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Archive for May, 2005

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A Last Taste of the Subcontinent: Amritsar and Delhi

Saturday, May 28th, 2005

My return to India snapped me right back into the differences between that country and Pakistan. I had to bargain for several minutes for the rickshaw ride back to the bus stop, and fend off several taxi drivers at the same time.

I caught the bus back into Amritsar and headed to the train station to try and book a ticket to Delhi that night. (My extra night in Peshawar had meant that I needed to cut out a day somewhere, and I decided that it had to be Amritsar, since I needed to get my plane tickets replaced and didn’t want to limit the available time to do that in Delhi.) After waiting in line for the better part of an hour, I learned that the trains were all jam-packed-full and my chances of getting a ticket were poor.

From that point on, however, things took a big positive turn. I managed to book a seat on an overnight bus with little difficulty, and even got a good enough feel from the booking agent that I was willing to leave my pack in his shop while I made my quick tour of Amritsar.

My previous visit to Amritsar had been confined to a single night, and some of you may remember that the only photo I included of it was of a garbage pile near the railway station. I’ll attempt to redress that here.

Amritsar is the largest city in the Indian state of Punjab, and the holiest city for the Sikh religion. This is due to the presence of the Golden Temple, which is the centre of the Sikh faith and reputed to be one of the most beautiful religious buildings in the world. The Golden Temple was to be my first stop.
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A Passage (Back) To India: Chitral-Peshawar-Lahore

Monday, May 16th, 2005

Chitral was similar to Gilgit in that they were both the regional centres for large, remote areas of northern Pakistan. That was more or less where the similarities ended, however. Gilgit, occupying a spot on the well maintained Karakoram Highway, felt like a small but burgeoning city. Chitral, meanwhile was cut off from the rest of the country for several months a year by the closing of the Lowari and Shandur passes to vehicular traffic. During this time, the only access to the town was by air from Peshawar or on foot over one of the passes. This isolation probably had a lot to do with Chitral’s appearance as a big frontier outpost rather than a modern, developing Pakistani town.

Nick and I were dropped off at the front door of our chosen guesthouse. After a checking in and resting a bit, the manager suggested that we head down to the police station and register there, as all foreigners were required to do.

Our five minute walk took us past the Chitral fort and the town’s oldest mosque. Once at the police station we were invited into a dark, dusty room where three Pakistani men sat talking. As soon as they saw us at the doorway they stopped and welcomed us in. The process was painless, if slowed a bit by the number of officials that needed to look at or sign copies of our registration. As we sat waiting for the process to be completed, we learned that the Lowari Pass (at 3100m considerably lower than Shandur) was STILL not open, though likely would be in a few days time. As a result of this, there were still very few foreigners in Chitral (there had been four registered in April and Nick and I were numbers four and five in May) but they were starting to filter in.

With our presence in the town legitimized, we went out for a look at the rest of Chitral.
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Gilgit to Chitral: High Adventure on the Shandur Pass

Monday, May 16th, 2005
I was happy to be back in Gilgit, and especially happy to be back at the Madina Guesthouse, whose staff and owner made the otherwise pleasant-but-boring town a great place to be. My first order of business was to sort out ... [Continue reading this entry]

Posted in Pakistan | 3 Comments »

Last Stop North: Passu and Surroundings

Saturday, May 14th, 2005
Passu is the farthest north I got in Pakistan, sitting barely 100km from the Khunjerab Pass and the border with China. It's a quiet little town, but has started to see some tourism activity in recent years due to ... [Continue reading this entry]

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Hunza: The Heart of the Karakoram

Thursday, May 12th, 2005
The title of this entry is perhaps a bit misleading. It would probably be fairer to say that Baltistan, in Pakistan's northeast corner is the TRUE heart of the Karakoram, since it contains four of the five 8000m peaks ... [Continue reading this entry]

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Rawalpindi to Gilgit on the Karakoram Highway

Monday, May 9th, 2005
The Karakoram Highway was constructed in a ten year period from 1969 to 1979. It links Pakistan with western China and is one of the true engineering marvels of the world. The KKH (as it is commonly known) ... [Continue reading this entry]

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