{"id":28277,"date":"2012-06-11T03:34:17","date_gmt":"2012-06-10T22:34:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/?p=28277"},"modified":"2012-06-11T03:43:25","modified_gmt":"2012-06-10T22:43:25","slug":"biking-to-the-extreme-north-part-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/2012\/06\/11\/biking-to-the-extreme-north-part-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Biking to the Extreme North – [Part One]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The writer and his friend, Shahid (R), on the Karakuram Highway\u00a0
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

Kaiser Tufail<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I<\/span><\/span>f you have heard people claiming to have travelled inPakistanfrom \u2018one end to the other,\u2019 take it as no more than a figure of speech. \u00a0I thought such a sweeping contention should, for a start, entail a boat ride to the fabulous Astola Island in the Arabian Sea, thirty miles south-east of Pasni; and, no amount of travelling inside Pakistan\u2019s heartland can be considered complete unless the sojourn is rounded off with the ultimate feat of reaching the northern-most latitude of the country.\u00a0 That extreme geographical point was the goal of our two-man bicycle expedition last May, so we could proudly flaunt our \u2018end-to-end\u2019 travel credentials.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

Most ordinary maps show a small kink jutting into China, a few miles north-east of the point where Pak, Afghan and Chinese borders meet, being aptly described by the British explorer Colonel Schomberg as the \u2018solar plexus of the mountain system of Asia.\u2019\u00a0 Astride the kink is the 15,840-ft high KilakPass, which fans out northwards into a sprawling snow-clad pasture.\u00a0 Here, herdsmen from Pakistan\u2019s northern-most villageof Misgarcome to graze their sheep and goats, when the melting carpet of snow starts to uncover the rich herbage in May.\u00a0 Up to the end of the 19th<\/sup> century, the pass was infrequently used by traders from Gilgit and Hunza to sell dried fruit and, of all items, wretched slaves \u2013 with the acquiescence of the heartless local rulers \u2013 to caravans plying between the fabled oasis towns ofWestern China and Afghanistan\u2019s Badakhshan province, and beyond.\u00a0 Much of the goods fromChina, however, came through the closerMintakaPass and, included silks, printed textiles, carpets and jade products, mostly destined for the ruling elite of the region.\u00a0 Like most mountainous passes, Kilak and Mintaka were also notorious for being hideouts for brigands to waylay caravans laden with those exotic wares.\u00a0 Some of the infamous outlaws of Gilgit and Hunza had spent their useful years prowling the crags and defiles of these passes, while living off the land in the company of wild animals and, lashed by bitterly cold winds.\u00a0 I could almost hear the nervous whistles of marmots scampering about at the snarl of a hungry snow leopard in that mountain vastness, as I started to plan the expedition.<\/p>\n

When I broached the subject with my friend Shahid Dad, last year, he seemed sufficiently enthused.\u00a0 \u201cWould you be willing to bike all the way from Gilgit to the extreme north ofPakistan?\u201d \u00a0I inquired carefully, lest he take it as an indolent suggestion.\u00a0 The strong fighter pilot bond we had shared in yesteryears came through when he emphatically replied in the affirmative. \u00a0When he added in his usual scholarly manner, \u201cAge doesn\u2019t matter, the heart is still young,\u201d I knew I could take comfort, knee joints and all!\u00a0 It was summarily decided that Shahid would be returning fromBostonthe following May, especially for this expedition.\u00a0 I promptly purchased lightweight mountain bikes for the two of us from Nila Gumbad,Lahore\u2019s crowded cycle mart.\u00a0 Getting those \u2018retired\u2019 muscles back to vigorous work was a challenge, and the coming months saw me pedalling feverishly every morning on the outskirts of Lahore, while Shahid was mostly confined to a gym due to severe cold weather in Boston.\u00a0 The expedition was to last a full fortnight, from Gilgit up to the northern limits ofUpperHunzaValleyand back in 50-km daily stretches, so the demands on endurance and stamina had to be painstakingly catered for.<\/p>\n

While physical conditioning was underway, the equally important planning aspects were looked into, critically.\u00a0 Choice of route, basically dictated by suitable night stops, was followed by selection of nearby inns, motels or camping sites; geographical coordinates for GPS, climb gradients, astronomical and weather data were then gathered.\u00a0 Most important, satellite pictures from Google\u00ae earth, which could be viewed in amazing 3-D ground-level panoramas, were downloaded, carefully analysed and then uploaded into our mobile phones for enroute correlation.\u00a0 With a Mandarin vocabulary limited to nin hao <\/em>and xi\u00e9xi\u00e9,<\/em> explaining a border violation to Chinese guards would have been a disaster; good navigation was, thus, the key to a successful mission.<\/p>\n

The problem of Acute Mountain Sickness also had to be tackled.\u00a0 The earliest mention of this sickness is known to have been made by a Chinese official by the name of To Kan in 32 BC, while he was touring in the vicinity of theKilakPassitself.\u00a0 \u201cA man\u2019s face turns pale, his head aches, and he begins to vomit,\u201d observed To Kan.\u00a0 This malady afflicts even the very fit mountaineers if the rate of vertical traverse is more than 2,000-ft in 24 hours, above an elevation of 8,000-ft.\u00a0 Such a situation was going to be encountered during our last leg, so we decided to break it up at the half way point.\u00a0 With the vitals adequately taken care of, we were rearing to go.<\/p>\n

————————<\/p>\n

Part Two (2\/4) will be posted on Thursday, 14th June.<\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The writer and his friend, Shahid (R), on the Karakuram Highway\u00a0 Kaiser Tufail If you have heard people claiming to have travelled inPakistanfrom \u2018one end to the other,\u2019 take it as no more than a figure of speech. \u00a0I thought such a sweeping contention should, for a start, entail a boat ride to the fabulous …<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28278,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[13],"tags":[9,4109,390,4772],"class_list":["post-28277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-gilgit","tag-kaiser-tufail","tag-lahore","tag-pakistan"],"better_featured_image":{"id":28278,"alt_text":"","caption":"Author (Kaisar Faisal)) and his partner Shahid (R) on the Karakuram Highway (KKH)","description":"","media_type":"image","media_details":{"sizes":{"120x85":{"file":"1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH-120x85.bmp","width":120,"height":85,"source_url":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH-120x85.bmp"},"415x260":{"file":"1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH-415x260.bmp","width":415,"height":260,"source_url":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH-415x260.bmp"},"150x150":{"file":"1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH-150x150.bmp","width":150,"height":150,"source_url":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH-150x150.bmp"}}},"post":28277,"source_url":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH.bmp"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/1_Author-L-and-his-partner-Shahid-R-on-the-KKH.bmp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28277"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28280,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28277\/revisions\/28280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/tg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}