Rawalpindi to Gilgit on the Karakoram Highway
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) covers some 1300km from Hazara, just north of Islamabad, to Kashgar in Xinjiang Province, China. The route passes through the Karakoram Mountains, some of the most rugged terrain on Earth, placing it right at the centre of the collision between the Indian and Asian tectonic plates and their accompanying mountain building, earthquakes and landslides. The Karakoram contain I planned to head 723km along its length from Rawlapindi to heart of Pakistan’s Northern Areas province.
As soon as I’d purchased my ticket for the long haul up into Pakistan’s Northern Areas, I was shown to the VIP seat (the single seat right up near the front of the bus.) Normally this would have had lots of leg room and been quite a comfy spot, but the water cooler and (occupied) stool that had been placed immediately in front of it made it decidedly less so.
Due to this situation, I hardly slept at all as the bus sped on up the road, and I was very happy to be able to get out and stretch my legs when we made a chai (tea) stop at around 23:00. While walking around the parking lot, I started talking with a fellow passenger from the bus. He was a Pakistan Army officer on his way up to a base high in the mountains near the Indian border. Our talk gt nto the shalwar kameez that I was wearing, and I happened to mention that it was perhaps the most comfortable clothing I’d ever worn, but that people might find it a bit odd if I wore it back home. “Yes,” he said with a smile, “they’d probably think you’d joined Al Qaeda.” I didn’t think people here were supposed to make jokes like that.
We re-boarded the bus and I took my prized if uncomfortable seat and continued to not sleep for a few more hours. At about 04:00 we pulled to a stop in another small town, though this time for more than just a chai stop. Talking with passengers from my bus (as well as the two or three others that had stopped in the town) I learned that there had been a large landslide on the road ahead, and that we’d be sitting around until it was cleared.
I spent the following hours sitting on a charpoy (a sort of rope-bed) drinking tea, chatting with the army officer and others before, finally, getting some much needed sleep.
A couple of hours later, sun rose on the town, and by 06:30 we received word that the blockage was almost cleared and we could continue. My first views of the Indus valley were striking. It’s difficult to make such comparisons, but the valley we traveled through rather reminded me of the inner section of the Grand Canyon in Arizona. And if you know the Grand Canyon, this may give you some idea of the type of terrain the builders of the KKH had to work with. So tight were the confines in which the road was built there was often no possibility of placing culverts for the road to pass over streams. The waterfalls would simply cascade over cliffs above the road, onto special concrete fords in the road, then continue their downward journey over the cliffs below the road.
At 10:00 (we’d paused for another breakfast/chai stop) the bus arrived at the landslide with work there not quite complete. I spent the next three hours sitting in the beautiful clear air, high above the raging Indus, talking with the dozens of travelers also stranded (though every single one of them was Pakistani… I was the only foreigner to be seen.)
At 13:00 we received word that work was almost complete and that only one more blast was required to clear away rock that threatened a further slide and stabilize the slope. The three charges were nearly deafening, and their echoes rumbled up and down the valley several times before the air was still once again. Once the dust had cleared it became apparent that there’d been a bit of a miscalculation. Apparently the engineers of the Frontier Works Office had been a bit too liberal with the explosives and the road was one again covered by tons and tons of rubble. Sigh… At least it was a nice place to wait.
I spent the early afternoon chatting with everyone around me, most notably a Pakistani businessman who got into a somewhat heated debate with a young man sitting next to us. Not speaking Urdu I couldn’t make out the details, but I got the general impression that the young man thought my friend shouldn’t have been so welcoming towards a non-Muslim (I’d answered the “what religion are you question several times already) like me. I also chatted with a young Pakistani man who was interested (though not 100% surprised) to learn that professional wrestling was not real. He wasn’t the first person in Asia to have asked me this.
After much prodding from my officer friend on the bus, the army engineers agree that they’ll do one more blast and then we’ll all be allowed to walk across the rubble and find transport on its far side (this, of course, only worked for the passengers. Truck drivers were stuck until the whole mess was cleared.) The second blast took place a 15:00 and shortly afterwards the masses began to clamber over the piano-sized boulders it left behind.
On the other side I was very, very happy to be invited into a private car by my businessman friend for the remainder of the journey. The bus hadn’t been entirely unpleasant, but looking for transport on the far side of the landslide would have been difficult and chaotic, and the ride in the car gave me a much, much better chance to appreciate the majesty of the road as it rose out of the foothills and into the westernmost end of the Himalaya.
We were the first vehicle out on the road, and had no difficulty for the remainder of the day’s travels. The Indus valley started to widen out as we raced along its flatter sections. It became more and more desert in its appearance. It brought back memories of looking up into Mustang from Kagbeni, Nepal, and even occasionally of the southwest US.
I decided to stop for the night in the town of Chilas, both so that I could finish the journey to Gilgit in daylight, and so I could get a look at its renowned rock carvings the following morning. My drivers were keen to get to Gilgit and so after a quick dinner (which they insisted on buying for me) they were off and I settled into my comfortable hotel for the night.
The next morning I went out for a walk in search of Chilas’ renowned petroglyphs. After about an hour of walking and fruitless searching, I was about to give up when a young man waved from across the road and asked if I was looking for the Buddha. I presumed that this wasn’t meant as a theological entreaty, so I replied in the affirmative, and was soon after led to the first of many rock carvings. My guide had to head off to school soon, but I was able to find more of the carvings on my own. While I hadn’t spied the very best of them, at least I’d found what I was looking for.
My walk back to town was pleasantly interrupted on a couple of occasions by folks asking me to sit down with them for tea at nearby chai shops. According to my guidebook the residents of Chilas were generally unfriendly towards outsiders. Perhaps the ones I’d met had heard about their bad rep and were doing their best to turn it around?
Also on the way back I asked a few folks if Fairy Meadows (a beautifully and often easily accessible campsite nearby) was open for the season yet. The score was three yeses and two nos, so when I finally returned I decided it would be most prudent to give it a miss and head straight for Gilgit (this decision probably also had something to do with the fact that I was feeling a bit lethargic and that getting there meant an expensive jeep ride or a 25km walk with a 25kg pack on my back.)
I stood out on the edge of the highway and flagged down a passing minibus. It pulled to the side of the road and in a couple of minutes my pack was tied to the roof and I’d found a “seat.” (The quotation marks here are because I was one of 15 people in the vehicle with “seats” for 10. Not as bad as Cambodia, but still not comfy.)
The scenery along the KKH continued to be absolutely spectacular, including a view of Nanga Parbat, the world’s ninth highest peak at 8126m (Fairy Meadows sits at its foot.) Sadly, being crammed into a middle seat in a minibus meant that I really didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I should’ve. Be that as it might have been, I still rather enjoyed the trip. We had to stop at police checkposts a few times (these stops were lengthened by the need for me to get out and register there) so I did get a few nice, clear looks at the countryside.
We arrived in Gilgit, the major centre in the Northern Areas, around noon, and everyone disembarked. We seemed to be a ways out of town, and though I wasn’t SURE, I thought I could locate the spot on my map, so I headed down the road on foot, intent on finding a place to set down my pack. This took rather longer than I’d expected. First because I actually wasn’t even in Gilgit yet, but in the nearby town of Jutial (this left me feeling a bit grumpy with the minibus driver who I already suspected of over-charging me) and second because of all the police checkpoints.
These checkpoints were different from the ones I’d been through on the KKH: these were meant primarily for locals. I’d been aware of some troubles in Gilgit, but I hadn’t known that they’d been great enough to require the presence of the police and army. For some months now, tensions have been high between the Sunni and Shia Muslims in town. Some weeks before my arrival there had been even been bombings of mosques in town by rival groups, as well as a three day curfew when no one in town was allowed out on the streets. Things had calmed down by the time of my arrival, but there were still plenty of armed police and military in town, and every vehicle entering was given a thorough search at one of the many spots where barricades and barbed wire blocked the road.
Despite (or perhaps because of) the armed intervention, there didn’t seem to be tension in the air. People were simply going about their business in town. And the town itself was a welcome relief from the chaos of Rawalpindi, Peshawar and Lahore. Gilgit looked like quite a modern town, and while it had a similar feel to these places, it seemed like a vastly less busy, scaled down version of them. The surroundings of the town were pretty, sitting in a bowl surrounded by mountains on all sides. While the walk to my guesthouse HAD taken a while, it was more than worth it. The folks at the Madina made me feel right at home with a cup of welcome tea, and loads of friendly questions and advice about my future plans.
Shortly after I arrived, I was joined at the Madina by two couples, once Icelandic and one Australian. These folks were notable in that they were the first fellow tourists I’d seen in Pakistan. By that point I’d been in the country for over a week, and while I had seen five or six few foreign diplomatic and NGO workers in Islamabad, it had taken a long time to find any other travelers.
I spent the afternoon wandering around Gilgit (I even ran into the fellow I’d rode to Chilas with and had a cup of tea!) and writing in the town’s best internet cafe before returning to the Madina in the evening. This proved slightly more difficult than I’d planned, since a few gates hade been locked, changing the route, and there were very few lights about. There was almost no one around to ask directions of either. I’m not sure if this was because of the tension in Gilgit or just because it’s a quiet place at night. Either way, I made it back to the Madina and had a tasty dinner of Dal (lentils) salad and chapattis with the owner before heading off to bed.
Though Gilgit was a pleasant break from the big cities, it still wasn’t too far removed from them, and certainly wasn’t what I’d come to the northern areas for. The next day, after some packing, unpacking (items to be left in Gilgit) and information gathering I headed to one of the towns many Hiace (pronounced Hee-Ass, this brand name is the generic term for mini-buses in northern Pakistan) stands and with only a little difficulty found one headed for Minapin, some 50km away. Rather conveniently dried fruit and nuts, staple trekking foods, are a specialty in northern Pakistan, so I was able to pick up a kilo or so of trail mix for a ridiculously low price before departure.
The ride to Minapin on the KKH was even better than what I’d experienced before, but the only time I was able to really enjoy much of it (crammed into the hiace as I was) was when we made a chai/lunch stop in the beautiful little town of Chalt.
Minapin itself was a wonderfully quiet place, with only one guesthouse (where the driver considerately dropped me off.) It took some time to get checked in… the manager wasn’t around and the other hotel employee had a pleasantly relaxed attitude, first preparing a pot of tea, then disappearing for a while, and finally asking me if I needed a room some 40 minutes later. (This may have had something to do with the fact that I was the third guest since October, 2004) and headed off down the road to get a good look at the valley as the sun began to set. If the valley itself was stunning (and it was) then Rakaposhi (7788m) and Diran (7010m), the towering, snow capped peaks looming over the town were… um… extra-stunning. (With all of the incredible places I’m visiting I’m running into trouble with superlatives and adjectives meaning “beautiful” in this ‘blog.) Sitting and listening to the simultaneous calls-to-prayer of two mosques while watching the last rays of the sun on the mountaintops was a truly incredible experience.
After sunset, I had a fine dinner of a local meat pie (essentially meat sealed between two chapattis and baked) and a talk with the owner of the place. From him and from the guestbook I learned that the walk up to Rakaposhi base camp that I hoped to attempt the next day mightn’t be easy. The owner told me that there was probably 60cm or more of snow on the way up, but that the campsite 2/3 of the way there at Hapakun was probably free of snow.
During the night I felt rather ill. Perhaps it was the fact that I hadn’t had any meat for some months, or perhaps it was just a typical Asian stomach bug, but I didn’t get much sleep that evening, and woke up at 11:00 feeling less than 100%. Nonetheless, I felt bad about not having attempted the trip up to Fairy Meadows, and was determined to get going towards Rakaposhi Base Camp. I lightened the load in my pack and set out, using the maps in my guidebook and the rather better one in the hotel guestbook as a guide.
After a pleasant stretch along the irrigation channels in town, the walk took a turn for the harder. I’d missed a turning and had to hop across the Minapin river instead of using the bridge wooden bridge high above. Immediately thereafter the trail started up a long series of switchbacks with no respite from the afternoon sun. Every turn, and every metre climbed, however, brought more and more wonderful views of Ultar Peak and the valley I’d just left behind me, and though I wasn’t feeling perfect, my pack wasn’t that heavy, and I WAS in pretty decent shape.
The switchbacks did finally end (it would be something of a surprise, both to me, and most certainly to geographers/astronomers if they hadn’t) and the track carried on through beautifully scented juniper forest (at one point passing some berry-heavy trees it seemed like someone was waving a gin bottle under my nose) before one more tough climb up to the pretty (snow-free) meadows at Hapakun.
Once there I weighed my options. While there was no snow at Hapakun it began not far above. This meant that the walking would be a bit tougher, and the trail impossible to see. I WAS feeling pretty healthy though, and it was still pretty early. I decided that I’d have a crack at reaching the Base Camp that afternoon.
I carried on up the valley before arriving at its end where I had to start making random guesses at the best way to make it to the ridge top above where I knew I needed to be. The climb towards the ridge was hard and steep, especially in the snowy sections. It wasn’t too too bad, and by 17:30 I was nearing the crest. During this time my mind had been working just as hard as my body, and I wasn’t entirely comforted by the conclusions it had reached. I had perhaps two hours of light left, and maybe one hour of walking to do. IF I could find the way to the base camp after traversing the ridge top, and IF I didn’t get there to discover a useless campsite that necessitated a walk down to Hapakun.
These thoughts reluctantly forced me back down the mountain to the (still delightful) Hapakun. It was disappointing, but given that I’d started late in the day, feeling rather sick with no guide or even map, I realized that I couldn’t have expected any better. I set up my tent at Hapakun, and contented myself with the sun setting on the peaks I could see (sadly both Diran and Rakaposhi were invisible from there.)
The next morning I debated whether I should give RBC another try. I did want to, but I still wasn’t feeling 100% (the slightly sloping, sleep-depriving) campsite I’d chosen hadn’t helped) and save for the lateness problem, the others still remained. I decided that it would be for the best if I just took a short walk around Hapakun and headed back down to Minapin. I’m very glad I decided to at least take the short walk, since the trip I took, across a small valley then scrambling up a lateral moraine gave me a wonderful look at the Minapin glacier that tumbles down from between Rakaposhi and Diran. All over its surface were seracs (ice towers) and crevasses (deep cracks in the ice) and its colour was the beautiful pale blue that only glaciers seem to be able to manage to produce.
I returned to my campsite and enjoyed having Hapakun all to myself for a bit before I started back down towards Minapin. The trip down went much, much more quickly than the one up, and I even had some company, with occasional Pakistanis out collecting firewood or grazing goats joining me along the trail. I arrived back at the guesthouse in time for a huge late lunch, during and after which I started asking questions to help me plan for the next day. The owner mentioned that a recent French visitor had decided to walk from Minapin up to the (reputedly very beautiful, though heavily touristed [by Pakistan standards, mind you] town of Karimabad.)
I spent the remainder of the afternoon just soaking up the sun, sights and mountain air before yet another huge meal, this time of local noodle soup and a sort of fired potato pancake wrapped in a chapatti (I couldn’t even finish all of this and saved some of it for breakfast!)
The next morning I bid farewell to the folks at the Diran Guesthouse and set out, following the map that the owner had thoughtfully sketched out for me detailing the route I’d follow.
My thanks this time will go not to an individual or individuals, but just to all of the Pakistani folks I met on the way north that made my journey so much easier and more pleasant.
Tags: Pakistan
Llew