Coverage / Pakistan
Pakistan
South Asia
A South Asian republic that holds one of the greatest concentrations of high mountains on earth in its far north. Gilgit-Baltistan, where the Karakoram, Himalaya and Hindu Kush ranges meet, contains five of the world's fourteen peaks above 8,000 meters, including K2 at 8,611 meters, the second highest mountain on the planet. The Karakoram Highway climbs from the plains through the Indus gorge to the Khunjerab Pass on the Chinese border at 4,733 meters, threading the Hunza and Nagar valleys past Rakaposhi and the Passu Cones. The season for the northern mountains runs late spring through autumn.
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What you can do in Pakistan
Trekking / Hiking
- ConcordiaJun Jul AugThe trek to Concordia and K2 base camp is widely called the greatest trek on earth, and the claim is hard to argue with once you are standing at the meeting of the Baltoro and Godwin-Austen glaciers. From this one amphitheater, the Throne Room of the Mountain Gods, you can see four of the world's fourteen 8,000-meter peaks at once: K2 at 8,611 meters, Broad Peak, and Gasherbrum I and II, with the sheer granite of the Trango Towers and the fang of Masherbrum on the walk in. The route runs from the roadhead at Askole up the Braldu gorge and onto the 63-kilometer Baltoro, the longest glacier outside the poles, camping on moraine and ice at Paiju, Urdukas and Goro before Concordia. Strong parties add the Gondogoro La at 5,585 meters to cross out to the Hushe valley. It is a full expedition on foot, portered and camped, inside the Central Karakoram National Park.
- Fairy MeadowsJun Jul Aug SepFairy Meadows is the classic first sight of Nanga Parbat, the ninth highest mountain on earth at 8,126 meters and the great peak that anchors the western end of the Himalaya. The meadow is a shelf of alpine grass and pine at around 3,300 meters, reached by a short, famously exposed jeep track up from the Raikot Bridge on the Karakoram Highway and then an hour or two on foot. From there a day walk climbs to Beyal camp and on to the Nanga Parbat base camp view at the foot of the Raikot Face, looking straight up 7,000 meters of ice and rock to the summit. Nanga Parbat is the Killer Mountain, which resisted climbers longer and more lethally than almost any other before Hermann Buhl soloed the first ascent in 1953. For trekkers it is one of the most accessible 8,000-meter base camp views anywhere, non-technical and doable in a long weekend, yet it stands among the most dramatic. Fairy Meadows and the mountain sit inside the Nanga Parbat conservation area.
Witness / Attend
- Hunza ValleyApr May Jun Jul Aug Sep OctHunza is the valley that gave the wider world its idea of a Shangri-La, a string of terraced villages climbing the mountainside above the Hunza river with Rakaposhi at 7,788 meters and the Passu Cones filling the skyline. The old capital of Karimabad is watched over by two restored forts: the 700-year-old Baltit Fort, once the palace of the Mirs of Hunza and now a museum rescued by the Aga Khan Cultural Service Pakistan, and the older Altit Fort below it with its royal garden. The people here are mostly Ismaili, followers of the Aga Khan, and the valley is known across Pakistan for near-universal literacy, the prominence of women, and an openness to outsiders that has shaped its travel culture for decades. Beyond the forts, the draw is the everyday life of the valley: apricot and cherry orchards in blossom in April, the turquoise flood-lake of Attabad, the Wakhi villages of Gojal at Gulmit and Passu, and the ancient Silk Road rock carvings at Ganish. It is the cultural heart of the Karakoram, as much a reason to come as the mountains.
- Shandur Polo FestivalShandurJun JulThe Shandur Polo Festival is the highest polo tournament on earth, played each summer on a natural turf ground at 3,700 meters on the Shandur Pass, the watershed between Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral. For three days the teams of Gilgit and Chitral meet in freestyle polo, the wild original form of the game with almost no rules and no umpire to speak of, to the beat of drums and surnai pipes. A tent city of several thousand spectators, players and traders springs up on the pass for the festival, with folk music and dancing in the evenings, trout in the nearby lakes and horsemanship on show all day. The setting is the draw as much as the match: a green shelf of grass ringed by bare peaks, reached only by a long, rough mountain road from either side. It is one of the great spectacles of the Karakoram, a local event that draws travelers from Europe, America and the Gulf without ever becoming a packaged show.
Best months at a glance
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