Scratch the surface of a landscape colonised by nature and you might find the mysterious remnants of human civilisation just beneath. The wild cliffs and scraggy green fields of the Pembrokeshire hide ditches that once sheltered mine trains, a perfect azure pool that was once a quarry, heavy stones heaved into situ by ancient undertakers, and neolithic-looking brick dens which turn out to be lime kilns, Industrialists ovens for burning rocks.
One of many picture-perfect bays, near Lydstep.
I wandered among this gently beguiling landscape in October 2020. It was a strange point in time: after a spring frozen by pandemic, the comparatively free summer told us things were getting better. The growing creep of lockdowns still felt like blips on an inevitable path back to normality.
I took the Wales Coastal Path, and specifically its westernmost spur: walking from the village of Penally clockwise to Fishguard. It was the first time I’d visited the area, Pembrokeshire being just a little too far for a Londoner on a short trip. The journey was a full, masked, morning; changing trains in locked-down Swansea I lurked uneasily just outside the station, the sense of danger reminding me of a Tunisian bus station I had been warned not to wander away from. At Carmarthen the passengers trooped over the rails to the train waiting opposite, which pulled out the way we had come and carried on to the colourful houses of Tenby, before trundling a couple of miles down the coast to Penally, and its military range.
I had come to Wales in mid-October fully expecting rain. Previous midsummer walking in other Celtic extremities of the British Isles – County Kerry to Kinlochewe – had taught me to expect little moral support from the elements, but rather to treat each minute of sunlight as a bonus. But I was spoiled in Wales, and after a single torrential downpour on day two I enjoyed largely uninterrupted sun. There’s a meditative simplicity to following a well-signed coastal path, on which you can never really get lost, and so stepping out Penally station I simply started walking, and didn’t really stop for ten days.
On the path I encountered a lot of gorgeous vistas and not a lot of people. I found smooth sandy beaches, which it seemed a waste to tramp across in my muddy boots, looked across high stretches of green fields well watered by autumn’s rains, and followed miles of high, jagged cliffs. Often there was an exuberant sea far beneath, sometimes a deserted white sandy beach, or a rocky one, and often a muddy little stream, meaning I had to climb down to cross, before climbing straight back up. (I got into the habit of stopping at the bottom to touch my toes for thirty seconds, to give my knees some respite.) At the most dramatic points – rounding St Anne’s Head or St David’s Head – I was surrounded on all sides by sea, surging against gaping cliffs topped with light grass, fingers of headland reaching out to explore the water, topped by joyous dog-walkers, and the occasional brooding decommissioned bunker. On the clearest days I saw across to the north coast of Devon, and I passed islands with alluring names – Skomer, Skokholm -, jet-speed currents flowing through the sounds between them and the mainland. I shared the environment with harvest mice, scurrying as they do across the way in front of me; at Martin’s Haven I met a seal pup plopped practically on top of the path leading up from the beach. Thereafter I saw the occasional distant seal, until on my final day, around Strumble Head, I saw a colony of over twenty, lying on rocks far below the cliff-top path, lazing, awkwardly pulling themselves around by the flippers, crying out, oblivious and totally unbothered by any humans walking above them.
Old structures crumbling in the rock near Porthgain, Pembrokeshire
One pleasure of a long point-to-point to walk is that it necessarily includes variety – the conventionally beautiful as well as the less disarming views. Walking out of the picturesque village of Angle on my third day, having slept within spitting distance of a fourteenth-century Pele Tower, I was confronted by the much higher towers of Pembroke Oil Refinery; along with nearby power station, it dominated the landscape over the next three days. At the same time, the scenery became flatter and muddier as I entered the Daugleddau Estuary, the high cliffs of the sea coast retreating; Pembroke Dock and Milford Haven were the largest towns I passed through on my walk, and even a charming, Victorian hilltop park looked across the water to the refinery. Industrial works in the late twentieth century displaced the villages of Rhoscrowther and Pwllcrochan, now preserved on Ordnance Survey maps and borne witness by their churches. Tucked away in a wood, I passed Pwyllcrochan’s fourteenth-century church and cemetery, now owned by the refinery, its noticeboard emblazoned with the Valero logo. But this is not to make a judgement, and I sensed no local resentment against the industrial complex: the refinery and power stations are the biggest employer in the area.
Indeed, the area around has long been busy with comings and goings. Well over a century before Texaco shipped Trinidadian oil into Pembrokeshire, slate and granite were shipped out from the bustling docks of Porthgain, now a bustling seaside hamlet, noteworthy to me for having not one but two pubs on the water’s edge – a choice! – where I had my first, delicious, portion of bara brith, a local fruit cake. Porthgain’s narrow natural harbour is further sheltered by two looping breakwaters, and the path passed towering red-brick buildings pushed into the cliff that once housed hoppers, machines crushing granite for export.
St. Bride’s Bay. To keep my Mum happy.
Pembrokeshire’s relative proximity to France and Ireland, and the easy access inland along the Cleddau river, long gave it strategic importance. Excited notice boards at Carreg Wastad pointed out the site of the last – French – invasion of Britain; it seems it was a fairly drunken and unplanned attempt, led by an American, and that the hero in putting it down was local woman Jemima Nicholas, who was armed with a pitchfork. In the 1800s more effort went into building defences, and walking towards Pembroke Dock it seemed that every island going had a Victorian fort on it. I was even able to spend the night at Dale Fort, which holds a youth hostel (one of very few that was open mid-pandemic) and had the vibe of a geography field trip – while clearly maintaining the layout, architecture, and fortifications of a military defence.
Within an hour of leaving Dale Fort, I passed by the unassuming and sheltered Mill Bay; this, I learnt, was where Henry Tudor landed after his exile in Brittany, keeping out of the way of what was then Dale Castle. Just a few weeks later Henry, whose Tudor ancestors originated from Anglesey, defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth and became Henry VII. I had already seen where, in Pembroke Castle, where he was said to have been born – an unassuming tower room with figurines set up much like a nativity. The affection that Henry received in Pembrokeshire in the 15th century, when he was welcomed and defended on his return from France, seems to have lingered a bit, and I later walked past a Welsh-language school called Harri Tudor.
Long before the Tudors, Pembrokeshire was a place of pilgrimage. St David, patron saint of Wales, was born at St Non’s, now the ancient remains of a chapel in a verdant field perched above a rocky bay, not far from where Pembrokeshire tips furthest west into the ocean. St Non was St David’s mother, and the site also contained a sacred spring. I enjoyed this evidence of how a pre-Christian holy site had been taken up and developed into the birth-story of the local saint. However, an information sign told me I was wrong: the holy spring wasn’t pre-Christian at all, but had in fact miraculously appeared precisely at the moment of St David’s birth.
St Non’s is a stop on the old pilgrimage route to Britain’s smallest city, St David’s, while lies a couple of miles inland. I reached it via the exhilarating coast of St David’s Head, probably the most dramatic part of my walk, and one of the few places where I suddenly found myself surrounded by lots of other walkers. I couldn’t help but take a detour to scramble up Carn Lidl, the highest hill in the area, giving me wide views across the coast and out to Ramsey Island beyond. After losing the path on the descent I took evasive action (think backpack thrown down to help preserve balance); I wandered into St David’s in the late afternoon. The city is very much the size of a village, with one main road, one supermarket, no sprawl, and a population just under 2,000. The complex around the cathedral – which provides city-status – is not much smaller than the town-centre. An arch through an imposing, if pocket-sized, guard tower leads to a grassy hill cradling the cathedral, and beyond it the 14th-century ruined bishop’s palace, more or less the same size as its holier neighbour. I returned for evensong, a favourite activity of mine, as it’s a chance to enjoy any cathedral serving the purpose it was designed for. Here, the bishop led the service in a soothing mix of English and Welsh, and instead of a choir, a socially distant cantor sang preces and responses alongside the organist. St David’s doesn’t feel at all far from the more numerous spires of Oxford at such times. I put my head back and lost myself in the criss-crossed vaulting of the wooden ceiling.
Most ancient of all, if we discount the hills themselves, are the pagan sites that decorate Pembrokeshire’s landscape – reminding me of end-of-the-world stone circles in Atlantic Ireland. I passed the most impressive, Carreg Samson, on my final day: after leaving the delightful, temporarily deserted, clifftop village of Trefin, I wandered along quiet lanes, turned right at a farmhouse, and found it in the middle of a field, one massive horizontal rock balancing one top of six enormous upright ones. I find such monuments peaceful: they are profoundly unbothered by my presence, or by the farm, fields, cows, or civilisations that pass them by.
Carreg Samson
There was an elemental wind that day and I kept further than usual from the cliffside edge, seeing not a single person until I rounded the headland into Fishguard Bay, its piers, upper and lower towns, sealife centre, and train station opening up beneath me. The Coast Path casually transformed into a perfectly suburban street named Harbour Village, and beneath me the A40 appeared, ex nihilo, ready to flow all the way from Fishguard Harbour to St Paul’s Cathedral.
I instead took the train back to the metropolis, and onwards into lockdown, and haven’t really left either since. As I sit and wait, ever so slightly cooped up, it’s reassuring to know that, hopefully not too far in the future, a few hours on the rails will plunge me back to the opposite coast of this island, a historic land, where I can wander and forget it all.
Andrew Irvine and George Mallory disappeared on the North Face of Mount Everest in the summer of 1924, within touching distance of the summit. Their Oxford University expedition took place three decades before Tenzin Norgay and Edmund Hillary finally made the first official ascent in 1953, and while Mallory’s body was located in 1999, that of Irvine – just 22 years old at the time – remains lost.
The mystery of how they died, and whether they ever reached the summit, is mountaineering folklore. And Irvine lives on not just in legend but in the AC Irvine Travel Fund set up in his memory, which makes travel grants for Oxford Undergraduates. Back in 2007 I received a generous grant towards trekking in Tajikistan, and afterwards I had to write up a report. That is what this post contains: my first ever piece of travel-writing.
Trekking in the Ghunt Valley, near Yashil-Kul
Re-reading now, I’m wryly amused by how I seem vaguely to have taken on the tone of a Victorian gentleman explorer. Content-wise, I imagine that the way of life in Tajikistan is less untouched nowadays than when I wrote, and that several of the nomads we met have since got smartphones. However, change is not necessarily something to fear, and besides, this is why we write – to preserve a set of experiences in time and place. This trip was absolutely one worth remembering.
It is not without reason that the Pamiris call the mountains in which they live Bam-i-Dunya, the Roof of the World. This mighty knot of 6000m peaks in the heart of Central Asia is after all the convergence of four great mountain ranges: the Hindu Kush, the Tien Shan, the Kunlun, and the Karakoram. It is a hard country of narrow valleys, high plateaux, and was once host to the biggest mountains and glaciers of the USSR. Today it is mostly contained within the Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast (GBAO) of Tajikistan: the poorest province in the most struggling of the former SSRs. After a few decades of Soviet exploration, its peaks and passes are once more untrodden, and its roads are slowly being worn down by Lada 4x4s and 22-wheeler Chinese trucks, as well as snow, rockfalls and earthquakes. It was therefore with great excitement, but no little appreciation of the challenges ahead, that I started making plans for a trekking expedition to what is certainly one of the more remote corners of the planet.
It was a little difficult to know quite where to start my preparations. In contrast to the Himalayas, which seem ever more accessible what with the reporting of Michael Palin and the photography of the Föllmi brothers, it is not since Frances Younghusband and the murky final years of the Great Game that Central Asia has truly been in the British consciousness. Only one reliable modern map, at a scale of 1 : 500000, is available, (although that is the excellent work of Swiss cartographer Marcus Hauser). The dearth of literature on the area meant that it was largely online that I could contact people with experience of mountaineering in the area. In this way I could get some idea of the problems we would likely face – mainly due to the region’s remoteness and the contorted bureaucracy to be overcome – but also of the expansive and challenging mountains that would be the reward. As I started to look into which routes we might explore, I also began to sort out some of the numerous documents I had to get hold of. Tajik visas for myself and my travelling companion, Conrad von Stempel, had to be sent for along with expensive GBAO permits – from the Viennese embassy – as well as visas for Kyrgyzstan, to where the oblast’s only road exits. My overland route to the country also required Russian, Kazakhstani, and Uzbekstani visas, making for a very hectic few weeks commuting between London embassies.
We overcame these problems, and a few weeks later I finally met Conrad at Dushanbe Airport, early on the morning of 9 August. It had already been a long journey for me. I had travelled by air, train, road, and cattle-truck, over fields, steppe and desert, via the ruined Aral Sea and magnificent Silk Road cities. Dushanbe itself was however a sleepy city; it kept us only long enough to register with the relevant authorities (amusingly always referred to as the KGB) and organise transport, before moving onto to Khorog, administrative capital of the GBAO.
A view into the GBAO at the Kyrgyz border
We travelled in the back of a jeep stuffed very full of large Tajik women; 20-hours on an impossibly pot-holed road took us from deserts stretching back to the Caspian Sea along the rocky Pyanj Valley and the border with Afghanistan – across which we saw only donkeys on a dust path. However, when we arrived in the middle of a dark night in Khorog, to a friendly welcome at the Pamir Lodge guesthouse, we felt relieved and excited finally to be within striking distance of the peaks of the Pamirs.
What differentiates the Pamirs from the hundreds of miles of mountains extending away from them is primarily the culture of its inhabitants, the Pamiris. They are not a numerous people, living mainly in villages scattered along the river valleys of the region, and leading a way of life largely unchanged over centuries. In summer, shepherds move up to high pastures, grazing flocks on the grass and shrubs that grow only a few months each year.
The Pamiris definitely see themselves as a being of a different ethnicity from the neighbouring Tajiks – in 1992, during the Civil War, the GBAO went so far as to briefly declare independence. Despite ancient roots in Zoroastrianism, Pamiris adhere to Ismailism, a branch of Shi’a Islam. They revere as their spiritual leader the Swiss-born, multi-millionaire, fourth Aga Khan, and his image inspires respect akin to that of the Dalai Lama among Tibetan Buddhists. However, he is not a removed figure, but rather vital to the lives of many Pamiris; he provides money, and gives a great deal of assistance in feeding the population and improving the quality of life of the Pamiris.
A local lady near Yashil-Kul
It is noteworthy that great linguistic diversity is to be found amongst the Pamiri people. (Their languages are regarded by a consensus of linguists as being separate to Tajik, further explaining their separate identity to their fellow Tajikstanis in Dushanbe.) Mutually unintelligible languages are spoken in the different valleys of the Pamirs: the Shugni speakers of Khorog cannot understand the Wakhi of their neighbours 100km down the road in Ishkashim (let alone the Kyrgyz spoken a couple of hundred miles further on).
However, the characteristic of the Pamiris which without doubt left the deepest impression upon me was their unbelievable hospitality. For the entirety of the month we spent in the area we were made to feel not like explorers or travellers, certainly not tourists, but guests. It is hard to know whether this was due to the influence of Ismailism, our own novelty as Westerners, or human nature as yet unaffected by a globalising world. Yet we were repeatedly invited into homes, from relatively comfortable traditional Pamiri houses to the most basic of huts; without any payment expected we would be offered at least tea, more often than not bread or biscuits, and on plenty of occasions a meal and overnight lodgings. What struck me was how this welcome was absolutely natural: homes were opened to us without a moment’s consideration, and we felt totally at ease.
Thus Conrad and I found ourselves looked after in the guesthouse in Khorog. Once just a village nestling in a side-valley of the Pyanj, with a view of Afghanistan, this town grew abruptly when the Soviets made it the GBAO’s capital. It is a place of little interest – the world’s second highest botanical gardens notwithstanding – yet we found there a comfortable base to return to; after a couple of days of acclimatisation we filled our bags with supplies from the bazaar and set off on our first trek.
Wanting a simple route the first time we were going to be at altitude, we elected to cross the pass from Khidorjev in the Roshtkala Valley to Nishusp in the Ishkashim Valley. We had been recommended the path’s beautiful scenery, and had been told that we might not be too late in the season to find a family of shepherds staying below the pass. A short taxi-ride from Khorog took us to Khidorjev. We were sorry to turn down an old lady’s invitation to tea, before starting up the mountain, delighted that we were at last trekking in this mighty range.
The walk up was relatively straightforward, taking us through a narrow green valley containing a surprisingly fast-flowing little stream. In such a rarely visited valley, we just had to make sure not to lose our often-invisible path, as we had no intention of getting ourselves in a position where we would need to ford the stream. As the pass was hidden by the valley’s many bends, it was hard to gauge our progress, and so we pressed on at quite a pace; around 4:00 pm we were surprised to see people below us, and realised that we had actually climbed a little above the home of the shepherds, who were beckoning us down to them. After the briefest of greetings we were being helped to take off out bags and rushed into their house.
On the track near Rivak
We were straightaway presented with bread and delicious freshly made butter – appreciated after our first day of walking with somewhat poorly packed bags, which were heavier than they might have been. Before long, bowls had appeared with a whole variety of milk products from the herds of sheep and goats: yoghurt, curd, and a kind of buttercream. We spent some time chatting in some very broken Russian – theirs was hardly better than ours – and a very few words of Shugni which we had picked up in Khorog. As they returned from the day’s work we met the family’s four children and their parents, whose sun burnt faces looked too old for their toddler’s ages.
After a little while we were offered seer choi, a kind of milk tea that is a Pamiri speciality. Although at first pleased to see our first milk tea since England, it was quite hard to stomach the weak tea, heavily flavoured with pungent sheep’s milk, usually mixed with gelatinous ghee, and sometimes even with stale bread… (It bore quite a resemblance to Tibetan butter tea in its flavour and the way that cups were refilled without one noticing – apart from the fact the while the Tibetans drink their tea in quite small cups, the Pamiris use big bowls!)
We did wonder at how the shepherds managed on such a poor diet of bread and dairy products, with vegetables and meat added only occasionally, after a trip to the village or the death of an animal. Sitting in their home we also appreciated how poor the really were. The house was built of rocks, mud and dried manure, contained only two rooms, some ripped plastic sheeting served as a roof. We sat on worn wool carpets and were lit only by a gas lamp; in this context, the hospitality that was received was all the more overwhelming. We did not know how best to repay the shepherds – they were most unwilling to accept money, and it almost seemed to undermine the selfless nature of their generosity. The best compromise that we could find was to give them a recent photo of the Aga Khan – they were thrilled to receive this, straightaway kissing it and putting it on their wall: practically the only decoration in the room. Eventually we left the house to set up our camp; just before we went to sleep we were amazed to see the parents of the family walking across to us, bringing us yet more bowls of butter and cream, a totally unexpected and incredible gesture.
In the morning we were once again treated to our hosts’ hospitality. Over more seer choi we discussed the route we should take over the pass to Nishusp. The father explained that we could go either to the left or the right of the nearby hill. We chose the former option, which was apparently slightly easier, and set off, saying a grateful goodbye to the shepherds. Having already climbed 1500m from Khidorjev, itself at 2200m, the pass was still 500m above us, and the higher altitude made the going a little harder. Our start had been later than we would have liked and we found ourselves rushing for the pass; unfortunately we ended up not going to the left or right of the hill, but rather straight over it!
The shepherd who guided us over the pass
After a couple of ridges which revealed not the Ishkashim valley below but more climbing to be done, we found ourselves in sight of what we were quite sure was the pass, but on a field of rather unstable, refrigerator-sized rocks. We edged cautiously across this for nearly half an hour, before a shepherd we had seen in the valley below shouted to us to come down off the scree. In our efforts not to lose any height en route to the pass we had in fact cost ourselves time and energy, as well as putting ourselves at unnecessary risk on the boulders. However, once we reached the friendly shepherd – and were treated to some fresh milk – he took us up what was now a simple route to the top. It was a pleasure to cross the long and wide pass, with a strong and cooling wind in the intense sun, views of Lake Shiva across in Afghanistan, and accompanied by our Pamiri guide.
Having come to the end of the pass we said goodbye to the shepherd and started our descent. It was by now afternoon; although we had decided to aim not for Nishusp but the more nearby village of Push we still had approximately 2000 vertical metres to cover. Around 2:30 we had tea with a shepherd called Sultan, a slower undertaking than we had anticipated, as he had to stoke a fire for his kettle. We asked Sultan how long the walk to Pish would take; he answered that for him it was three hours, but that for us, with our bags and smaller lungs it would take five – maybe six! Now we continued down at a much faster pace, with just enough time to enjoy the green valley and views of Afghanistan. Come 6:00 we were pleased – and surprised – to find ourselves coming around a bend in the stream, and suddenly back on the main Pyanj Valley. We had reached the road back to Khorog, and the conclusion to a fine first trek.
We rested for a couple of days in Khorog, enjoying hospitality which had in fact begun even while we were trying to flag down a lift back from Pish: we were kindly gifted a bag of fragrant fresh apricots by a lady who lived nearby. Back in Pamir Lodge we set about selecting the next route to tackle. We were looking for something longer and more challenging, and decided on the route from Rivak, a village in the Ghunt Valley, to Nimoth, in the Roshtkala Valley. This would take us through varied scenery, past a high-altitude lake, and over a challenging pass. Hiring a guide because of the remoteness and potential difficulty of the trek, we set off early one morning for Rivak.
The valley near Rivak Kul
Our first day’s walking took us along a Russian jeep track, unfortunately fallen into a state of disrepair. We made steady progress, and passed on our way springs of iron-rich, curiously fizzy water. In the afternoon we walked through a village set in fertile fields, and were happy to be treated by picnicking locals to a share of their tea and juicy watermelon! We camped at a lovely spot where a deep stream emerged from the hillside, and the next day continued up the valley.
We were aiming for a point beneath the lake, where there was a shepherds’ camp that we reached by early afternoon. Once again we were straightaway afforded amazing hospitality without question. We were encouraged throughout the afternoon and evening to share all the food and drink that the two families living there had to offer. Again we were able to show a degree of our thanks with a photo of the Aga Khan – received with the same delight. (We also had a go at churning milk by hand – a surprisingly hard task at which both Conrad and I were easily out-muscled by the shepherdesses!) Having set up camp we were able to scramble over the terminal moraine just above the shepherds’ home for a swim and wash in the glacial Rivak-Kul Lake that lay just beyond. Not everybody is a fan of swimming in water at 10°C, but I find it very refreshing!
I particularly remember our atmospheric meal that evening in the shepherds’ house. we sat together, talking and joking, with the starry sky visible outside; we drank delicious hot milk, before retiring for the night. The next morning we were delighted to be able to pay the shepherds, with money and excess supplies, for some dried milk cakes we received from them (definitely one of the least pleasant things either of us had ever tasted) and once more said a fond goodbye, joking that we hoped not to be seeing them again on this particular trip!
The shepherds that hosted us in the Rivak Valley
This, our third day walking, was more challenging. Having passed above the lake in the morning, our progress started to slow, as the path climbed and became hard to follow – our guide did not know the route nearly as well as he had led us to believe – and we had to cross many unstable and tricky boulder-fields, demanding both for our concentration and on our ankles. Also, the valley here was wide and straight, so that by the end of quite a long and tough day, we were frustratingly still in sight of the lake. Furthermore, our guide had been telling us for the past couple of days about the (immeasurable) danger of nocturnal bears. Not being sure whether or not he was being reasonable, we chose to err on the side of caution, and found ourselves following his recommendation to get up in rotation throughout the night, to tend an anti-bear fire.
After the rigours of the previous day and an interrupted night’s sleep, we were not 100% fresh the next morning. We had always envisaged the fourth day as being the longest and hardest – we aimed to climb up and over the pass, and to continue a good part of the distance on to Nimoth. And so we were walking by 6:45, making fast progress along the banks of the river. After a couple of hours we could see the head of the valley in front of us, an impressive sight: there was a massive ridge, about 2km across, covered in snow, save some sharp protruding rocks. We did not know which side of the ridge to try and tackle – our map was not very clear, but seemed to favour the right-hand approach, while our guide vaguely favoured the left-hand side. However, as the right-hand side appeared both the least steep and the least snowy, we headed in that direction.
Taking a dip in Rivak Kul
We spent several hours on an increasingly difficult climb. We were now above several tongues of ice and as we approached 5000m were ever more aware of the lack of oxygen – whilst on the far side of the valley a serac spewed forth intermittent small avalanches, with an ominous rumble. We were also walking almost exclusively on boulder-fields; in contrast to the secure rocks in the riverbed down-valley, these car-sized monsters were very finely balanced and quite ready to clunk over to one side if we stepped on them in the wrong way.
After what seemed like an age we neared what must be the final ridge, perhaps 100m away at the top of a difficult scree. It took us some 25 minutes to climb it; our guide meanwhile peered through what we thought could be the pass – we were disappointed to hear that it led back to the valley we had come up. With the sun high in the sky – causing one or two more avalanches across the way – and having walked some six hours already that day, we were now tired. We were also no longer sure whether we would in fact find a way down to the Roshtkala Valley at all.
A brief rest during our ascent of the Rivak Valley
While Conrad and the guide rested a little, I scouted out a possible route over a rocky promontory. This did indeed offer a way of into the next valley, but I was dismayed to see that the other side was covered in thick snow and ice, terrain that we simply did not have the equipment or experience to cross. Conrad and our guide next set off across a small patch of snow to investigate another possible way. While they were out of earshot and I considered what best to do, the serac that had been slowly crumbling for hours totally collapsed. It caused a huge avalanche, a frightening sight to behold. This acted for me as a confirmation of the fact that although in our current position we still felt safe – and I believe that we were – it would have been all too easy to put ourselves into a potentially very dangerous position.
When the other two returned, Conrad having had an alarming slip in the snow, we had no great difficulty in deciding to give up on the pass and turn back on ourselves – despite our guide’s protestations that we could continue on to Nimoth without problem, and would in fact be foolish not to do so. Although certainly not disappointed in ourselves for making this decision, we were a little dejected as we headed back the way we came, aware that we still needed to cover a large distance in order to reach a suitable campsite. As we were also worn out, we had to go especially carefully as we descended such an unstable route: on several occasions we had to warn one another of rocks we had sent tumbling down the slope. That night we camped higher than the previous night – having hoped by that time to be approaching Nimoth.
In turning back we had accepted that we would almost certainly be on our trek for an extra day, and as we rose on our fifth day, after another night interrupted by bear-fires, I thought we should probably spend the night at the shepherds’ once more, before returning to Rivak the next day. However, after breakfast and another 7:00 start, we were soon in sight of the lake again. Reaching it within a couple of hours we met one of the shepherds and his daughters, looking for a lost cow. They were surprised and perhaps a little amused to see us again, but accompanied us back to their home, where we were once more treated with just the same hospitality. Nonetheless, after lunch it was still only 1:00, so we decided no to overnight there, but rather to push on down the valley.
We were no longer at altitude, and were now descending on easier terrain. With the much greener scenery of the lower valley, our spirits were raised once more. Around 4:00 we reached our first campsite, and on realising that we could in fact reach Rivak that day resolved absolutely to do so. We returned quickly, our spirits really lifted as the town and road came into view. During our final hour’s approach we were amazed to receive no fewer than 12 invites to tea, which really came from every single person we encountered. We finally reached the village with feelings of great satisfaction and relief, for despite not completing our planned route, we had made a great effort and enjoyed a fantastic trek. We were also glad that we had made the correct decision regarding the pass: not to play with fire at 5000m.
Khakha Fort, Wakhan Valley
After this trek we wanted a good physical and mental rest. After a little time relaxing in Khorog we spent some days exploring the Tajik side of the superbly remote Wakhan Valley, shared with Afghanistan. This visit was a delight; we enjoyed beautiful views of the Hindu Kush, stunning hot springs, Zoroastrian shrines, Silk Road forts and even a brief foray over the border to the weekly Afghan market!
Yet soon the mountains were calling once more, and so we set about preparing for a third and final trek. Wanting a more reliable path we chose to follow the Alichur Valley past Yashil-Kul, the Green Lake – definitely going without a guide. Saying a warm farewell to our hosts in Khorog, we rode along the Pamir Highway as far as the village of Alichur, from where we in fact planned to trek back in the direction of Khorog, before continuing along the highway east to Kyrgyzstan. En route to Alichur we crossed the Ak-Baital Pass into the ethnically Kyrgyz Murghab region of the GBAO, and even from the little time we spent in Alichur the cultural change was quite apparent. Faces looked more east Asian, the language spoken was of course Kyrgyz, and – perhaps most noticeably – all the men wore not skullcaps, but towering white-felt Kyrgyz caps.
A Kyrgyz-style tea break
After a night spent in the home of the town’s English teacher, we started walking west, following the windings of the River Alichur. This was a beautiful route, in very different scenery to that of our previous treks – we were now on the expansive, almost lunar landscape of the Murghab Plateau, with panoramas reaching as far as Muztagh Ata in Xinjiang. On approaching a small hill that we had to cross, we suddenly saw our first Kyrgyz yurt, somehow camouflaged against the rock. The owners were just as willing to welcome us as the Pamiris, and we were once again treated to effusive hospitality – we received tea, bread, butter, and on this occasion also had noodles cooked in our honour. We were extremely fortunate to be invited into such a home: a traditional yurt, which is a portable yet sturdy and well-insulated dwelling. Its interior was beautiful, with trellis wooden walls, while a decorated hole in the roof allowed convection currents to regulate the heat, and tens of colourful felt carpets were strewn from the walls. Frustratingly these people spoke almost no Russian, and certainly no Shugni, and so our conversation was limited; it was however fascinating to meet them, and when we left the father of the house absolutely refused any payment.
That evening, having made good progress and knowing that we were near the lake, we found a tranquil spot near the river to camp. Setting up camp and cooking dinner we enjoyed our wonderful solitude, travelling alone and wholly independent, carrying everything we needed on our backs. We were out in an enchanting landscape under an unlit sky, and in absolute silence save for the flow of the river.
The River Alichur’s lazy meanders
By now we had happily settled into the advantageous routine of sleeping and waking with the light – we were generally in bed by 7:30, so that we could rise by 6:00 and be walking an hour later. It was therefore early the next morning that we passed the ruins of a 12th century caravanserai. This was testament to the fact that this gentle valley was for hundreds of years the main route through the region, until it was bypassed in 1934 by the construction of the Pamir Highway over the Ak-Baital Pass. We spent most of the day walking above the beautiful Yashil-Kul, fording a couple of its tributaries, and taking the opportunity to go for a swim – again an enlivening experience! The day’s trek was glorious but some 35km, and we were a little tired by the time we had to climb a few hundred metres to cross the lake’s natural dam. Descending once more we camped in a grassy spot by the bank of the river, now called the Ghunt, and much deeper and faster after its exit from the lake. We knew we had to cross it at some point soon, and had heard tell of an old Russian cage crossing, but we could not see it and elected to solve the problem in the morning.
After a good sleep we set off to find the cage, in fact hidden a little way upstream; the river here was about 15m wide, a metre deep, and rather fast flowing. Suspended over it were two metal cables, and hanging in the middle of these was our cage – rickety, rusting, and floating right over the middle of the river. Although I was not sure quite what to make of this, I must pay tribute to Conrad: without hesitation he stripped down to his underwear, jumped up onto the cables, and pulled himself across the cables to the cage; he then jumped on to the frame and manoeuvred it back to the bank, an impressive effort!
Conrad swings out to the cage over the River Ghunt
We decided to send our bags over first; we attached them with bungee cords, straps, and shoelaces (having first tightened the many loose screws on the contraption) before Conrad took them over the river. I was to cross with him last of all, and the cage’s un-reinforced joints seemed under great strain as it carried our combined weight over the river – yet it held, in fact serving our purpose very well.
We continued for several hours along this high river valley; the scenery became ever greener, and we were lucky to spot Lammergeier vultures flying above us before we reached Batchor, a picturesque village set amidst fields of potatoes and grazing livestock. The first house we reached was in traditional Pamiri style – for we had now crossed back out of Murghab and its Kyrgyz culture – resplendent with a conical haystack on its roof. The owner invited us straight in for tea, and as we had been aiming to spend the night here we happily accepted. Our hostess, a woman called Dulsultan, was perhaps the most impossibly caring and welcoming of everyone we met during our trip. She looked after us constantly, always ensuring that we had enough tea and bread, were sitting comfortably, and she was not even at all offended at our refusal of her proffered seer choi. We were happy to give her one our last remaining photos of the Aga Khan, and she was elated to add it to the ten-year old photo that she had on display. We were invited to stay the night and pleased to accept. Dulsultan’s home seemed like a kind of communal centre, with neighbours constantly popping in and out – this chance to meet so many locals was fascinating and enjoyable; we also enjoyed joining in with a village volleyball game!
Dulsultan, probably the ultimate hostess
However, when we re-entered the house for dinner we were struck by how absolutely basic a lodging it really was. Batchor is only some 25km from the Pamir Highway, the main road from one end of Tajikistan to the other, yet the house was built just of stone, mud, and wooden pillars, with a single lifeless electric bulb replaced by the wood- and manure-burning stove. I asked myself what the arrival of the twenty-first century could mean to Dulsultan and her family, living as they were in a medieval house in the year 2007. One of the younger villagers who we talked with over dinner seemed to be scorning such an old-fashioned existence – he was dressed in what was for him the epitome of cool: fake designer labels imported from nearby China by the truckload. However, we were heartened and touched by Dulsultan’s simple welcome, and hoped that modernising change, when it comes, need not alter such wonderful human nature.
The next day we set off on the final day of our trek, hiring a pack-pony from Dulsultan’s son to carry our bags to Shahzud, (we could therefore happily pay both for this and for our stay) from where we would continue by road. After bidding a fond goodbye we followed a jeep-track with our guide and horse, gradually nearing the main road and the long arm of modern civilisation.
Near Ak Baital Pass, on the Pamir Highway from Tajikistan into Kyrgyzstan
Despite its physically less demanding nature, it was on this trek that we had in a way travelled the farthest from our world. As well as yet more stunning scenery, we had experienced hospitality which just is not to be found in our own society; it was as if we had travelled to another world and back again.
From Shahzud we would travel the stunning Pamir Highway, eventually taking us to Osh, a city with ancient roots but a rather ugly modern face. Finally we would reach the Communist blocks and 21st century buildings of Bishkek, from where we would return the long distance to a grey and rainy England, and the continuation of everyday life.
My time in the Pamirs was unforgettable. We were very fortunate to see first-hand the pristine beauty of this wonderful corner of the earth. I also experienced the amazing emotions of independence, excitement and freedom that being in the mountains makes possible. Most of all I felt thankful to the Pamiri people – for their ceaseless sometimes humbling welcome – and privileged to have the opportunity to witness their way of life, so removed from the modern world, high in the majestic mountains of Central Asia.
