Advertisement
Hitting the road again...but not any road, THE Karakoram highway, also known as the highest paved international road in the world, an adventure in itself! This road built by Pakistan and China connects Kashgar to Islamabad, reaching the altitude of 4600 meters, and goes through the border area where Pakistan, Tajikistan, China, Afghanistan are all within 250 km from each others. Sceneries...well, the word in itself sounds weak to describe the unbelievable diversity of landscapes, lights, colors, climates & the speed to which all those could change for better (and sometime worse...) , a paradise for the one seeking nature at its purest... Leaving Kashgar...short backtrack Here I was, standing by a
local SUV at the very far end of Kashgar, sorting out the transportation for the first part of the journey along the Karakoram highway. Done deal, bag properly tied up on the roof & ready to meet the locals I would be sharing the ride with! Still not sure who was the most surprised, them (six local Kirgiz men) or me who could find nothing else to do than smile.
First part of the journey - Kashgar to Karakul 
Breathtaking
The Karakoram HighwayLake
A three hours drive to start this journey, the SUV is going full speed, passing by locals on foot, donkey carts and the usual motorbikes. Kashgar quickly gives place to a more agricultural landscape with here and there mud houses and looking at the hats worn by the men (four-corner flower hats) the majority of those locals are still Huizu.
One hour later, the mountain ranges are getting closer. Time for a short dinner break at a local village where my new companions invite me over to share their meal. By then, we still couldn’t communicate (so to speak..) but the first cigarette offered to each of them broke the ice and followed lots of smile & "animated discussions" using the sign language and a bit of Chinese (one of them could understand basic Chinese).
Back on the car, starting to go up the mountain on a very well maintained two lanes road, so far so good!
Reaching the outskirts of
Ghez, I find out that here as well (same as last trip by the Myanmar border), there is a
check point to enter the area, starting
to get used to passport controls in China...So here you go, my companions walk into the tiny office first, showing their permit to enter the area (required for Chinese citizens) &
when it comes to my turn, the Chinese officer looks up, then around, and surprised ask me how I came... He seemed somehow relieved when I point out the SUV then parked on the other side of the check point (no, I didn’t come on foot...)...judging by his reaction, guess most visitors pass by in the morning using the official bus system...
In the meantime, our driver had decided to turn on the vcd player & flat screen TV located in front of the passenger seat, putting music video on, full volume.
Somehow, I enjoyed it as the music & dance was the perfect match for the landscape we were starting to see from the car...getting more and more dramatic as we went up and crossed the
Pamir mountain range. Mountains then became
pink, lots of dust, landslide too & a cloudy sky that seems threatening. The pinkish color mountains are then replaced by a
sandy color mountain range with snow capped peaks on the background. The canyon created by the
Ghez river is impressive and somehow I am glad to be traveling on a SUV! We then reached a plateau that goes as far as your sight can see,
guess that's when the sky decided that we would start by a sand storm.... By then, we
couldn’t even see at one meter and were all hoping that one of those big truck we had seen earlier would not come the opposite way. A
fter a few minutes, the sand was replaced by snow!! Still have no clue on how this
climatic aberration is possible ... so snowing for few minutes it was, strong wind and the sun still breaking through the cloudy sky from time to time...
Once the snow stopped,
the light was simply amazing and the sceneries around us somehow lunar. We then drove further up, seeing very little local yurt or mud house on the way, villages being located a few km away from the road.
Karakul Lake...simply unreal... Here it is...the Karakul Lake is right in front, with the
Mount Muztagh Ata (7,546m), Kongur Tagh
Gez River canyon
The Karakoram Highway (7649m) and Kongur Tiube (7530m) in the background. The SUV dropt me by the road, a few hundred meters and I reached the Kirgiz settlement...
The lady who welcomed me had the same reaction as the check point officer, looking outside to find out where I parked my car or where my guide was hiding.
Followed a really nice chat in Chinese & before I knew it she shown me the way to one of the yurt and invited me to join them for the party that was about to start in the main yurt,
youth day celebration! That night, I was sharing the room with two other European girls and while having a nice chat and enjoying some coffee, I was slowly getting acclimated to the altitude
(3600m+). It seems that I would be the only one joining the
local "party", so as my yurt mate went to sleep, time to head to the main yurt!
Inside, 30+ local Kirgiz were dancing, laughing, playing, drinking tea... they gave me a warm welcome, offering local cigarettes and tea & we quickly started to laugh as the "party people" went back on the
Yarksamesis!
Karakul Lake dance floor, dancing on some local style songs and disco songs & making fun in the meantime! Before I knew it, I ended up on the dance floor too...
ever tried to dance at 3600+meters? Simply exhausting but had so much fun that before I realized it, it was already 1 am, time to get some rest!
Great night of sleep: having learned from the first night spent in a yurt, I carefully loaded the stove with coal before going to sleep (while keeping plenty of coal next to it...), nice & warm!
Another day in middle of nowhere, sensation of infinity as I enjoy the morning sun while drinking some coffee...
Back on horse! Riding along the lake The day started with a short discussion with local Kirgiz kids who arrived at the settlement with some horses and before I knew it I was on one of them!
Quickly I started to feel really at ease and here we were on a
full gallop mode in the middle of the grassland , along the Karakul lake with its
dark blue shades, too windy to
Eheh
Karakul Lake see the mountains reflection on it but still so unreal...
Crossing water, riding by yaks & sheep, going along tiny path before going back to the grassland where we went for one full gallop after the other...the horses seemed exhausted and somehow so were we, so we finished the ride slowly, going on foot for a little while for the horses to rest...
3 hours ride & by the time we reached the settlement, the lake was taking different shades of
azure blue...
Time to head to the next stop: Tashkurgan, Tajik autonomous county Standing by the road, guess I was lucky as I waited less than 5 mn before one of the SUV stop by and give me a ride to the next town, Tashkurgan located within the Tajik autonomous county.
Nice ride with a Chinese family, and within an hour and half I was reaching the Tajik town.
Tashkurgan in itself
felt like I had reached the end of the world, in the middle of nowhere. The sky was low & at first the overall look of the city (ugly concrete buildings along one main
road) made me feel like I was going to head straight back for the Karakul Lake...
I decided instead to give a second chance to the city and decided to spend the night and walked around. After a little while I still felt the same way toward the city (not even mentioning the "fortress" supposed to be THE site to see...) but somehow people were friendly and it was interesting to see
how different they were from the Kirgiz in their attitude and outfit, another day another experience! Managed to miss the bus back to Kashgar the next morning (again...), although I was at the station on time (well at least at the time the driver indicated the day before).
Starting to have doubts about which time they were using in this area (seems there was one more hour difference...)
Anyhow, it took me about 10mn to find a minivan heading back to Kashgar for a fare of 40RMB (4 Euros), getting good at it!
Back in Kashgar, ready to head for the journey starting the next day that will be taking me through the
Taklamakan desert Peace & Quiet
The Karakoram Highway all the way to Urumuqi.
Trip around Xinjiang
PART 1: Xinjiang Southern Pastures: Kazakh, horses, snow & yurts!
PART 2: Hundreds years of dust...welcome to the Gobi Desert!
PART 3: Kashgar, the gate to Central Asia! Vibrant & colourful!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.143s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 16; qc: 36; dbt: 0.053s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
fabien
non-member comment
comment
Salut Laetitia, ces photos sont simplement superbes ! Cela me donne envie de faire cette route comme toi. On pense bien a toi. Biz Michele et Fabien