The Pamir Highway: Driving into Tajikistan’s Wild East
It cost us three bottles of vodka, a sack of milk powder and 100 somoni (£9) to get into Tajikistan.
Our driver, Oman, handled the negotiations. Two guards were prising open the wheel of the car in front, but they weren’t in the least interested in us: tourists gnawing on Russian cheese strings in a 4x4 with a smashed-in boot.
We’d seen Oman stashing the vodka under our rucksacks and just hoped it wasn’t his favourite breakfast tipple. But it was a surprise when he also heaved a sack full of white powder from under our bags, and dragged it into the shipping container cum customs checkpoint.
He crosses this border every week, so the guards might be mates who really like White Russians and asked Oman to buy vodka and a sack of milk powder because they were running low. Then again, he was the only one doing the reimbursing; he didn’t look happy when he returned to fetch 100 somoni from the glove compartment.
Most foreigners we met on the road forked out around $10 per vehicle at each of the three Tajik checkpoints. The arbitrary reasons included an $8 “hygiene test” in which soapy water is sprayed on a wheel.
Two Brits also had their Johnny Walker confiscated because alcohol isn’t allowed into Tajikistan, or so they were told. They promptly confessed to having a bottle of vodka as well, but the guards weren’t interested in that, possibly because Oman had just replenished their liquor cabinet.
Only the cyclists didn’t have to put their hands in their pockets. Maybe the guards admire their stamina; the bleak no man’s land between the Kyrgz and Tajik border controls includes the 4336m Kizil Art Pass, which was a river of red mud when we went through. Or else they feel sorry for them: they must be very poor or quite mad to brave the Pamir Highway on a bike. (Here’s one of the passes on the Kyrgyz side – paved but still pretty tough on two wheels.)
We came across a surprising number of cyclists and felt ashamed that we had taken the easy option – and very glad when we saw them slogging up the passes. We shared the cost of a 4x4 and driver with an Austrian couple we met in Osh, the starting point for our eight-day road trip. (Chris is a photographer – I’ll post a link to his website when he uploads his Pamir pictures. My poor photography doesn’t do the landscape justice.)
As well as a Tajik visa, you need a permit to travel through eastern Tajikistan – the province of Gorno-Badakhshan – which makes up almost half of the country’s territory but is home to only 5% of the population. The Pamir Highway snakes through its high mountain passes and was built by Soviet military engineers in the 30s, who were enviously observed by British spies. 80 years on, large swathes are still unpaved or pocked with cavernous potholes.
So why are foreigners eager to travel this bumpy, lonely road? Well, because it feels like you’ve landed on another planet – a bleakly beautiful universe of empty plains and mountains of every flavour, from snow-capped Alpine peaks to Spaghetti Western-worthy terracotta crags to stark mineral spires.
After Oman had paid off the guards at the Kizil Art border, we descended into a stony grey moonscape. Soviet road aside, man’s only incursion was a sinister two and a half metre-high Chinese border fence.
For miles there was no sign of life or colour apart from our Nissan Patrol. Even the sky had vanished under leaden cloud. By the time we reached the vast salt lake of Kara-Kul, the mountains had turned a moody purple. Where they ended, flat nothingness began: a desert of sand, stone, ochre grass and red seaweed.
Kara-Kul was created by a meteor impact 10 million years ago and the name is Kyrgyz for “black lake”. Clinging to one end – so small and squat it was easy to miss – was the village of Karakul. (Squint and you can just about make it out in the shadow of the mountain below.)
The village was as eerie as its otherworldly location. Matt and I barely spied a soul as we wandered around one-storey mud-brick houses and mysterious rusty tanks, trying to get to the shore – a beach of grey sand and boulders, encrusted with salt.
The real oasis turned out to be our B&B: Homestay Sadat. The remote villages of eastern Gorno-Badakhshan don’t have running water, mains electricity or grocery stores, but that doesn’t dampen the age-old tradition of hospitality. Pamiris have been looking after European travellers since Marco Polo ventured here in the 13th century and are incredibly generous – they would go without rather than refuse a guest.
Karakul sits at 3900m so we were grateful to get into the warmth where our gentle hostess, Nigiri, rustled up afternoon tea: a new loaf, homemade jams and a beautiful porcelain teapot with matching bowls. Dinner was veggie pasta. It’s rare to get a meat-free meal in Central Asia, except here where even mutton is a luxury. (No matter whose name was painted over the door, we were fed and looked after by women – but at least our money went directly into their pockets.)
The scrappy, impoverished villages scattered across the eastern Pamirs are all Kyrgyz. Their nomadic ancestors used to migrate to these high-altitude pastures in summer to fatten their herds, but they were collectivised and permanently settled under the Soviets.
We slept on mats in a room that was gloriously toasty thanks to a dung-burning stove and colourful carpets on the walls and floor. There was even a hot shower: an outhouse-sauna with two tanks of water – one scalding, one icy – and tin cups to use as ladles.
The next morning, we awoke to a white planet – two inches of snow had fallen overnight. Matt and I were delighted; the Austrians were less impressed.
Karakul was less creepy dusted with snow. The whole village seemed to be out to survey it and the children next door were busy building some kind of snow creature.
During the long winter, the lake freezes over and the temperature drops to minus 20. The tourists are long gone by then. I can’t imagine how brutal those months must be without central heating, double-glazing or an indoor bathroom.
By 9.30am, the sun had burned away the curtain of cloud cloaking the mountains, so we set off without snow tyres for the Pamir Highway’s highest point – the 4655m Ak-Baital Pass. Oman instinctively swerved the worst potholes, but occasionally forgot one and the car was showered with shards of ice.
Cost of 4x4 and driver for eight days: $929 (split between four)
Cost of a homestay: $15 for dinner, bed and breakfast
Souvenir shops visited: zero
*If you’re tempted (and why wouldn’t you be?) check out Caravanistan’s comprehensive guide to the Pamir Highway. It’s a brilliant resource for Silk Road/Central Asia trips.
