A Stairway to Heaven

The world is full of beauty. I believe in this fact with all my heart, and that prompted me to visit Gilgit-Baltistan sometime ago. On my way to Hunza, I was a bit nervous and quite excited as well, because I had heard about the place only but was unable to visit.. If you haven’t seen a place and only heard about it, you make an image in your mind. I wanted Gilgit-Baltistan to be as beautiful as I imagined it to be. The road to Hunza was never-ending, and the view was breath-taking. 

Me and my colleagues reached Gilgit Baltistan after a never-ending road, tired… yet happy. Peace overlaps you as soon as you arrive. Night fell, and our host took us to the Osho Thang in Minapin Nagar. Minapin is a stunning valley along the Karakoram highway which is also home to many marvelous mountain ranges. Osho Thang, a hotel known for their hospitality and scenic view as well as traditional architecture and décor. Osho Thang literally means “royal guest house” in the Burushaski language. The place has several gardens, full of cherry trees. The walls of the corridor have a gallery and history of the hotel as well as the pictures of visitors who stayed there, are on display. There are yurts (a portable, round tent) by the garden, which are delicately trimmed. The dining hall is huge and beautifully adorned in traditional decorations, and relics and paintings on display. They only serve local dishes; each dish is to die for. There’s an entire block dedicated to the legendary writer Mustanser Hussain Tarrar. Rooms of the hotel are named after his books. After dinner, we took a little stroll in the stunning garden.

A more dopamine-inducing experience in Nagar is to ride on a four-wheel jeep from Minapin, deep into the mountains with an amazing view of the surrounding peaks and for a full range of Mount Rakaposhi stretching to an awesome length of about 20 kilometers. Next day, we headed towards Mount Rakaposhi base viewpoint in a jeep. Higher the elevation, more beautiful and scenic our journey got. Ultar Peak (7388m), Ladyfinger Peak (6000m) and other mountains continued to mesmerize us as we went deeper into Hunza.

The sun poured it’s yellow-ish light upon the valley. Under the sun, the valley reflected shades of gold, ruby and emerald. Throughout the trip, we often mingled with nature, watched, and witnessed the simple lifestyle of the locals: children going to school, adults mending the roof, in the fields too, extracting food.

Burushaski and Shina are spoken by the residents of Nagar. The people are simple, kind and friendly. Main source of living is tourism and farming, despite that, people also love mountaineering, adventure-tourism, transport, and some of them are tour guides. These people value education, art, mining, livestock, and organic food.

After two days, we left for Khunjerab Pass: the world's highest frontier located between the borders between Pakistan and China. On our way there, we came across the beautiful Attabad Lake. Due to a massive landslide Attabad Lake was formed. Several villages vanished forever. It changed the landscape for good.

The peculiar metallic blue color of the lake leaves you in awe. The surface of the lake looked more like a huge mirror and reflected mountains, plains, and your reflection. We took a boat ride and while boating, I pondered upon the tragedy, which resulted in the formation of this beautiful lake and the fact that, how tragedies can bring about hope. This lake is one of the most important tourist attractions and provides livelihood for many. 

After a while we left the lake behind and then came across Passu cones, A dozen narrow peaks positioned side by side as if they were ready to embrace you. Traveling from Passu to Sost is so fulfilling, it feels like Mother Nature wants to connect with you, leaving many questions. If one truly seeks answers, one should submit and surrender before it. Trees, fields, clouds, snow-capped peaks, clear-blue-sky, and tangled twists and turns... few more turns to reach the border. A magnificent snow-capped peak rose over the border. Temperature got lower as we went upwards. Khunjerab is present at a height of more than 15,000 feet and at such high altitude it gets a bit hard to breathe. My colleagues experienced breath-shortness, but I was fine.

We reached there and it snowed; it felt like the movies. The border side is somehow simple with a check post, commemorative stones, and the world’s highest ATM. We walked towards the gate that separates Pakistan and China and waved to the Chinese citizens present on the other side.

We stayed there for two hours and went back to Hunza, after that our return to Islamabad was due. It was finally time to say goodbye to this heavenly place. I felt emotional on my way home. The trip preserved so many good memories to cherish for years to come!