So by now most of you know that I’m back home in Calgary. Having fractured my femur, coming back was my only option. I spent 10 days in the Mansehra and Islamabad visiting hospitals and trying to sort out a flight home. My accident happened to precede the Islamic festival of Eid Mubarak (Blessed Festival). This meant that nearly everything was closed for four days and Pakistan air wouldn’t be flying. I was starting to wonder if I was ever going to make it home. The details of my accident are in the last blog post.

I hadn’t the chance to post anything of my two months in Pakistan as the electricity and internet are intermittent. It was a busy two months so I will only recount my experiences of the first month.

It seems in Pakistan there is a specific list of sentences thrown at you as a tourist. Some Pakistani’s are being facetious, others are completely serious. They include:

“Hey Boss”
“Tic tac!”
“Acha”
“Inshallah”
“OK, GO!”
“Pakistan, no Taliban!”
“You are muslim?”
“In Pakistan, anything possible except party!”
“You have nice hairs!”
“What village do you come from?”

How quaint! I love it! The beard made people inquire if I was a devout Muslim, while the long hair just confused them.

Arriving in Sost was majestic after all the hassle of getting over the border. There is a huge beautiful mountain range to the south. It’s special when you can walk out of your little $2.50 cement hole in the morning and drink 10 year old stale nescafe in front of the massive peaks of the Karakorum.

The first night in the hotel, Erwan disappeared into the night. We found him smoking with some local Pakistanis in the hotel room next door. One of these guys pulls out a block of hash and proceeds to roll and smoke it. Chatting with him, I ask him what he does for a living. “Oh, I’m a police officer.” Uh-huh. I’d also noticed that the hotel was next door to the border narcotics control office. This epitomizes the effectiveness of the Pakistani government in the northern areas. Pure comedy.

I was still traveling with two friends I had made in China. Nico and Erwan were not on bikes but the transit in Pakistan is so slow there was no problem catching up. As we’d arrived together, we decided to take a walk in the hills and went up the valley just south of Sost.

Nico and Erwan took the bus the following day in the pouring rain. I spent the next two days hanging out in the hotel waiting for the rain to stop. Matthias, the German I met in Kashgar, showed up and we decided to ride together. The first day of cycling in Pakistan was absolutely amazing. The peaks on the road to Passu live up to the scenery of the Karakoram you find in a postcard.

I also passed another milestone. 23,000km!

At this time, it doesn’t feel like I’ve worked for it. I’ve ridden only five days in the last month, with a lot of time sitting around waiting to get a move on.

Matthias and I managed to find a campsite of the KKH between Passu and Husseini, just before the new lake. I never in a million years thought that I would be able to wild camp in Pakistan. Anything possible in Pakistan!

South of Passu, there is a new lake covering the Karakoram highway. In 2009, a giant landslide dammed the Hunza river and formed what is now called Attabad lake. The lake is 25km long, and the only way to pass was on a boat. These are the boats that we had to load the bikes on to pass the lake.

The boats were custom made, with old car engines mounted on the propellers. One of the crew would run around with a pole, directing the boat as it stopped to pick up people.

The south end of the lake revealed the landslide that had created the lake.

Pakistani trucks cannot reach the end of the lake, so they have tractors unload everything and bring it over the landslide. On the far side of the landslide there was a massive truck stop. Ostentatiously decorated trucks lined the road. Some of the nicest ones I’d seen so far.

Cycling down to Karimabad, I had just no idea how beautiful the valley would be. Greenery clings to the mountainside like moss on a rock.

Karimabad sits across the valley from the imposing and impressive Mt Diran (7277m) and Mt. Rakaposhi (7788m). These mountains are some of the highest in the world sitting right on the continental fault line that creates the Himalaya. There is a lot of trekking in this area and a lot of very famous peaks to see. The largest tourist attraction in Karimabad is the ladyfinger (6000m) and the Ultar meadows.

Erwan and I decided not to waste any time, and head up the valley to see this for ourselves. We waited for the rain to stop and walked from the village up the valley to the hut. It was a fairly easy walk, with a clear well marked trail. A lot of Pakistani’s seemed to think we needed porters or guides to walk up there. Don’t bother, it’s easy. It’s 6km with a 700m gain. It seems no one else has posted gps traces of the hikes in Pakistan. At the bottom you will find links to all of the relevant hikes. The hike is worth it, with many spectacular views.

You start off in the village of Karimabad, and go west up the valley. At the back of the village, the fields the locals kept we’re absolutely magnificent.

The route winds through the fields, and up onto a path cut into the side of the rock. The glacial river traces it’s way 400m below the path.

Once past the valley, you ascend the moraine to a grassy plane where you will find the hut. We arrived at the hut just before dark. It was nothing more than floor to sleep on and a stove to cook with. Unfortunately, the hut is sitting at 3100m and there’s no wood around at all. Nonetheless, it’s a lovely place.

From the hut, here is the famous lady finger…

There was some cloud cover when we arrived in the evening. The clouds moved quickly, but they never did clear completely. The place is very magical.

The clouds cleared in the evening, and we had a mystically starry night. Across the valley, we had a perfect view of star covered Mt. Diran towering on the other side of the valley. Photo credits to Erwan for this photo..

We spent the night in the hut, as there was space for mats and sleeping bags. We cooked a meal for champions out of instant noodles and some very strange rice soup I’ve been carrying around since Iran.

It was clear when we awoke at 5.30am as well. This was the view over my morning cup of crappy nescafe.

We’d planned a scramble up the side of the valley to a place called Gol Pass. Having no map and only a succinct description of the pass, we got it wrong and ascended up the incorrect route up the valley. By the time we realized this, we’d climbed another 1100m up from the hut. We had a satisfying view from 4200m.

The day after Erwan and I came down from Ultar meadows, we were walking around town like penguins. A year of only cycling left my legs strangely out of shape. It was at this time of slow walking around, I noticed all of the pot plants around town. They put them in their crops to repel insects??. They are everywhere in the Hunza valley. I had a little penguin trot through the pot plants. It was a good time! Strangely, nobody in Karimabad smokes hash. This was one of my preconceptions of Pakistan. Instead, the mostly Ismaili population seems to like a little homebrew called Hunza water. It’s made out of the local mulberries and has the strength of rubbing alcohol. A tea cup of the stuff sets you up for the evening, and you’re nearly guaranteed a ratcheting headache the next morning.

Taking a day to recover, we schemed of the next place we would visit. With Rakaposhi towering in front of us every morning, it seemed like the obvious place to go.

We took a bus to Minapin, a small village 15km south of Karimabad. The local busses in Pakistan don’t leave until they are full. Our bus driver stopped everywhere around town so his patrons could run their errands. He was kind enough to stop and let us get petrol for our stove on the way out of town From Minapin, we followed the road up the valley to the Minapin Glacier. We were blown away with all of the herbal medicine growing in the village. This merits closer inspection.

It didn’t take us long to climb well above the village.

As we’d left so late, we spent the night at the lower camp. There was some flat pasture that made a perfect campsite. We brought two litres of Hunza water to ensure proper star viewing.

The following morning, it only took us two hours to reach the second base camp and the foot of the glacier. The sun was out, and the view was simply astounding.

We hung out at the moraine for a couple hours. A group of Pakistani mountaineers were descending from the high camp after a week of paragliding and climbing. Sounds ideal, doesn’t it? The grassy plane on the right is where they camped. We made lunch and took in the view.

Nico did some yoga…

Coming back down was just as delightful. Autumn is here, the Junipers are golden yellow.

The rest of the day was clear, and we came back down the valley with a majestic view of the Rakaposhi south face. The green vegetation against the white of the peaks makes this a very magical place.

I spent another two days in Karimabad, and left on the bike again to join up with Erwan & Nico in Gilgit. Only 105km south, I thought I could make it. That was a bit of a pipe dream given the quality of the roads. Most of the time I wasn’t really moving faster than 10km/hr where the road was unpaved. These rough roads gave me 4 flat tires within an hour of leaving Karimabad. Yet, it’s still worth the ride. There were amazing viewpoints along the road up the glacier to Rakaposhi…

The ride along the Hunza river was nice too..

They’d just recently begun paving this section of the Karakorum. A fresh 30 kilometers of tarmac was laid down just south of Karimabad. This surely had to be the smoothest piece of road I’ve seen in a month. I stopped near a small collection of shops on the side of the road seeking a place to spend the night. I ended up in this building where all of the local shop owners slept.

I’m pretty sure the cooks, the owner, and the majority of the residents of this makeshift hotel were stoned. “Hey Boss, this rooms for you!” “Hey Boss, what you want to eat?” The high chef fed me, and the food was fantastic.

The door of the room had no lock at all, so I dared not wander far. After I’d eaten, I was reading in my room when an old Pakistani man burst in to the room. He stopped for a good stare at me, made his way to the toilet and shut the door. Leaving the toilet he stopped again for a good stare and left. He didn’t say a word. Neither did I. Whatever, strange shit like this goes down here all the time. I kept reading. Not 30 minutes later, he returns and the same scene repeats itself. Ok, I’ve got to go to sleep soon. I’ll barricade the door so he can’t come in. As I was organizing my baggage to do so, he snuck in and did it again. It was like a Pakistani Mr. Bean.

I surprised myself to find that I wasn’t at all paranoid about sleeping in a room literally next to the Karakorum highway, with a door that cannot be locked, and a regular Pakistani intruder. I slept surprisingly well in these circumstances. I got out of town fairly early the following morning and made it to Gilgit. My entertainment for the day was a bridge crossing on the way into the city. Following a truck on this bridge, it oscillated a lot more than I’d anticipated. I found myself bouncing up and down as I rode across it.

I met Nico and Erwan again at the Madina Hostel in Gilgit. Sometime in the last couple weeks, I’ve managed to break the hangers on my panniers. I ordered some from Wayne at thetouringstore.com in Colorado. If you’re in North America, I highly suggest buying gear from Wayne. He’s a fantastic human being, and a very well traveled cyclist. I had anticipated shipping costs to Pakistan to be horribly expensive, but it wasn’t too bad. To have parts shipped from Europe was about 60 dollars, and about 40 dollars from the US. The difficulty arises in where and when that package should arrive. Given the state of the road here, and the speed at which Pakistan moves, I expected to wait. The three of us decided to go on our biggest hike yet. We endeavored to do a five day self guided hike in the Pokara valley with no guides or no porters. It’s a 55km hike from the Naltar Valley just north of Gilgit to the Ishkoman valley NW of Gilgit. We took a day to get organized and catch a jeep out there. The jeep ride there was more interesting then we’d imagined. We waited three hours for him to show up, and got in the back with the other locals.

Of course, there was a chai stop halfway up the valley. By the time we got back on the road, it was dusk. The road begin to wind up the Naltar Valley on a dark dirt road, narrowly cut into the side of the valley. We stopped on the side of the road and the driver seemed compelled to take the distributor off the jeep. Everybody was in there with their lighters, trying to fix it.

Not another couple minutes later, we stopped on the road again to gather water for the radiator. Every time we stopped, someone would jump out of the back of the jeep and place a stone behind the rear wheel. This happened even if we were just waiting for other traffic to pass. The road with busy with tractors transporting potatoes back to Gilgit. It occurred to me that this jeep is probably a breath away from being at the bottom of the river valley. The scary little dirt road was not confidence inspiring.

We spent the night in front of a hostel in Naltar Bala. I was surprised to wake up in the morning to such a beautiful site.

We began our hike up the pass rather late, having waited it Naltar Bala for some locals to bring us something to make our trek more colorful. We followed the road to the lake, passing potato fields that had just been harvested.

We passed a couple locals on the way up too. This man had likely walked 10km and it’s also likely to be a very regular occurrence for him.

The children were sooooo cute too…

We found a nice place to camp near the river. There was no one around, and we had the place to ourselves. Another notably beautiful campsite.

This valley was absolutely stunning. Junipers turning their golden fall yellow, with the vital green of the pine trees and the vague reminder of Canada on the peaks.

We came across this little pond just below the moraine of Naltar lake. Mesmerized, we sat there for over an hour and just stared.

Continuing past the lake, we follow the river to the moraine of the Shani glacier. We were soon at the end of civilization up the valley, and found a young man hanging out by the river trying to spot sheep with his binoculars. He invited us to his house for a chai. Was sat on the grass in front of his stone hut drinking chai and lassie. He even brought us Chipati (bread) and Lassi (salted milk). It never ceases to amaze me how people who have absolutely nothing can offer so much. The people here are very poor, scratching out an existence with a couple goats, sheep, and a garden.

The walk up the moraine was glorious all of the way up. It just doesn’t stop.

We stopped for lunch on the last of the grass before the moraine. Two elderly shepherds came to visit us as we were cooking. He loved my sunglasses.

Sometime after lunch, a herd of Yaks approached over the hill. We asked the three young shephards where they were going with the Yaks. They were to bring them up to Pokara pass. Excellent we said, we’ll bring them for you. They gave us their herding canes and we were off with the Yaks. At first I kind of thought this was just a joke. The shepherds never followed us, instead, they returned down the same valley. So what the hell, we herded these yaks. We chased them up the valley for three hours with a loss of only four yaks! Not bad. I’d never previously considered how fast these animals walk either. We had trouble keeping up with them. They seemed locked into some predetermined path up the moraine of the glacier. Stepping over large stones and scree, some of them went places we couldn’t be bothered to. I didn’t feel like expending energy running up the hillside to gather yaks while we still had another 40km to walk.

We made it up to the foot of the glacier and camped alongside the moraine. There were a bunch of stone huts and pens nearby, but it was currently vacant. We were able to find some wood and have a fire under the stars.

The following morning we continued up the pass. We had another 1000 vertical meters to climb to the pass. Mt Shani (5887m) towered above us in the south while we ascended the moraine on the north side of the glacier.

Following the moraine next to the glacier, we descended to a small stream (to the right of the moraine) following it up until it ceased to exist.

Most of the route up to the pass was easy to read. We followed the river as high as it went and then a series of cairns marked the route. As we climbed beyond 4000m, the snow began to rapidly accumulate. By the time we’d reached the pass, we were ankle deep in it. At the top of the pass, we discovered cairns that marked the summit on a ridge. This appeared to be the best view point to see it all. Pokara Pass (4700m), Naltar Valley, Pakistan.

Finally, the much anticipated pass itself (4700m)…

Immediately on the other side of this pass, we found the glacier. We knew we had one glacier crossing to make from our brief description, but not really an accurate idea of where that glacier crossing might be. Immediately below the pass there is a large rock outcrop in the glacier. Left? Right? I had a look down the right side, and it looked fine. So we ran down the glacier, which seemed free of crevasses. Sketch!

Thinking we’d just done the glacier crossing the guide mentioned, we were elated that it was so simple. Continuing down the moraine we found more cairns, a reassuring sign that we were on the right side of the glacier. The moraine ended abruptly with a 3 meter drop on to a heavily crevassed piece of glacier. We backtracked up the moraine, and spotted a set of footprint heading across the glacier. It seemed like whoever had made those tracks had made it across. We carefully followed the trail, and within 20 minutes were on the other side of the glacier. It was getting dark at this point, so we made the next flat spot our campsite. We ended up near to the glacier on the moraine at 4200m. It was a very clear night, and one of the coldest I’ve experienced on this trip. Erwan managed to slip out of the tent and snap this with his camera.

We awoke in the morning to find that all of our water and our boots had frozen solid.

As we left, we were able to follow the glacial moraine back down. It’s unbelievable how large this glacier used to be.

It was a straight forward descent, as all that was required was to follow the moraine down. Once we got down into the valley, the path got a lot less distinct. There are goats and sheep in these valleys, and they make trails everywhere. We followed the river for a time until we discovered we had to keep making very large river crossings. The river was in a very steep valley that became harder and harder to leave. At one point we had to heave stones into the river to make a bridge to jump across.

When we scrambled back up to the rolling meadows above the river and were rewarded with an epic walk through the juniper and pine forests.

The remaining 12km hike out of the valley was straight forward. We followed the river to a small village and from there we followed a small footpath back to civilization.

Along the path we met some locals who were laying pipe (the only pipe laying I was going to see in Pakistan), and they invited us up for Chai. Again, these people that have next to nothing will share everything they have with you. Incredible.

The last 10km of the walk to Pokara itself followed the path and was uneventful. I believe this hike was one of the nicest I’ve ever been on. Eventually I’ll post the gps traces I’ve made for all of the routes.

As many people seem to be asking where I was when I broke myself, I was 300 kilometers north of the capital city of Islamabad.

View Larger Map

Apologies for the lengthy post, I hope you’ve enjoyed it. I will post one more entry of the last couple weeks of my trip. I’ll tell you all about my ridiculous adventure on the second highest plateau on the planet (4100m)…… in 15cm of snow

Peace.Love.BicycleGrease,
-jeremie

Well. A pretty fantastic adventure. In the distance covered in the last 17 months, I’ve had some close calls with car doors, Iranian paykans , people, sheep, goats, donkeys, and many cows. Surviving with little skill and a lot with luck, I made it to Pakistan. This wasn’t intended to be my final destination for my tour and I can’t complain if it is. The journey has thus far been the most phenomenal experience of my life. I’ve met some very amazing people along the way who have gone out of their way to help me, shown me around, feed and house me. It’s the people in this world that make some of these places on earth so special. I would like to thank the people who helped me on the way, the people that made the journey possible and my family who worry over me constantly.

So for the last three weeks I’ve been on the road from Skardu to Islamabad. I hadn’t been able to get an internet connection good enough to update my blog in Skardu at the time, so I’ve got two blog posts on my trekking and cycling in Pakistan to put up at some point. In the meantime, I’ll detail my little accident here as I’ve been getting a lot emails asking and I’m sure some of you are just curious.

I left Skardu with another German cyclist, Sebastian, so we’ve been two for the past several weeks.

On Monday night we arrived at Naran, in the pouring rain. Having spent the previous night at 3600m, we took a hotel there. The rain didn’t stop for 2 days and we couldn’t wait any longer. The road was paved, clear of snow, with small sections of something not remotely close to a gravel road. Gliding down, we stopped often to take pictures. The Kaghan valley is supposed to be one of the most beautiful in Pakistan. I thought it was nice….

Only 7km out of town, I came across a pool of water on good tarmac. In very bad judgment, I payed the shallow puddle too little heed. I had an instant to look down at my front wheel as I went over the bars, and watched it move back into my crank set. The next moment I was writhing in pain on the pavement. Everything in my body cavity had the sensation of being blended, and left leg had a surreal pain. What a fantastic crash! The instant I looked up and saw my frame broken and bent I knew that this was the end of the trip. I also quickly discovered I couldn’t stand up. Thankfully, Sebastian was right behind me and pulled me and my yard sale to the side of the road.

It didn’t take more then five minutes for a truck to pull up and offer us a ride. It seems I need to find a hospital. The closest one is 105km away. In Pakistan, that means a three hour drive. We end up hitching with two big trucks and hiring two busses to the nearest large town, Mansehra. Even with something to kill the pain, moving from vehicle to vehicle was absolutely excruciating. Sebastian and I made it to the hospital where I was promptly given an analog X-ray. The machine looked like one of the first X-ray machines ever built and I question the radiation dose I got from that thing. The X ray reveals the fracture on my femur. I had to return the following day to the see orthopaedic surgeon.

The following day I got a second digital x-ray and had this surgeon give me his opinion on the matter.

Diagnosis: I likely won’t be able to walk for 2 months, and it will not fully heal for 3 months. El weako. At the very least, it’s a good fracture and my bone is still oriented in the correct position. It should heal on it’s own without the surgical placement of pins in my leg.

I had a look a little more closely at my bike. I consider it to be amazing, as these frames are typically very strong. It is (or rather was) a surly long haul trucker frame, chromoly steel. It’s testimony to the force of that impact. I reckon I was rolling at 20-25km/hr, and I ended up on the pavement less then a meter from the hole. No trace of road rash or ripped clothing as I was already stationary when I fell to the pavement.

So in my incapacitated state, me and my “homme des bois” cycling beard will be coming home. I’ve managed three days of being a cripple in Pakistan, and it’s a tough place to make things happen on crutches.

Sebastian has kindly stayed by my side and assisted me with pretty much everything. However, he will soon need to leave as well, as he plans to continue on cycling to India. This means I must take a bus 200km south to Islamabad and catch a flight home. Fortunately, the Pakistanis are incredibly hospitable and helpful. At every turn, I find someone offering me assistance.

So that’s it. Inconvenient, but not impossible. I think often of Alex (god bless his soul) and Bettina, a german couple I met often in the last four countries. A month ago his life was taken from him by a construction truck in Tibet. All it takes is a moment and everything can change.

I’m happy to be coming home. I look forward to seeing you all when I come home. At the moment, I’ve booked my Pakistan air ticket to Toronto on the 11th of Nov. I will still post my tales from Pakistan. Hopefully they will make an interesting read as this place is a little like the wild west

Peace.Love.BicycleGrease.
-jeremie

After our little epic in Tajikistan, we spent all of six days in Kyrgyzstan. Paying 100 dollars for a visa and only staying six days in a country is a bit disappointing. Eleven days of consecutive riding in Tajikistan we were all very happy to see the little village of Sari-Tash along the way.

We ran into two elderly french cyclists on the road into Sari-Tash. I thought I was having a hallucination as two 70 year old cyclists appeared in their matching safari uniforms. It looked like they has just freshly ironed them. They were riding folding bikes, of the bike friday variety, with tiny little wheels and rolloff hubs We looked like a bunch of dirtbags who haven’t seen a proper shower in 3 weeks.

When we began talking to the couple, they informed us of their plan to cycle the road we had just come from. My second pressing thought was something like “these people are going to die out there!” My god, there’s a 2000 meter climb up a rough dirt road ahead of you people. They asked us what the altitude was and pulled out an old altimeter that has seen many seasons. Mireille whispers to me “it’s german” with a smile on her face

Not having seen a decent grocery store in 500 kilometres, we went a little nuts at the one we found in Sari-Tash. We bought vodka, chocolate, and cookies by the kilo. Ian got tired of pointing at what he wanted, and simply got behind the counter to grab whatever he wanted himself.

I’d never quite seen anything like this grocery store before. The counter where transactions are made also served as a bar. An elderly Kyrgyz couple, maybe 70 years old, orders two shots of vodka. One for him, one for her. So we did a shot with the shopkeeper

The kyrgyz tend to stock a lot of russian vodka as well. I’m a big fan of the pancake vodka.

Not wanting to ride but still wanting to see more of Kyrgyzstan we opted to take a taxi to Osh. As we were five we took two taxis to the next city. The highlight of that taxi trip was a short stop along the way where a live sheep was pulled out of the boot of the other car. Tim and I watched this in amazement, while the others in the second taxi has no idea that sheep was back there. This explained the suspicious noises and smells coming from the back of the car.

The previous year, ethnic violence left the city burnt to the ground. There’s a lot of Uzbeks living in the Kyrgyz city and they don’t get along very well. A border gift from the former USSR. The bazaar there was slightly apocalyptic, with stands and crowds amongst the charred remains of the old bazaar.

Beautiful country. I think I’ll have to come back Maybe climb peak Lenin. As there wasn’t much to see in Osh, we didn’t stay more than a night. Making it back to Sari-Tash, we prepared to leave the following day and ride to the border. We passed a few Kyrgyz yurts and children along the way.

The Chinese-Kyrgyz border crossing was kind of a mess. Trucks waiting in every which direction waiting for the border to open. Occasionally, they would fire up their engines and inch forward a couple centimetres. I believe they conspire to make passing between these trucks all that much more difficult.

I don’t have any photos of the Chinese border crossing as it’s not allowed, so I can only describe the curiosity that I found there. Passports were digitally scanned with efficiently printed receipts as we were politely asked to please sit down. When we bring the paper slip to the immigration officer, we were all standing before the desk idly chatting away. We were informed to please stand single file. Any time someone got out of line, an officer would come over and reiterate his demands that we stand single file. There was even a little electronic device on the desk of the immigration desk that said “How would you rate my service? A) Very good B) Good C) Bad D) Very bad”. After all of the border crossings in the ‘stans, this feels super modern.

Our first meal in China was a much awaited spicy noodle dish. We must have gone into the kitchen four times asking them for food. Not speaking any english, we played the sherades game of “noodle dish”. Two hours later, we were finally served with a noodle dish.

This was the first good dish we ate at a restaurant in nearly a month. Bloody amazing after the goat with goat and some more goat pilav we’ve been eating in the ‘stans.

Four more days of riding on dusty roads, passing construction, angry camels, and a lot more Kyrgyz we arrived in Kashgar.

Having a beer or five with all of the other traveling cyclists, it doesn’t get much better!

I can’t really say that I’ve visited China. It’s more that I’ve visited Uighurstan, and it’s been invaded by the Chinese. After the riots that happened in Kashgar the previous month, the police were everywhere to be seen. This made leaving Kashgar more trouble then entering. There seem to be many rules here, but no one seems to know them. The area south of Kashgar on the way to Pakistan is inhabited by Tajik and Kyrgyz, and is a “permit area”. It’s known as the Tajik autonomous region. I think it means they’re about as autonomous as the Tibetans. As we were getting our visa on arrival at the border in Pakistan we could not prove to the Chinese authorities that we were in fact going to Pakistan and not trying to enter the permit zone illegally. Having a border guard that would let you through the checkpoints was more or less completely random. A German cyclist I know, Matthias, rode to the checkpoint 130km and was turned back. He had to hitch back to Kashgar. The poor guy then got on an international bus and made it to the border….only to find it was closed. Many tourists came back to Kashgar after being denied entry to Pakistan. The reason: “We’re out of stickers, sorry” Someone came back with a copy of the letter from the Pakistan border police. You may want to zoom in and read this little gem.

Sounds a bit suspicious. Citing the flood in Aliabad (2 years ago) and the festival of Eid (finished a week earlier), they closed the border for a week to any tourist that needed a visa. It’s the only point of entry in all of Pakistan where you can get a visa when you show up. The only other way to get into Pakistan is to get your visa in your home country, or Dubai. So I hung out in Kashgar for a week hoping they would eventually open the border.

The old town hostel we were staying in soon acquired the name “Hotel California”. So many other tourists checked out only to be denied at the border or the checkpoint and return to Kashgar.

Most of the time, I didn’t do much. Wake up. Coffee. Eggfast. Internet. Coffee. Internet. Lunch. Beer. Discuss dreams of going to Pakistan with the other captives. Beer. Internet. Big cook up in the evening. More beer. Receive warnings for being too loud in the evening. Sleep. Repeat.

Occasionally, we went outside of the hostel. Most days I find something interesting or strange. It’s China after all.

Chicken head?

Boiled sheep head anyone?

Need a dentist?

Hungry?

Need your bike fixed? No problem.

I did take the time to visit the animal market in Kashgar. Every Sunday, the Uighur people from all around come to Kashgar to buy and sell their animals.

Balls!

Some days, I didn’t even bother to leave to hostel. I can’t really complain about spending two weeks waiting, there was someone else who’d been there much longer. A British cyclist by the name of Chris had been waiting in that hostel for two months! He had developed an abscessed tooth while riding across the pamirs. Two root canals and a bridge later and he would be off again. Even when he tried to leave, he couldn’t get a spot on the train and had to come back.

The VOA to Pakistan was supposed to be closed until the 15th of September. We found out on the 11th that they would open again. Not wanting to take the same chance as Matthias, I opted to take a shared taxi with my new friends Erwan and Nico.

The taxi driver wasn’t so sure himself that we could get across the checkpoint, so he took us to the foreign police office. He just about left us there too, as Erwan insulted his honour when trying to barter for a better fare. We met the head military officer who informed us that we should not have any problems crossing the checkpoint and continuing to Pakistan. We asked that he write this down in Chinese with his name and phone number. Sure enough, when we arrived at the checkpoint it didn’t look like he would let us pass. The military officer at the checkpoint sported ray-bans you’d expect a Texan police officer to use. At least you can check out your reflection in his glasses and assure yourself that you look pleading enough. He was arguing with our taxi driver, it didn’t look like we would get through. Producing this piece of paper from the foreign aliens office seemed to change his mind. He quickly stamped us through and we were off. Two other tourists who showed up on the local bus moments later were promptly denied. Our taxi driver swiftly ushered us back into the taxi before the officer changed his mind. I wish I had a photo of this officer, but I didn’t want to jeopardize getting through this checkpoint.

Charly, our taxi driver was kind enough to stop along the road after the checkpoint and let us get out and take photos.

He was even nice enough to stop at Karakol lake for us. Muztagh Ata.

It’s a 7400 meter peak that sits above the lake. It was the same peak we could see from Tajikistan as we crossed the Pamir. The lake is stunning, with 13 glaciers hanging above the lake.

There are a lot of Kyrgyz living in this area, with the same nomadic lifestyle we’d seen earlier. The yurts along the lake were absolutely stunning.

The actual border crossing itself is a sensitive spot for the Chinese. Tashkurgan is the last Chinese town on the way to the border. It’s still 150km from the border and it is where the Chinese customs and immigration is located. Once exiting the country, an armed military officer escorts you to the border. All traveling tourists must take a bus from Tashkurgan, China to Sost, Pakistan. A Chinese military officer came with us on the bus to ensure that no one could get off and wander around. When we got off to go to the toilet, he yelled at everyone to stop taking photos and get back on the bus. Really a pity too, the border is situated atop the Khunjerab pass, one of the highest border crossings in the world.

At one point, Erwan wanted to get a better view from the bus.

I noticed it wasn’t only the foreigner the Chinese treated like dirt, it was also the Pakistanis. Their patience seemed to be wearing thin after all the checkpoints and stops on the way out of China.

As we crossed the official monument on the pass into Pakistan, the bus erupted in applause. Erwan shouted “No more stopping in China!” to which a Pakistani turned around a shouted back “The only people who will stop you in Pakistan are the Taliban!” Oh epic. Can’t wait.

Once in Pakistan, the bus crawled it’s way down the first of the Pakistani side of the Karakoram highway. The road was rough and we spent the better part of 5 hours having our insides shaken out of us. I was so excited to finally arrive in Sost. I’ve been waiting for this moment for two weeks. 100 US dollars, and within a couple minutes I have my one month visa for Pakistan. I wish all countries were this easy.

It was clear when we arrived in Sost as well. Towering 6000m peaks to the south could be clearly seen to the south.

I love this place already.

Peace.Love.BicycleGrease.
-jeremie