Holiday in Pakistan (5): travelling north
The last two days of our trip have been very much travelling days.
On Wednesday, we left our hotel in Lahore and took the M-2 motorway all the way to Islamabad – a journey of 430 kms (about 270 miles). We were supposed to break the journey with two tourist sites.
The first was the Himalayan Salt Mine at Khewra but it was closed due to Eid.Some of the group members were very disappointed by this, but I’ve seen salt mines in Poland and Colombia so I was quite relaxed about the situation.
The second was the Katas Raj Hindu temple complex. The local Hindu community fled the location in 1947 but it remains an important location for Hindus. It is a large complex but we barely spent half an hour there.
Our lunch stop was at Kallar Kahal in the Soon Valley where – in spite of a bit of light rain – we sat outside (under an awning) for our meal and enjoyed the view of the lake.
Before entering Islamabad, we drove through the city of Rawalpindi, just to obtain a quick appreciation of it. Rawalpindi is the older and larger sister city of Islamabad which is very close by. It is the fourth most populous city in the country with a population of over 2 million. It houses the headquarters of the Pakistani military.
We arrived at our hotel in Islamabad at 5.15 pm. Islamabad is the capital city of the country, although it only has the ninth largest population (1.2 million). The capital used to be Karachi, but it was moved in 1967. Our accommodation – the five-star Serena Hotel – was amazing, but we had dinner out at a huge, sprawling restaurant where there was a multitude of joyous families celebrating Eid.
On Thursday, we had a very early start: alarm at 5.30 am, breakfast at 6.30 am, and departure at 7 am. This was because we had an early flight from Islamabad north to Skardu. It was a short flight (half an hour) but the views were breathtaking; huge, snow-capped mountains. We were now at an elevation of 2,250 metres (7,400 feet) so we had to wear warmer clothing. We were met by a young local guide called (Mushraq) Ali.
We made a quick visit to the Satpara Lake before having lunch in the dusty little town of Skardu overlooked by the mountains. Them we took a basic, single-lane, mountain-side road all the way eastwards through the Khapu Valley to our next hotel. It took us four hours, but we had a few stops to take photographs of the amazing scenery and to relieve ourselves behind suitable rocks.
Our accommodation was fabulous: the Serena Khaplu Palace Hotel – first built in 1840 and a former royal residence. We were now at an elevation of 2,660 metres (8,700 feet). The night was cold.