If
you have heard people claiming to have travelled in Pakistan
from ‘one end to the other,’ take it as no more than a figure of speech. I thought such a sweeping contention should,
for a start, entail a boat ride to the fabulous Astola Island in the Arabian
Sea, thirty miles south-east of Pasni; and, no amount of travelling inside
Pakistan’s heartland can be considered complete unless the sojourn is rounded
off with the ultimate feat of reaching the northern-most latitude of the
country. That extreme geographical point
was the goal of our two-man bicycle expedition last May, so we could proudly flaunt
our ‘end-to-end’ travel credentials.
Most ordinary maps show a small
kink jutting into China, a few miles north-east of the point where Pak, Afghan
and Chinese borders meet, being aptly described by the British explorer Colonel
Schomberg as the ‘solar plexus of the mountain system of Asia.’ Astride the kink is the 15,840-ft high Kilak
Pass, which fans out northwards into
a sprawling snow-clad pasture. Here, herdsmen
from Pakistan’s
northern-most village of Misgar
come to graze their sheep and goats, when the melting carpet of snow starts to
uncover the rich herbage in May. Up to
the end of the 19th century, the pass was infrequently used by
traders from Gilgit and Hunza to sell dried fruit and, of all items, wretched slaves
– with the acquiescence of the heartless local rulers – to caravans plying
between the fabled oasis towns of Western China and Afghanistan’s
Badakhshan province, and beyond. Much of
the goods from China,
however, came through the closer Mintaka
Pass and, included silks, printed
textiles, carpets and jade products, mostly destined for the ruling elite of the
region. Like most mountainous passes, Kilak
and Mintaka were also notorious for being hideouts for brigands to waylay caravans
laden with those exotic wares. Some of
the infamous outlaws of Gilgit and Hunza had spent their useful years prowling
the crags and defiles of these passes, while living off the land in the company
of wild animals and, lashed by bitterly cold winds. I could almost hear the nervous whistles of marmots
scampering about at the snarl of a hungry snow leopard in that mountain vastness,
as I started to plan the expedition.
When I broached the subject with my
friend Shahid Dad, last year, he seemed sufficiently enthused. “Would you be willing to bike all the way
from Gilgit to the extreme north of Pakistan?”
I inquired carefully, lest he take it as
an indolent suggestion. The strong
fighter pilot bond we had shared in yesteryears came through when he emphatically
replied in the affirmative. When he
added in his usual scholarly manner, “Age doesn’t matter, the heart is still young,”
I knew I could take comfort, knee joints and all! It was summarily decided that Shahid would be
returning from Boston the following
May, especially for this expedition. I promptly
purchased lightweight mountain bikes for the two of us from Nila Gumbad, Lahore’s
crowded cycle mart. Getting those
‘retired’ muscles back to vigorous work was a challenge, and the coming months
saw me pedalling feverishly every morning on the outskirts of Lahore, while
Shahid was mostly confined to a gym due to severe cold weather in Boston. The expedition was to last a full fortnight,
from Gilgit up to the northern limits of Upper
Hunza Valley
and back in 50-km daily stretches, so the demands on endurance and stamina had
to be painstakingly catered for.
While physical conditioning was underway, the equally
important planning aspects were looked into, critically. Choice of route, basically dictated by suitable
night stops, was followed by selection of nearby inns, motels or camping sites;
geographical coordinates for GPS, climb gradients, astronomical and weather
data were then gathered. Most important,
satellite pictures from Google® earth, which could be viewed in amazing 3-D
ground-level panoramas, were downloaded, carefully analysed and then uploaded
into our mobile phones for enroute correlation.
With a Mandarin vocabulary limited to nin hao and xiéxié,
explaining a border violation to Chinese guards would have been a disaster;
good navigation was, thus, the key to a successful mission.
The problem of Acute Mountain Sickness also had to be tackled. The earliest mention of this sickness is
known to have been made by a Chinese official by the name of To Kan in 32 BC,
while he was touring in the vicinity of the Kilak
Pass itself. “A man’s face turns pale, his head aches, and
he begins to vomit,” observed To Kan.
This malady afflicts even the very fit mountaineers if the rate of vertical
traverse is more than 2,000-ft in 24 hours, above an elevation of
8,000-ft. Such a situation was going to
be encountered during our last leg, so we decided to break it up at the half
way point. With the vitals adequately taken
care of, we were rearing to go.
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On
26 April, I departed for Islamabad
where I met up with Shahid who had arrived from Boston
a few days before. Next morning, we
boarded PIA’s ATR-42 turbo-prop for Gilgit under command of a very helpful and
friendly Captain. The bikes had been
transported to Gilgit by road earlier, as the baggage hold of the aircraft was found
to be too small for bike cartons. In
Gilgit, we promptly assembled the bikes and went off for a familiarisation spin
to the nearby town of Nomal, which
we nostalgically remembered having passed by nearly four decades earlier, while
on a tough route march during a survival course as cadets.
Riding the rather dazzling bikes – what, with Darth Vader
helmets to complete the striking figures – we must have
looked like some aliens, as we swished past the curious bystanders. After returning from the test run, we rigged
the bikes with pannier bags, tents and sleeping bags and, carefully calibrated
the bike computers to help us keep track of speeds and distances during the
expedition.
Finally, on 30th April, we set course for our
first destination, Chalt. The Karakoram
Highway (KKH) was in good shape and pedalling seemed like a breeze. The resplendent Common Magpies (Pica pica)
in their black, white and iridescent green feathers were to become a common
sight throughout our trip. Said to be
the most intelligent of all birds – being from the clever crow family – they
cackled and quacked delightfully as if welcoming us to their garden localities. A more hearty welcome came from the village
children who would run alongside our bikes, chanting, “Hello, one penny please.” We’d respond with salaams and good wishes in
Urdu, but some of the kids would insist that we were angrez and, would
keep on pestering for pennies!
After a tough 50-km leg, we approached Chalt by a suspension
bridge and, to get our legs in normal working order, walked some distance to an
old PWD rest house that had been booked in advance. The facility had seen better times during the
Raj – “comfortable bungalow,” according to the 19th century explorer
Sir Aurel Stein – but even now, it wasn’t too bad for a night’s stay. A hot bath before sleep and, a hearty open
air breakfast at the nearby River View Hotel put us in top gear for the next
leg.
Hunza evokes thoughts of a fabled land where everyone lives
long, and happiness seems to be a gentle breeze that blows the year round. We had been to Hunza previously in hurried
affairs, but never as merrily as this time, on bikes. Leaving Chalt, which also marks the northern limit
of Gilgit District, we had to negotiate a steep climb over a highway that
suddenly was no more. The KKH was under
major repair from Chalt onwards, and we found ourselves huffing and puffing
over gravel and shingle, an ordeal that was to last till our final destination,
all of the remaining 200 kms.
As we approached Hunza’s main commercial town of Aliabad
after a very steep 50-km leg, which took us nine long hours to cover, courteous
adults and cheerful children made us feel quite welcome. Following the unfortunate spate of sectarian
killings a few weeks earlier, tourism had come to a complete standstill in the
region; now, we seemed harbingers of better times to the locals.
Having no energy left to climb yet another 2,000-ft to the
Eagle’s Nest Hotel perched atop a sheer cliff beyond Duikar village, we hired a
pick-up to haul our bikes. Just in time to catch the ginger and orange glow of
the setting sun bouncing off the snow clad mountains, we enjoyed the dazzling
spectacle from the hotel terrace. Not
too far in the sky, the crow-like Red-billed Choughs (Pyrrhocorax pyrrhocorax)
in their glossy black plumage could be seen performing some spectacular
aerobatics in the mountain updrafts. While
climbing up, we had noticed scores of youngsters returning to their homes in
the nearby towns after a day-long picnic at Duikar. Interestingly, there was no segregation, much
like the rest of Hunza and, one wondered if this might be one of the possible
reasons for bliss in the happy valley! Later
at the hotel, a short dinner for two turned out to be a huge serving for four. Though
not quite a master of Burushaski, I suspected that the order for alto
(two) was conveyed as walto (four) by the waiters to the cooks! Well fed and tired to the bones, we were
almost sleep-walking back to our rooms.
The
third leg promised to be different as we had to negotiate the 18-km long Ata-abad
Lake that, in one of the vagaries
of Nature, came into being three years ago as a result of a massive landslide
damming the Hunza River. We arrived at a dirty little jetty, where
disorder and confusion vied with dust and a merciless sun to rile the coolest
of nerves. It took some tough shouting
to ensure that our bikes were not mishandled as they were hauled onto the boats. Thereafter started a 90-minute ferry, what
with a deafening putter of the diesel motors for a serenade, as we watched the
reflection of the towering mountains in the turquoise waters of the lake. Disembarking a little short of Hussaini, we
found ourselves in Gojal Tehsil or the Upper
Hunza Valley,
where Hunza’s Burushaski language largely gives way to the Afghan-linked Wakhi.
Already tired and profusely hungry,
the stretch from Hussaini onwards to Pasu was torment for our lower limbs. We had to get off the bikes when even the
lowest gear refused to generate forward motion over the precipitous
mountains. After a good two hours of
lugging our wobbly selves along with the bikes, we finally hit downhill. In the fading light of the day, a ‘Welcome to
Pasu’ road sign came as a godsend and we raced to get to Sarai
Silk Route, a small but adequate hotel. As everywhere else, our requirements centred
on a hot bath and enough to eat, both of which were available promptly. Over dinner, our waiter who preferred to speak
only in English, explained that he was basically a tourist guide and in this
lean season, was doing odd jobs. Those
with better means were offering the services of their vehicles to the locals to
get to the ferry at Hussaini and back.
The Ata-abad Lake
has hampered the movement of tourists as well the locals, who have to pay hefty
amounts to get their goods across. A
permanent solution seems years away, though it is my considered opinion that
two modern berths at either end, suitably equipped with cranes to service heavy
duty barges, might be a functional interim solution.
The hearty dinner we had at Pasu gave us reason to rest an
extra day, for Shahid had taken ill not long after the meal. In the meantime, I sauntered around the
apricot and apple orchards and, took some striking pictures of the serrated
Pasu peaks also known as the Cathedral Spires.
The day after, we set course for the fourth leg to Sost, which is the
dry port for trade with China
via the Khunjerab Pass, 80-km further east. After another arduous day of cycling which saw
us through the beautiful village of Khaibar
– where everyone looked like a Bosnian
or a Croat – we arrived in Sost. A
rather shabby town despite the natural beauty all around, we were hard-pressed
to look for accommodation. Due to an
unusual influx of two busloads of Japanese tourists, the PTDC Motel was fully
booked; however, we were permitted to set up our tents at the little camp site
in the hotel premises. Once again a hot
bath and, some very appetising food served by a most eager-to-please waiter
Shams-uddin, lulled us to an early sleep.
It was a wonder that, having biked for more than 200-kms over
a rubble of a highway, our cycles held out, with not even a puncture to stop
our progress. We were glad that much of
our cycling was over, but in all earnest, we knew that the remaining trek
wouldn’t be Boy Scout stuff. Physical
rigours had expended the last of our calories and will power had been sapped to
the last grimace. Kilak
Pass was still 7,000 feet above and,
a perilous 55-kms beyond. Our trainer in
boot camp of yesteryears, the late Sqn Ldr Sabir, had always reminded us that
when all else is spent, determination surely lends a helping hand. We had loads of it and it was time to tap
into this resource.
As
we set out from Sost for Misgar about 15-km away, we were excited about seeing
this last outpost of the British Empire. During the ‘Great Game’ of the late 19th
century, Misgar served as an important station for keeping an eye on Czarist
Russia’s involvement, gauging the extent of Chinese influence and, trying to
manipulate the double-dealing Mir of Hunza to side with the British.
Much earlier in 1844, Mir Ghanzanfar Khan of Hunza had driven
out some Kyrgyz settlers in the area in an effort to assert his authority and, to
secure exclusive trade relations with China. After evicting the intruders, the Mir ordered
his small expeditionary force to settle there permanently, which is how the Burushaski-speaking
Misgar village emerged in the predominantly Wakhi-speaking
Upper Hunza Valley.
About an hour out of Sost, we diverted off the Karakoram
Highway, onto a very steep jeepable track that led
to Misgar. During the climb, one had to
keep the eyes off the deep gorges and plunging ravines, lest a flash of
dizziness caused a fatal wobble. After
some of the toughest cycling so far, we reached the outskirts of the village,
welcomed as usual by little children asking for their share of pennies. Pakistan's northern-most village, Misgar is set in a valley of verdant fields
and rushing streams surrounded by towering snow-clad mountains. Terraced gardens, awash with pink apricot
blossoms, were tended by colourfully clad womenfolk.
We had planned to hand over our bikes to the village numberdar
(headman) and, on making an inquiry about his residence, were held back for
a cup of tea by a stranger. Our host Irshad-ullah
would not let us go without taking a little rest and he brought in his excited children
who met us most courteously. After some
invigorating tea and biscuits, we took leave and headed for the numberdar’s
residence at the far end of the village.
A surprised Ata-ullah welcomed us at his home and insisted that we stay
over for a night as we were tired. When
we told him that we were hard-pressed due to our schedule and wanted to start
our trek immediately, he got busy with arranging porters for us. In the meantime we readied the backpacks,
tents, sleeping bags and our food supplies which were to be carried along,
while the bikes were safely kept by Ata-ullah.
In an hour, we were hiking off to Runghil, about 13-km away. On our way out of Misgar, we passed by the old
post and telegraph office that was an important message despatch facility for
the British and, continues to be fully functional nearly a century after it was
established in 1916.
Five kilometres out of Misgar, we came across the Qalandarchi
Fort, another relic of the ‘Great Game’ where the British maintained a small
garrison to keep an eye on Russian and Chinese activities across the frontier. We decided to survey the fort on our way
back, so more about it later.
From Misgar to Kilak, there are several shepherds’ way
stations having a single stone hut each, where a team of four shepherds lives
during the summer grazing season. The
shepherds take short monthly breaks to Misgar in rotation for visiting their
families, and for restocking their food supplies. A single team tends a flock of as many as five
hundred sheep and goats, most of which are later sold off in the markets of
Gilgit and Hunza. Runghil was the first
of these staging posts where we camped for the night, reaching there just
before night fall. Our porters being
educated up to high school had kept up a good conversation, filling us up on
the terrain, flora and fauna, as well as local lore and history. Out of mobile phone coverage, we started
using the handy satellite phone to call our families daily about our progress
and well-being.
Next morning, a nourishing breakfast of oatmeal and coffee
cooked by Shahid over firewood got us going to our next destination of
Morkushi. Being a mere seven kilometres
from Runghil, we reached Morkushi by midday and decided to give ourselves a
rest as some tough trekking was expected the following day. Morkushi is another shepherds’ way station
and large herds of goats could be seen grazing in the alpine meadows at an
elevation of 12,000-ft. Juniper, birch
and willow are the common trees of the valley.
Wild rose grows plentifully, and some delightful White-winged Redstarts (Phoenicurus
erythrogaster) could be seen perching on the bushes, seemingly filling in
for the roses that had not yet blossomed.
“Down in the little wood of stunted birch trees by the
river,” wrote the explorer Sir Aurel Stein about the site where he had camped
in 1900, on his way to Kashgar via Kilak
Pass. We too, found a place to camp in the woods by
the river and Shahid soon got to work building a fire for a meal of rice and vegetable
soup, while I collected some ice-cold water from the nearby river. The Kilak and Mintaka
Rivers meet at Morkushi, flowing in
from the north-west and north-east respectively. Interestingly, while the sandy bed of Mintaka
River is sparkling white, that of Kilak
River is jet black seemingly laden
with antimony compounds, though a proper soil analysis might suggest a more
complex composition.
Setting
out from Morkushi to Sad Buldi – which was to be our base camp for the final
trek to Kilak Pass – we passed by a number of crude stone tombs said to be
those of Kyrgyz nomads who had been settlers here, once upon a time. Nearby, a neat helipad with a floor of well
laid out stones testified to visits by senior military commanders who keep the
area under their watchful eyes.
During the trek to Sad Buldi, we
came across numerous marmots whose warning calls to their mates sounded
to me like, “Heeeeere they come … run, run, run!” If during the day we were there to startle
them, they had a tougher time at night when they had to stay clear of prowling
snow leopards, whose pug marks we spotted a dozen times across our track.
On the way, we stopped at an odd run-down
monument known as Bozai Gumbaz (dome of the elders), which had a couple of ibex
horns strung up, apparently votive in nature. Similarly named structures stand not too far
in Afghanistan’s
Wakhan strip and are actually tombs in the vicinity of Kyrgyz settlements. During the short break at the monument, our
porters built a quick fire and we had some hot coffee to pep us up for the
remaining trek.
Reaching Sad Buldi in the
afternoon, we were caught by a snow flurry followed by icy cold winds. During the night, the temperature fell to
minus 10ºC and a 40-knot wind kept lashing our tents. Shahid, who is prone to freezing earlier than
most, got up in the middle of the night and jogged around while I wondered what
the hullabaloo was all about!
The Big Day dawned with a
surprisingly clear sky and we set course at six in the morning before the snow started
to melt under the sharp rays of the sun.
The 6-km trek to Kilak Pass
turned out to be a tough one as we had to climb a good 2,000-ft, what with the atmospheric
oxygen at Sad Buldi’s 14,000-ft elevation already 45% less than at sea level. Shahid led the way with a surprisingly brisk
gait and by 9:00 am we were at our
objective, Border Pillar No 2, that denotes the Pak-China border at Kilak
Pass.
The amount of snow for the first
week of May was far more than what we had expected. All around, the vista had Arctic overtones
and, only the blue sky added colour to what was otherwise a most enchanting
composition in various shades of white.
So pristine was the scenery that our footsteps in the snow seemed to mar
eons of stillness, much like Armstrong’s did on the moon, I liked to imagine.
The Kilak
Pass opens into a sprawling plain
about two kilometres wide, enclosed by towering mountains on the eastern and
western sides. A border fence about 50
metres inside the Chinese territory ensures that shepherds and their animals do
not create a diplomatic fuss every now and then. We stayed around the border pillar and took
numerous pictures, though in the excitement we missed an important screen snap
of the GPS, that could have recorded the latitude of 37º 05’ N and an elevation
of 16,000’ above sea level.
Having to rush before the snow
turned into slush, we headed back carefully but to little avail. I plunged several times in to waist deep snow
and, in a few instances, scraped my shins against hidden rocks. Luckily, the injuries were Band-Aid curable. Anything more serious would have been
disastrous and, in retrospect, I feel that donkeys or other pack animals might
be the next best thing to helicopters for evacuation in a hiking eventuality,
especially in a remote area.
Back at our camp by midday, both Shahid and I started to feel a bit
of queasiness which we put down to altitude sickness. Feeling better by the evening, we called our
anxious families to tell them that the mission had been accomplished. Eight days of hard work had paid off and we
were eager to get back.
The trek
back to Misgar was on familiar route and included a night halt at
Morkushi. Before we got to Misgar the
following afternoon, we made a short detour to Qalandarchi Fort. Built by the British in the 1930s to show a
military presence in a sensitive area, the fort found new use half a century
later, when the Pakistan Army posted a small section of soldiers in the wake of
the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. In the late eighties, when India
occupied the Siachen glacier, Pakistan Army decided to establish a High
Altitude Combat School
for its Northern Areas troops that were earmarked for duties in Siachen. A decade later, when training began in situ
at Siachen, Qalandarchi was finally abandoned. Today a mosque and some barracks in the
vicinity of the decrepit fort await new residents. Maybe the infrastructure could be leased out
to some enterprising tour operator if the Army doesn’t find the area as ‘sensitive’. I am told, however, that cross-border
sensitivities may be a bigger issue.
Reaching Misgar at midday, we were welcomed by Ata-ullah over
sumptuous snacks and tea. We paid off
the porters, rigged our bikes with the camping gear, and took leave from our
genial host. As we cycled through the
village, we were cheerfully waved at by all and sundry, as word had gotten out
about our successful expedition.
Arriving in Sost by evening, we
checked in the PTDC Motel, which this time, was mostly vacant. A bath never felt so good, as we had to do
without this facility during our camping.
A good load of laundry was also done in quick time. With the household chores out of the way, we
had a sumptuous dinner, much starved as we were on our limited rations in the
camp.
Next morning, we decided to
leap-frog to Hussaini in a vehicle, cross the Ata-abad
Lake by boat and then ride our
bicycles to Aliabad in Hunza. After a
luxury stay at another of PTDC’s excellent motel in Aliabad, we moved on to
Gilgit, where the friendly and caring ways of the Army made us feel absolutely
at home.
Unfortunately, the way out of Gilgit by air was closed due to
bad weather and, the prospects were not favourable for the coming days, so we
decided to take a 20-hour ride by bus to Rawalpindi.
We had been on the road or the trail for a fortnight and,
most of the daylight hours had been taken up by a gruelling regimen. The sense of accomplishment was immense
indeed, particularly because our mode of transport was unique as not too many
Pakistanis are given to cycling for leisure.
We hope that the younger lot is inspired enough to take up similar
challenges; that is not to say that the senior lot should be considered past the age of pluck and
resolve. Here is a little secret that
should get you going: we are both 58 and, there is no stopping yet!
© KAISER
TUFAIL. This is an open-access article published under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
This article
was published in the daily newspaper The News International, in two parts, on 3 June and 10 Jun,
2012. It was also published in Pamir Times, in four parts, between 11 June and 21 June, 2012.
Next day, we were formally
welcomed to the aircraft factory by the general manager over a sumptuous lunch,
but the 20-course formal dinner the following evening outdid any banquet that
we had ever been feted with. Our hosts
were careful to ensure that no kind of animal appeared on the platter and, the qipao
clad waitresses were under special instructions to serve the fiery Moutai
liquor only to the Chinese. We sipped
green tea instead, much to the amusement of our hosts, for whom tea-drinking is
a valued tradition in 
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