Day 61
From now on we’ll ride with Mark, Eloy, Lucy and their guide. What an amazing coincidence! I knew him from Instagram, we had been talking for a long time on the net and by chance we end up riding together through Pakistan. He is Sha, from Karakorum bikers (https://www.karakorambikers.com and @karakorambikers in Instagram) the best biker guide ever! They are offering other kind of tours around Pakistan, so if you go there contact them!
Samuel and Marc decide to ride a tough off road valley with two new biker friends, Mario a superfriendly Italian (@heartchallenge on Instagram) and Martin, a German guy travelling with Mogli, a cat that he rescued from the streets (@motomogli on Instagram). We’ll met again in Gilgit.
The Pasu cons and the Hunza river…
Our first stop will be the hanging bridge, and there we have another surprise Ahmar and Shaheryar are waiting for us. It seems they were talking to Mark on Facebook and somehow they managed to find us without having an appointment or anything! They just took the car from Gilgit (3 hours each way) to meet Mark! As I’ve said, this country is amazing! We love its people!
The hanging bridge! and no… we are not brave enough to cross it.
Next we visit the Attabad lake. In January 2010, a massive landslide blocked the flow of River Hunza, creating a natural dam and burying 20 people beneath it. The rising water displaced thousands of residents and submerged countless villages, fields, orchards a well as a 19-kilometre stretch of the Karakoram Highway … Until the connection was restored, the only way to reach the villages of Shishkat, Gulmit, Passu and China was to cross the beautiful, blue lake by boat. However, the Karakoram is being rebuilt so we just ride through some tunnels now! This blue it’s not from this planet!
The last stop will be in Karimabad, where we’ll spend the night. Our new friends have prepared some sightseeing! We visit the Altit fort and the Eagle’s nest. The views are just breathtaking, I can’t even try to describe what we see… and the photos are not good enough as usual.
As I’ve already said, people in Pakistan are incredibly friendly with us, we don’t feel insecure or not welcome at any time. Just the opposite, we are overwhelmed with all the love and generosity that they show to us.
That’s why it is called the Eagle’s nest; due to this rock form:
And the views…
Finally we end up having dinner all together in a Pizza restaurant, well not the est pizza ever, but at least it was not spicy! After that Ahmar and Shaheryar drive the 3 hour back home, with the promise to see us tomorrow in Gilgit.