Month: June 2016

From the Kyrgyzstan-China border to the city of Osh, I shared a rather expensive taxi with two Chinese tourists. The road follows a wide valley adjacent to the border with Tajikistan, with picturesque views of nomads tending their flocks in green pastures. Jagged, snow-capped peaks form the backdrop for this picture of traditional life. A […]

Xinjiang is the largest and most westerly province of China. It’s also one of the strangest. The majority ethnic group here are the Uighurs (pronounced wee-ghurs), who are Muslims. Culturally and genetically, they are much closer relatives of Tajiks and Turks than of the Han Chinese who rule the country from Beijing. They aren’t the […]

Further up from the Hunza Valley is a region called Gojal. The elevation here means that it has had no permanent residents until the past few centuries. The Karakoram Highway continues to wind its way through the mountains here. From Karimabad, my base for exploring Hunza, I took a minibus to a town called Gumit, […]

My minibus wound its way north from Gilgit, passing through rocky valleys flanked by snowy peaks. The summit of Rakaposhi (7788 m/25551 ft.) was draped in clouds for much of the journey, but still dominated the landscape. After a right turn around the base of the mountain, I was now in the Hunza Valley. Here […]

I spent a rest day in Lahore, Pakistan’s cultural capital. The oppressive heat, dust and pollution irritated my eyes, nose and throat. It didn’t lend itself to exploration of this extremely historical city. I took a bus the next morning to Rawalpindi, a city adjacent to Pakistan’s capital Islamabad. This is the foot of the […]

While I was in Amritsar, I made an excursion to the India-Pakistan border at Wagah to watch the famous border closing ceremony. This visit was a prelude to crossing the border for real two days later. Around sunset, the Indian and Pakistani border guards took their places for an elaborate ritual full of posturing and […]