jiejie

Day Two

The program for today began with getting up about 10:00 (BJ time) and heading for the ruins of the Stone Fort, a 1000-year old structure that guarded the Silk Road route between Kashgar and the Khunjerab Pass. In ancient times, Khunjerab was famous for being a pretty lawless place, with roaming bandits and other ne’er-do-wells preying on traders and travelers. Tashkorgan itself—or early versions thereof—has been around for another millenium before the Fort, and had always been a sort of “mountain oasis” in the same way that Turpan served for the desert travelers. The Fort can be a bit of a scramble to get to the top, especially if you climb the backside path like we did, but the views from the top are well worth it. The snowy Karakorum mountains are to the south, separating Xinjiang from the ‘Stans, and the marshy grasslands are to the north, lush with summer growth and heavy with yaks. A maze of new boardwalks across the grasslands (Golden Meadow) have just been built, leading to groups of tourist yurts, but nobody was there yet. I was told that this was a Han enterprise that had been allowed to take the land from the locals to build this, ostensibly for incoming Chinese tourists. But they hadn’t yet constructed the ticket booth and had not started charging entry fees yet.

After the Stone Fort and lots of photo-taking, we went into town central to a restaurant for some basic breakfast (a spicy soup thing with fresh flatbread, and tea). Another Abdul Wahab group of four Dutch tourists was adjacent to us, they had been running roughly the same route, about an hour or two behind us. After a final pitstop at the hotel, we checked out and set off to Khunjerab Pass, which at nearly 4700 meters (over 15,000 feet), would be the highest point on our journey. It was going to be a long driving day but one with plenty of rewarding scenery.

Checkpoint

Just outside of Tashkorgan, is a military checkpoint where guide M had to check in, show our permits from Kashgar, get another chopped permit paper for this final stretch of Highway, and deposit our passports (and ID’s for driver and guide) since we were returning and not continuing on to Pakistan. We didn’t need to leave the car, though. The Chinese military is very much in evidence in the Tashkorgan area, and are serious about keeping on top of who’s up there. This isn’t so much an anti-foreign tourist issue, as it is a general security issue with Afghanistan and Pakistan and all that chaos so close. The vehicle and traveling party get logged in, and if you don’t reappear within some reasonable time frame, there’s likely to be somebody out looking for you. Once past the checkpoint building, the soldiers manning the barriers look papers over again and let the car through. Also right in this part of the road is the China Immigration and Customs building for those heading to and coming from Pakistan. All the usual formalities are actually done here, even though the border itself is still another 1.75 hour drive away.

It’s still very brisk and cool so we wore our jackets. We pass through basically a continuous valley, sometimes with barren scrubby land, other times with grassland suitable for grazing and for a few vegetables. Very few vehicles on the road at all. About an hour into our journey, we pass the turnoff to the finger of China that touches the Afghanistan border. Nobody except military and a few villagers are permitted down there. There is no road or border crossing between China and Afghanistan; one would have to walk over, and judging from the inhospitable looks of the intervening mountains, it would likely be suicide at any time of year.

There were initially quite a number of villages (mostly Tajik) this far out of Tashkorgan, but at this point they start to get sparser. Clouds rolling in have got me rather bummed out, as they are starting to obscure the mountains on either side, which themselves are getting taller and snowier. And the air is again getting very thin so breathing is more labored, even sitting in a car. And then it starts to snow at a fairly good clip. Apparently this can happen in the Khunjerab Pass at any time of year including summer. I can easily see why the road and Pass are closed completely for about 5 months out of the year in winter. The road itself, while two lanes, is plenty wide enough for trucks and is well-paved. M says the Chinese Army maintains the road well all the way to the Pakistan border, but once on the Pakistan side, it goes to semi-paved with potholes and washouts, and it can get flooded in parts during snowmelt season. Upside is the road and scenery of the Karakoram Range are supposedly even more stunning on the Pakistan side. I will not get to compare.

While the snow isn’t particularly hard, it is steady and plays havoc with taking effective photos. What rotten luck, as on a relatively blue-sky day, this area would be epic. However, even with less-than-ideal visibility, we can still see the jagged mountains begin to hem in the road, and the strange quality of the gray-blue light gives the place an other-worldly quality. We suddenly leave the gradual gradient up the plateau, and go up a few switchbacks, climbing steeply. A couple of km later, and we arrive at the farthest point we can go, the military/security checkpoint at the Pass. We are still about 4 km away from the actual border demarcation with Pakistan, but the barrier gates with the big “Stop” across the road punctuate the message. Two soldiers come out of the adjacent building, run over to our car to peer in, look at us strangely, then without a word go back inside. Q and I get out of the car to take photos of each other in front of the barrier, and it is absolutely freezing—definitely below 0 degrees C. And windy. We aren’t dressed for the occasion and manage about 5 minutes before hopping back in the car. M and our driver sensibly stay warm inside the car.

Just then, a couple of 4WD vehicles with government plates pull up behind us, and out come the soldiers again, this time all smiles and greeting the occupants. No doubt a couple of VIP’s come to “inspect” the border. Our timely arrival just before that of the VIP’s must have faked out the soldiers with a false start, heh-heh. One soldier opens up the barrier gate and the Chinese pile into their 4x4’s and go driving off into the snowy mist beyond. Our visit is brief as there is nothing more to do here, but as we are about to pull away, our driver accidently hits the horn and a couple of soldiers come running down quizzically. We die laughing, but fortunately the soldiers aren’t too miffed by the whole thing. Mostly they just want to get back inside their nice warm building. I feel for the guys that have to man this post out here—it is isolated and bleak though wildly beautiful. The Edge of the World.

We turn around and head back for the downhill about 1.5 hours back to Tashkorgan. Interestingly, the scenery does look a bit different when you are going in the opposite direction. Once out of the Pass, the clouds thin a bit and our visibility is better for photography. We got back to Tashkorgan about 14:30 (BJ time), picked up our passports at the military checkpoints and got logged out, then head to the town. I had gotten a significant altitude headache about halfway between Tashkorgan and the Khunjerab pass—I estimate around the 3600-3700 meter point, but now back in Tashkorgan, it seems to have dissipated. And my appetite had returned. We first go to the local market to pick up some vegetables for evening, and delicious freshly baked Tajik flatbread. Also some notebooks, pens, and candy for the Kyrgyz kids at Karakul where we’d be staying the night. Then off to a restaurant for lunch., same one we had breakfast at. And a toilet break at our previous night’s hotel, where we were able to cajole the reluctant girl at the desk into letting us use one of the rooms. We ended up getting back on the road about 16:30 (BJ).

Karakul, Take 2

The return drive to Karakul Lake was lovely—unlike yesterday, we were having nice weather. On the way, we stopped off at a lovely Tajik lady’s house. She welcomed us as if we were long-lost friends, and invited us in for a look around. Her traditional house was much bigger than it looked from the outside. She put on her Tajik hat and we had a photo taking session. She looked about 80 years old but in fact said she was 56. Four grown children, one of whom was mentally disabled and lived with her still. Kind of sad. Her husband had died 3 years earlier. I reflected how very, very hard life is for these people, basically just subsistence living, and how lucky we are even with our own trials and tribulations. We spent about 30 minutes or so with her, then continued to Karakul, now heading back uphill again. The weather was cool but very pleasant. We arrived into our little yurt camp at Karakul about 19:00 (BJ), with the sun was still pretty high in the sky. I climbed up a nearby low hill and a short hike nearby to take some gorgeous pictures of the lake, and while a little ripply water, still got some decent reflection shots of Muztagh Ata in the background.

Q was energetic and decided to go for a more extensive hike, with the intent of joining up with the Dutch foursome who’d be arriving in about a half-hour. I was still huffing and puffing upon exertion so decided to go with M into one of the Kyrgyz host’s yurts and just lay down, rest, and chat. The hostess bought out her mini-bazaar, and I bought two hand-embroidered traditional Kyrgyz cushion covers for RMB 150 for the pair. She said each one takes about 15 days to do. Yikes! But then, not much else to do up here. My efforts to find a place to recharge my camera battery were fruitless, and I stupidly forgot to bring both a spare battery and a solar or car cigarette-lighter charger. These yurts don’t have regular electricity, just a contraption hooked up to some sort of large storage battery that they used for mobile phone charging. I was afraid it might damage my only battery so declined, deciding instead to ration my photo-taking the next day to conserve power until I ran out, and just recharge in Kashgar later. Furious with myself for this oversight.

The plan was to have the Dutch group stay in this yurt, while our own foursome would stay in the adjacent rock house. Around 21:00 Q and the Dutch returned from their hike into the hurt, and with the fading light and some clouds rolling in, the warmth of the sun was lost and it was nearly freezing outside—probably a drop of about 15 degrees C over the last 2 hours. The driver, M, Q, and me moved over to the rock house to get settled in. Our hostess got busy putting afire in the stove and a kettle on to boil, then put together a soup and made a cold salad out of our veggies purchased earlier. I was a bit dubious about the sanitation issue so had just a little soup and bread then begged off, pleading altitude effects and no appetite as an excuse to avoid the food. Hostess kindly made up my sleeping pallet in the corner, so I could lie down while the others finished up.

Most of the yurts and rock house have a small solar panel which can provide enough electricity for a light bulb inside, and the rock house had a big battery, but really not enough juice for much of anything else. So the yurt denizens try to use outside light from the window until very dark, then use the bulb for no more than 30 minutes or an hour. Very much traditional agricultural, activities follow the sun up and down. Even though the stove gave us a headstart on the evening’s heat, it was still a bit cold inside. I once again rolled up in my silk sleep sack then under the quilts provided. I prayed there were no lice or bedbugs in these. This is the part about a yurt stay I most loathe. (Well secondmost, after the lack-of-bathroom situation.) Fortunately, the pallet included an elevated headrest/pillow thing, so I was able to lay down and breathe with reasonable comfort, and eventually fell asleep with my earplugs in place. It wasn’t too long before everybody else was in a similar state so by 23:00 (BJ), I think we were all asleep: the four of us travelers, plus Kyrgyz Pa, Ma, and Son about 5 years old. It’s surprising how many people you can fit in a yurt.