Memorable Tours of Pakistan at surprisingly low cost
Jeep Trek of Nanga Parbat Rakaposhi Hunza Deosai Plateau Polo Festivals Kalash
Popular Jeep Trek - 21 Day
THREE persons per jeep in mountain areas
Open topped Jeeps in mountain region
Air cooled transport of the whole Group from Islamabad to Gilgit and
Chitral to Islamabad
Festivals:
Polo Festival with Group 2W
Kalash Festival with Group 1W, 4W, 5W
There can be few areas in the world where mountains rise in such awesome splendour as in the Northern Areas of Pakistan. Towering above the Chitral valley, on the northeastern border of Afghanistan, Tirich Mir reigns as the highest of the majestic peaks of the Hindu Kush. Some 500 km further east, the magnificent pyramid of K2, the 2nd highest mountain in the world, crowns the violent spires of the Inner Karakorum. To the North the remote Pamir plateau separates South from Central Asia, two continents once joined by the caravan routes of the Old Silk Road which sliced their way across the passes and through the central valley of Hunza. To the south, the huge bulk of Nanga Parbat rises in splendid isolation as the last great bastion of the Himalayan range, dividing the fertile plains of Kashmir from the forbidding gorges of the Indus.
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What follows is a brief overview of our journey through this area. In our opinion this is the best possible use of a top quality jeep/driver over 21 nights - it is, however, only a guide, and may occasionally be changed by the group leader in the face of adverse road or weather conditions. Moreover, even though the locations are effectively fixed, KJTI prides itself on the fact that no tour is ever the same, read John Shear's diary for the details of what typically happens day to day. "It is often the 'getting there' that is actually better than the ‘being there"'.
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Following itinerary is reversed for group 5 to see Kalash Festival.
Day 1: Islamabad/Naran/Swat:
From your international flight you will arrive at Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, where you will be met at the airport by your driver / guide. You may have to reconfirm your return flights. In summer, it is hot and therefore you will travel in an air-conditioned transport to the beautiful valley of Kaghan and Naran which is relatively cooler and the following day you travel through Babusar Pass to Gilgit. From Gilgit your tour starts by jeep. You will be supplied with your shalwar chemis clothing for the trip.
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Depending on your itinerary you may travel a different route to Gilgit through Swat. Your journey will take you to the green and cooler hills of Manshera and along the KKH - the Karakorum High Way to Gilgit. In some groups you may travel the reverse route through Peshawar.
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Your first taste of the adventure yet to come…
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Day 2: Gilgit, Karimabad:
Moving along the Babusar Pass and then the famous Karakorum Highway out of the green valleys and travel into the Chilas desert the landscape changes to a baron environment with fearsome mountains. We stay the night at the important trading post of Chilas.
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Day 3: KKH, Passu:
The group continues up past Gilgit towards the border with China along part of the famous Karakorum Highway (KKH) - in an unprecedented feat of engineering the 1300km long KKH crosses the Karakorums along the route of the Old Silk road from Beijing, to connect Islamabad to Kashgar in Xinjiang, China. As the highest tarmac road at Khunjerab Pass (4,790m) in the world it offers a great chance to get right in amongst some of the worlds highest peaks with relative ease.
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Day 4: Karimabad:
Karimabad is a small town in Hunza surrounded by the most massive peaks of the Karakorums and the Pamirs, including the unimaginably awesome spectacle of Rakaposhi (c26,000ft) (see photo). Many of the drivers originate from this area.
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100 km beyond Karimabad and the KKH reaches the Passu glacier (See Photo). Probably the most impressive stretch of the roads it affords spectacular views of dozens of (20k+ ft) snow-capped peaks, including 'Ultar I', 'Diran' and 'Golden peaked The glacier itself is equally unforgettable, running 58km up into the Passu massif from virtually the edge of the road. After a short stop for lunch and an optional ramble up onto the glacier itself, we return by the same route and spend a second night in Karimabad where we usually have enough time for a quick tour of the local forts at Baltit or Altit.
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Day 5 & 6: Gilgit, Tarashing:
Gilgit is the largest town in the Northern Areas, and is the place to 'people watch' - from as far West as Afghanistan and as far east as Tibet it is a real mix of traders, jeep drivers, farmers and trekkers
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The next four days are far and away the climax of the trip; after heading south on the KKH from Gilgit to Jaglot our route leaves the main road and heads on a dirt track along the Astore valley towards Nanga Parbat (5th highest in the world, 27,000ft+) (see Photo) and finally to the tiny village of Tarashing which lies at 13,500ft and within a few miles of base camp. There is, undoubtedly, no where else in the world where an individual can get so close to one of the worlds greatest peaks without trekking. Probably the most challenging part of the entire tour for the drivers, it is extremely rarely frequented by westerners and yet offers mind-bending images of the entire massif. Accommodation is in a traditional log cabin in the middle of this friendly village.
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Day 7: Deosai:
"Covering an area of 400 sq km, all of it above 14,000ft, the Deosai plateau is stunningly beautiful. In Shina the word translates literally as 'Giant's abode', and it is not hard to see how a landscape on such a massive scale could have inspired stones of giants. In Balb the region is known as 'Bbear Sar', meaning 'place of flowers: an apt description during summer.
Closely resembling the Tibetan plateau in its topography and environment, it contrasts sharply with the ring of jagged rocky mountains that surround it on all sides. Gently rolling hills extend into the distance as far as the eye can see, clothed in a soft cladding of vegetation and carpeted with brightly coloured flowers in the summer.
The plateaus rivers flow past crystal clear and icy cold. There is an unmistakable sense of the elevation in the huge expanse of horizon, the wide open space and the clarity of light and colour typical of such high altitudes."
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Ivan Mannheim, "Pakistan handbook"
The night is spent under canvass by the famous bridge over Bara Pani.
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Day 8 & 9: Skardu:
After a long and steep descent that passes the tranquil Satpara lake we arrive in Skardu, the capital of Baltistan and home of the greatest concentration of 8000m+ peaks on the globe, including K2. Baltistan means 'Little Tibet'; populated by descendants of Genghis Khan, both the language and the landscape are indeed distinctly Tibetan. The view from the hotel over the Indus is appropriately wild, dry, and inhospitably magnificent.
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The 100km drive east of Skardu to Khupalu is perhaps the easiest way to see Baltistan; complete with truly unforgettable stacks, vertical gorges and at Machalu 60km from the Indian border it is possible to see Masherbrum I (27000ft), the southern wall of the Inner Karakorums. Khapalu village is also probably the prettiest in Baltistan. We return to Skardu, the same day.
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Day 10: Gilgit:
The road from Skardu is in many ways more impressive than the KKH itself.
In places not much more than a notch in the side of a gorge 1000s of feet above the Indus, the road reputedly cost more lives per mile than its more famous sibling.
It also presents the jeep trekker with belittling views of the 'Naked face' of Nanga Parbat, that drops almost vertically for 6km from the peak (27000ft) to the bottom of the Indus gorge; no snow can stay attached to it.
Day 11 & 12: Gupis, Shandur:
The trek takes the road west for three days to Chitral. Again from Hopkirk's "The Great Game"...
"...a hair-raising, 200 mile drive by jeep, most of it in bottom gear, along a narrow track just one vehicle wide, and with sickening views of the valley floor hundreds of feet below...the rewards are great, however, for the journey takes one through some of the most stupendous mountain scenery anywhere. In winter the road - if it can be so described - is closed unless one is prepared to struggle waist deep through the snow which blocks the 12,500 ft - Shandur Pass, the highest point on the route. "
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Despite the remoteness, there are basic, clean hotels peppered along the route; although we may camp on Shandur itself, especially as in July the huge open pass is the site of the highest polo match in the world. It is also perhaps the best chance of the whole trip to see village life up close, as the route is rarely frequented by tourists.
Day 13 & 14: Chitral:
Arriving in the Chitral valley demonstrates the diversity with a new scenery, people and culture asking to be explored.
"Even today Chitral has lost little of its remoteness. In the great empty valleys surrounding it, the only sounds to be heard are the melancholy cry of the eagle, the occasional whine of a jeep, and the perpetual thunder of the glacier-fed torrents as they race through the precipitous gorges. Just getting there is still something of an adventure... from the south, via Swat along a road which cost 500 lives to Construct. Even so, in winter, the telegraph poles are sometimes buried in snow to within a foot of the wires. But whichever way he comes, the traveler is in no doubt that he has reached his destination. For there set dramatically on the bend of the river, is the great fortress of Chitral, ...
Peter Hopkirk, "The Great Game"
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The richly fertile Chitral valley lies ensconced in the heart of the Hindu Kush and is dominated by its highest peak, Tirich Mir (25,200ft) to the North.
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Even further north the track winds its way along 'Lutkho Gol', a superlative gorge which, in places is nothing more than a 5,000ft vertical slot.The road eventually opens up a little at Garam Chashma ("Hot Springs"), where Northerners come from miles around to bathe in the superheated spring water and trade in Lapis Lazuli, fresh from Afghanistan 30 miles up the road. The only hotel in the village is pleasant but would otherwise be unremarkable were it not for the fact that it has its own blissfully pleasant outdoor hot spring swimming pool, complete with views of Afghanistan down the valley.
Day 15: Garam Chashma
Travel to a small village Garam Chashma, near the border of Afghanistan. The valley is between two mountains. One side cool water falls and the other side hot water springs.
Day 16, 17: Kalash:
After returning to Chitral, we head to the valleys of the Kalash. Extremely isolated, and accessible only by a recently constructed and barely jeepable road, it is unsurprising that these peoples remained undiscovered for more than a millennium.
After a tour of Brum (by the Kalash leader), the main village in the Rombir Kalash valley, there is a traditionally Kalash meal and an early night in a simple cabin in the middle of the village.
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The Kalash Festival is an evening dance by the Kalash people.
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Day 18 & 19: Khyber Pass, Peshawar:
Dir:
Further south we descend into the highest part of the Chitral valley. The descend from Lowari pass is an amazing mountainside view. We spend the night in a small village Dir.
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Peshawar / Khyber pass:
We head south over the 10,500ft Lowari pass. From the top you can look forward over the green Peshawar valley and backwards to the distant outline of the Hindu Kush.
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"Peshawar is the largest city of the North west Frontier province. The Pathans just call it 'Shehr' The City'. There are others, but from Turkey to China this is 'the' city of central Asia... Like the cafes of the Champs Elysees in Paris, if you sit long enough in one of Peshawar Old City's teashops the whole world passes by."
Christine Cottam.
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Peshawar, with its tiny side streets and ancient bazaars is romantically, the best place on the route, to go shopping. We also stay two nights, which should go some way to helping you recover from the rest of the tour! An optional day trip will take you west to the border with Afghanistan at the head of the famous Khyber pass (subject to the permits granted by the Government of Pakistan), from here it is possible to see the Afghan town of Torkham - the site of countless invasions the journey is as much one of history as a trek through the foothills of the Hindu Kush.
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Day 20 & 21: Islamabad and Departure:
Initially constructed in the 4th century BC, and completed by the Moghuls in the 16th, the Grand Trunk Road (GT Road) is the very backbone of the subcontinent. It runs from Kabul in Afghanistan to Calcutta in Bengal.
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"All castes and kinds of men move here. Look! Brahmins and chamars, bankers and tinkers, barbers and bunnias. pilgrims and porters - all the world going and coming. To me it is a river from which I am withdrawn like a log after a flood. And truly the GT Rd is a wonderful spectacle. It runs straight, bearing without crowding India's traffic for fifteen hundred miles such a river of life as nowhere else exists in the world."
from Rudyard Kipling's "Kim"
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Mid-way along the GT Road between Rawalpindi and Peshawar we stop for lunch at Attock, where the great Indus turns through 90 degrees and heads south. We continue along the GT road to Islamabad for the final night stay of the trip. The Faisal Mosque is a mosque of futuristic architecture.
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A good nights rest before departure by international flight the next day.
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