From Islamabad I headed north on a road trip with the goal of seeing Pakistan’s Karakoram Mountains. The roads started off reasonably good, but driving in northern Pakistan was an adventure of its own. I regularly saw buses, trucks, and jeeps carrying incredible numbers of passengers and luggage. The vehicle above was so packed that I couldn’t believe everyone managed to stay aboard.
Heading North Through Abbottabad
On the way north I passed through Abbottabad, a mountain city that became internationally famous after Osama bin Laden was found and killed there during a United States military operation in 2011. By the time of my visit, that event had made the city’s name recognizable around the world, although for me Abbottabad was simply one stop on the long drive toward the mountains. Above are a military facility and one of the signs I photographed while passing through the area. :contentReference[oaicite:1]{index=1}
One unexpected sight along the highway was the number of beekeepers. For hours north of Islamabad I passed rows of bee boxes beside the road, and during a breakfast stop I was able to try some locally produced honey. Sometimes there were clouds of bees surrounding the boxes. At one point a bee even flew through my open window and spent several minutes causing chaos inside the car before I managed to get it back outside.
As we traveled farther from Islamabad, the cities gradually gave way to smaller settlements and a much more rural landscape. Herding remains part of daily life in many mountain communities, and I frequently saw goats and sheep being moved along the valleys and roads. Above is one of the herders I passed during the drive.
The Indus River
Eventually the road entered much larger and drier mountains and began following the Indus River. The Indus originates on the Tibetan Plateau and flows through Pakistan all the way to the Arabian Sea. In this part of the country the river looked brown and silty, cutting through an extremely dry landscape with very little vegetation along its banks.
Farther downstream, the Indus River system is also home to the endangered Indus River dolphin. It seemed almost impossible to imagine dolphins living in the same river I was watching flow through these barren mountain valleys.
The Karakoram Highway
From Chilas onward I spent several hours traveling along the Karakoram Highway, usually called the KKH. The highway cuts through some of the highest mountain terrain on earth and eventually crosses into China at the Khunjerab Pass, more than 4,600 meters above sea level. Even before reaching elevations that high, the scale of the surrounding mountains made this one of the most spectacular road trips I had ever done.
The Karakoram Highway itself had some intimidating drop-offs, but those were nothing compared with what came next. At one point we switched vehicles and headed directly into the mountains on an extremely narrow jeep road. Had the road not already existed, I would have thought building one across terrain like this was impossible.
Some sections traversed slopes so steep that the road appeared to be hanging from the side of the mountain. In places the outer edge seemed to be supported by little more than stacked rock, with enormous drops immediately below. Looking down, there were sections where I couldn’t even see the mountainside beneath the jeep, only the valley far below. This was easily one of the most intimidating roads I had ever traveled.
Hiking Toward Fairy Meadows
Eventually the jeep road ended and the rest of the journey had to be completed on foot. For some reason I decided this was the perfect opportunity to punish myself for eating poorly and not exercising enough back home, so I carried all of my belongings myself—about 60 pounds. Between the heavy pack, steep trail, altitude, and lack of acclimatization, the hike quickly became a serious workout.
The trail was dry, dusty, and almost continuously uphill. Then, after roughly 90 minutes, the landscape changed with almost no warning. The hot barren terrain gave way to a high-altitude forest filled with evergreens, flowing water, and much cooler air. The cabin above stood near a stream close to the entrance of the forest.
Into the High Mountains
From camp I did another hike the following day and climbed to close to 4,000 meters, or roughly 13,000 feet. Even at that altitude the surrounding peaks towered thousands of meters above me. Looking back, I could see the forest and canyon I had climbed through, while ahead were enormous glaciated mountains filling the horizon.
Every so often I could hear deep cracking sounds echoing through the valley as ice shifted somewhere high above. Against the silence of the mountains, the noise was surprisingly powerful and made the scale of the glaciers around me feel even more dramatic.
The mountain dominating everything around me was Nanga Parbat. At 8,126 meters, or 26,660 feet, it is the ninth-highest mountain on earth and one of the world’s fourteen peaks above 8,000 meters. Even from far below, its scale was almost difficult to comprehend.
Nanga Parbat has a long and serious mountaineering history, with enormous relief, steep faces, glaciers, avalanches, and rapidly changing weather making it a major expedition objective. The photo on the right shows a closer view of one of the heavily glaciated sections of the mountain.
Fairy Meadows
After hiking through the forest I finally reached Fairy Meadows, a high-altitude grassland with cabins scattered beneath the enormous mountains. Nanga Parbat rises directly above the meadows, giving this relatively peaceful place one of the most dramatic mountain backdrops I have ever seen.
The people I met in the area were generally friendly, although not everyone wanted to be photographed, which I tried to respect. That was a good reminder that even somewhere visited by travelers, these are still real communities rather than simply scenery along a trekking route. :contentReference[oaicite:2]{index=2}
These photographs were taken around the mountain communities and trails near Fairy Meadows. Spending time here was one of the most memorable parts of my Pakistan trip because the scenery was spectacular without feeling separated from everyday life. People lived, worked, herded animals, and traveled through an environment that to me felt like a remote expedition destination.
I didn’t encounter much wildlife during the trek beyond birds and a small mouse, but the alpine flowers were impossible to miss. Even above 3,000 meters, the meadows were covered with colorful plants during the summer. Considering how harsh the winters can be at this altitude, it was impressive to see how much life returned during the short warmer season.
Northern Pakistan ended up being one of the highlights of my entire trip through the country. The journey alone was an adventure: crowded highways, the Indus River, the Karakoram Highway, an intimidating jeep road, and then a steep hike into the mountains. Reaching Fairy Meadows and standing beneath Nanga Parbat made all of it worthwhile. Even after traveling through many mountain ranges around the world, the scale of the Karakoram and Himalaya in Pakistan was something completely different.
