Caspian Sea
The sea has a surface area of 371,000 km (143,200 sq mi) (not including the detached lagoon of Garabogazköl) and a volume of 78,200 km(18,800 cu mi). It has a salinity of approximately 1.2% (12 g/l), about a third of the salinity of most seawater.
Kaydak Inlet
In the same manner as the Dead Kultuk, the Kaydak Inlet had a distinct coastline in former times, but since the 1990s, with higher Caspian Sea levels, the water penetrates inland through the neck of the bay producing waterlogged marshes. Nowadays both the bay and the inlet are filled with Caspian Sea water. The water in the shallow inlet has striking colours, in which delicate tones of blue or of brown predominate according to the seasons.
The area was cartographed by Fedor Ivanovich Soimonov during the Caspian Expedition, which surveyed the Caspian Sea from 1719 to 1727, but was only accurately described later by G. S. Karelin in 1832.