Day 1. Morning flight Urumqi to Altay, arriving around midday. Pick up a rental car, eat lunch in Altay city, drive 130 kilometres to Fuhai in the afternoon. Check in, confirm shuttle arrangements for the morning, eat fish, sleep early.
Day 2. Out of the hotel by 08:30 in the dark. On site by 09:30. Opening ceremony and horse-drawn capstan work through the late morning. First net usually surfaces somewhere between 11:30 and 13:00. Buy fish, have it grilled lakeside, leave by 14:30 before the traffic knot forms. Afternoon drive north to Burqin, about two and a half hours. Evening at the Burqin night market.
Day 3. Drive into the Kanas Scenic Area, roughly two to three hours from Burqin in winter conditions. Frozen lake, snow-loaded pines, Tuva village smoke. Overnight in Kanas village or Hemu.
Day 4. Sunrise over Hemu if the sky is clear, which it often is not. Sledding or a horse ride mid-morning, then the long drive back to Altay for an evening flight. Leave four hours of margin for road conditions.
FAQ
Is the Kanas Fish Festival actually held at Kanas Lake?
No. That is the core misunderstanding this Kanas Fish Festival Guide is built to correct. The winter fishing event takes place on Ulungur Lake in Fuhai County. Kanas Lake sits inside a protected scenic area where fishing is prohibited, and its winter programme is about snow, horses and Tuva culture rather than nets.
What is the Kanas big red fish?
Local name for the Siberian taimen, a large freshwater salmonid that does live in the region’s waters and reaches substantial size. It is the biological candidate behind the lake monster stories. You are very unlikely to see one.
Can I fish at the festival myself?
Sometimes. Some years the organisers set up recreational ice-fishing holes with rented gear for visitors, separate from the commercial net operation. This varies by year and is not guaranteed, so ask locally rather than planning around it.
How cold does it really get?
Expect -20°C to -30°C during the day in late December, with wind chill on open ice making it feel worse. Nights routinely drop below -30°C. This is serious cold, and inadequate clothing turns the day into an endurance exercise.
Is it suitable for children?
Only with good gear and a short visit. There is nowhere warm to retreat to on the ice apart from your own vehicle. I would keep it under two hours with young kids, and I would keep the engine running.
Do I need a special permit?
For Fuhai and the standard Kanas route, no special border permit is normally required. Some areas closer to the northern frontier do require one, and requirements can differ for foreign passport holders. Check current rules before you travel rather than relying on any article, including this one.
Where This Fits in a Wider Trip
Realistically, a fishing festival is a half-day event, not a reason to fly across a continent on its own. It works best as the anchor for a five to seven day northern winter loop. Build it into a broader Xinjiang Itinerary that runs Urumqi to Fuhai to Burqin to Kanas and back, and the fish becomes a memorable morning inside a strong trip rather than a thin excuse for one. Readers planning around seasonal events more generally will find the region’s full calendar laid out in our Xinjiang Festivals Guide, which is the piece I would read first if your dates are flexible and you are still deciding when to come.
For a broader picture of the north beyond this single event, our wider Xinjiang travel guide coverage and the full attractions archive cover the lakes, valleys and villages that surround it.
Disclaimer
Everything in this Kanas Fish Festival Guide reflects my own visits and the conditions at the time. Festival dates are set locally each year and are frequently announced at short notice. Ticket prices, shuttle arrangements, accommodation rates and food costs change season to season, and the figures here are approximate guidance rather than quotations. Permit and registration requirements for foreign visitors can change without much public notice. Always verify current details with official county tourism announcements, your accommodation, or the scenic area authority before committing to travel plans or non-refundable bookings.