View from Eagle’s Nest
17&18.05
We spend the next few days in Karimabad. First we visit the fort Baltit. The place is a parаdise for Korean and Japanese people – there are signs in Korean everywhere. There are many shops in the street. They sell mainly carpets, precious stones, dried fruits and traditional clothes.
Passu glacier
11.05
Here comes the new day – full of adventures. We wake up at 6 in the morning and we start sightseeing. There are several old houses in the village (one of them was the summer palace of the Mir of Hunza – this is the title of the local rulers) and a museum, as well as an old fort that is 200 years old. We climb above the village and the sights are amazing.
Peaks in Hunza Valley
08.05
Apparently we led too luxurious and easy life the past few days and to counterbalance today was full of hardships. As soon as we prepared to leave the hotel the owner said we owe him 500 Rupees (5$) for the tent, but we refused to pay him. Later the hitchhiking was slow but after waiting for a while a guy took us to Battagram (around 20 km.), he treated us to tea and cookies at his office and it was hard to explain to him that we want to continue hitchhiking.
The caravan is blocked by a glacier on the way to Naran
05.05
We start hitchhiking towards the mountains. The driver of Shah and Fatima leaves us at the end of the town and a car stops right away. For me Pakistan is on the top of the list of all the countries, I have been up to now, regarding the hitchhiking. Almost everyone stops, most of the drivers speak English and the new and luxurious cars stop the most.
On the way to Muree
02.05
We get up late and we start hitchhiking. We need to take three mini buses to get out of the city. This time there are no fights and no crowds because it is Saturday. We have breakfast in the outskirts of Islamabad – samosas and airan (yoghurt mixed with water and supposedly salt). Every time we order airan we ask not to put sugar in it, but they almost always do anyway. The other thing one should be careful about is, when one orders fresh or sugar cane juice, not to let them put salt in them, which happens quite often especially with the street vendors.
People dance in the forest out of pure joy
29.04
We wake up ready for a day full of improbable events and incredible people. How is it possible to travel only three weeks and live thorough millions of things that usually a person experiences for a year? We feel like living in a magical fairy-tale.
In this mood we rush to issue visas for India. First we hop on a mini-bus to the centre of Rawalpindi and from there to catch another mini-bus to Islamabad. Alas finding transport from Rawalpindi to Islamabad resulted to be not an easy task. We ask some people for directions but part of them don’t know and the other part tell us it’s behind the corner. When we reach the said corner and ask other people, they tell us to go back to where we just came from.
Faisal Mosque, islamabad
25.04 & 26.04
We spend the next few days in a relaxed manner – mostly staying at home and rarely going out. We visited the traditional artisan bazaar which is in a big decline, but we saw some interesting artifacts such as lamp made of camel skin and jewelry made of camel bone. Mainly these two days we visit people’s houses that have their own relaxed style which we named decadent luxury.
Multan bazaar
23.04
We wake up pretty late. The house where we sleep is covered with dust and there is no furniture. We pitched the bottom part of our tent and it is not bad at all. The friends of the guy who accommodated us, came in the morning and, we spoke about politics for a while and we went out for a walk.
Somewhere in Pakistan
19.04
This is our second day living at the police station. We made a lair out of chairs and two plastic mat we bought to cover our sleeping mats. We have the feeling that we are here for weeks now. The day begins with drinking tea and chatting with our friends – the policemen. The boss who is short and lean but wiry, has his pants girded up to his belly button and looks like some general from the past, invites us at his cabinet to chat and watch TV. In a while a policeman shows up and gives us his laptop so we can use the Internet. Like this the day passes quickly. We can’t wait for tomorrow to come – there are so many things we want to see.
16.04
Around 8 o’clock our friends drive us down town and we catch shared taxi with some other people. The prices are high (around 3$ per person) for only 60-70 km. On the road we see a group of around 40 Balochi people, lined-up under the sun. We think that they are waiting for a group of white jeeps that we passed by some time ago. They looked really impressive with their “white pajamas” and Kalashnikov guns.
Magic Kervan 