Near Death Illegality

I've been procrastinating on the blog front for a while... a number of factors have influenced this:
1. Was trying to upload my photos so that you could marvel at these while my written commentary astounds you...
2. The Internet has either been unbelievably slow or not present at all
3. I've been doing too much shit and haven't been bothered.

However, you'll be glad to hear that I'm currently sitting in front of a computer with acceptably fast Internet and have therefore decided to grace your screens with a short monologue. Unfortunately I still can't upload photos so you'll have to wait a few days for these.

Last week, the five of us joined three other solo travellers and embarked on a climb to the base camp of Rakaposhi Mountain. I have to admit that it was the first thing that I've done in a while which has really put me out of my comfort zone.

On day 1 we started our trek with a leisurely stroll through Minapin village (and it's marijuana plants). The pace and incline belied what was to come and we were relaxed as we waved at the gawking kids we passed. After about half an hour, we came to a river and things started getting more challenging. For about an hour we walked zig-zag up a rocky pass which eventually opened up to a grassy plateau. The incline was still considerable and we slowly made our way up the plateau, stopping to have lunch with our donkeys. This was the last time that we were to see our donkeys and porters for some time as we set off ahead of them, the porters assuring us that they would follow closely.

Having left tardy (we had to wait for an extra donkey to come), it was getting quite late now and at about three o'clock in the afternoon, we moved off the plateau and up across a near vertical mountain face. For four hours we plodded one foot in front of the other following our guide. It was the most difficult walk that I've ever done. Not only was the incline very substantial but once the sun went behind the mountain, the wind turned icy cold. By six o'clock we had passed the snowline and were trudging through snow with darkness falling quickly. The majority of us had left our jackets with the donkeys assuming that things wouldn't get too cold but we were wrong. After several episodes of my legs seizing up, only being spurred on by the knowledge that to stay in one place would result in frostbite, we eventually arrived at the Rakaposhi base camp, each of us absolutely shattered.

However, what was to make the base camp; cold weather gear, tents, cookers, etc, hadn't actually arrived yet and was imprecisely located somewhere down the mountain behind us on our dangerously overladen donkeys. It was dark now and the cold was biting. We had no jackets, gloves or hats, some of us were only in t-shirts. We started a fire with a few pieces of wood left over by the last group of trekkers. Then suddenly one of the porters shouted something in Urdu from the darkness and our guide ran off, leaving the eight of us to battle the elements. This was about seven o'clock. Our fire was small and insufficient against the encroaching cold. Immediately one of the group, Alex, started showing signs of serious cold, which could have escalated to something worse. One of the guys, Alby, acted immediately; taking any spare clothing and anything that could possibly insulate, he wrapped him up, fed him some peanuts and biscuits, literally sat him on the fired and rubbed him up until the colour returned to his face. That was pretty scary and brought the reality of the situation home to us. The fire was slowly going out and we were taking turns to search for firewood, but it was difficult to stay away from the reducing fire for more than a few minutes. Given that we had no torches (they were on the donkeys) and the area was a rocky moraine, any attempts to locate firewood failed miserably. I was getting pretty worried since I couldn't stop shivering myself.

Eventually at nine o'clock the guide, porters and donkeys appeared in the darkness. They were carrying bundles of firewood and had all our cold weather clothes, torches and food. The relief was thick in the air, everyone throwing on every layer of clothing that they had. The guides and porters set up our tents as we thawed out by the fire and after a late dinner jumped into our freezing tents and slept like babies.

The next day the group went on a trek across the Minapin glacier. Myself and two others then called it a day (not wanting to overstretch our aching muscles after the previous days antics) while the rest of the group continued up to a lake. That evening after dinner, it started snowing. At first it was quite light, but the snow got heavier and heavier until we couldn't really sit by the fire any longer. Unfortunately for Alby, Alex and I, we had drawn the short straw with the tents as ours was a summer tent without an outer sheet. By this stage it had a wall of snow creeping up its sides and we weren't going to be able to sleep in it without touching the edges. Ergo we weren't going to be able to sleep in it without getting very wet and cold. The guide had mentioned to us that there was a stone hut on the other side of the base camp. Alby and I decided to check it out and walked the 100ft across the base camp. It was a bit cold and breezy but it was going to keep us dry so we decided to relocate for the night. As soon as we got our stuff from the tent, the snow started to come down in droves and we could only look down and follow our footprints on our way across the base camp to the hut.

Eventually Alby and I arrived at the hut and he started setting up camp while I went back to help Alex find the way. I also grabbed some timber and took some embers from the fire to start our own fire in the hut. Unfortunately, having a fire in the hut meant having the door open to allow the smoke to escape... which was far too breezy, so we forgot about the fire and decided to go to sleep instead. As soon as we had settled down and things got quiet, a noise started to pour out of the walls on all sides... I turned my torch on to find that we were sharing the hut with at least three or four rats. Didn't sleep a wink for the first two hours fretting that I had rats nibbling at my toes, but then we all got too tired and slept for the rest of the night, occasionally waking up to rat noises which I learned to ignore and go back to sleep. It was a mad night altogether.

The next morning, after some brekkie of porridge and scrambled eggs we made our way back down the mountain. It took us a good four hours of fairly treacherous downhill walking to get back to the friendly town of Minapin where we had chips and coke before the jeep took us back to Karimabad.

Sooooo, back in Karimabad, we took it nice and easy for a few days. It's a lovely place. It's located in the Hunza Valley, a fantastic valley through which the Indus river flows. Currently, it's washed in autumnal colours, poplar trees demarcating the vegetation line against a backdrop of high snow-capped peaks over which the sun plays its daily light show. As soon as I can, I'll throw up some pics and you can see for yourselves.

Tom and Anna left our little group of five last week, meaning that it's only myself that's travelling with Alex and Alby now.

Three days ago, we continued up north to a little village called Passu. No phone reception, no Internet, about five people... that kind of place. Passu is the most north that we want to go on the KKH, with the next stop being the Chinese border and Kashgar. Along the route, we saw loads of Chinese workers, givin' it socks, blowing the living bejayzus out of the mountainside. The Chinese are extending and widening the KKH for the Pakistanis (mainly because they want to use it as a trade route).

Up in Passu we did two short treks. The first took about five hours and brought us over two very shaky suspension bridges where there was a wooden slat about every two to three feet and you had to jump from one to the next with the river flowing beneath you. The other trek brought us up to the Passu Glacier. We walked (perhaps quite perilously) right up to the mouth of the glacier, to an ice cave from where a river sprouted. There were huge ice boulders around everywhere and everything was quite unstable. It was just Alby and I and while we were taking pictures of each others in a variety of stupid poses, a huge ice boulder slid down about three feet from Alby's foot. That shocked the shit out of us and we got out of there quicksmart with ice debris falling away beneath our feet. That was the second and final out-of-comfort-zone situation for this particular posting (I'm sure my Mum won't be able to handle any more).

So now that we're back on terra-firma in Karimabad, I rang my mate Helen today. Helen was my flatmate/landlord before I set off on this journey and she's currently in India where we've decided to meet on Sunday (this day week). We're going to meet in Delhi and then jump on a train to Calcutta where she has to open some kind of foundation thingamajig (whatever, she has something to do there and I'm coming along for the ride). So I have to make my way to Delhi within a week and within ten days I'll be in Calcutta, on the other side of the Subcontinent beside Bangladesh. In the next ten days, I have to cover approximately as much ground as I covered in the first three months of the trip, so it's gonna be a lot of trains, buses and taxis for Conor.

I don't know if I've mentioned this yet, but I'm illegal in Pakistan. My visa was good for a journey up until the 20th of October, i.e. one week ago. I would have had my visa extended, which isn't particularly difficult, only I forgot my passport in Lahore. Aha, I hear you say... that's a pertinent fact which I have happily omitted for some time now. The fact is that I forgot my passport in the hostel I was staying in in Lahore. Lucky for me, that particular hostel is run by the best connected, most honest and trustworthy Pakistani around... Malek... who has assured me per telephone, that he has my passport, that it is safe and should I run into any authorities, I should just call him on his mobile and pass over the phone. The unfortunate side effect of all this, is that a visa cannot be extended without passport and not wanting to leave Pakistan prematurely, I'm in a predicament of the illegal immigrant nature.

I have, however, been told that the first fourteen days of overstaying are without penalty, so I should be good once I get to the border. However, if the border guards decide to act up and charge me the 20 Euros per day of overstay that are rumoured, then I'm going to find my budget for Pakistan being completely blown out of the water.

This post has turned into an essay and it's time for dinner. Dinner in our hostel is a communal affair, around a big table with a soup, curry with rice, an apple and a tea... and I've just been called for it... So take it easy and once I get back to Lahore, I promise to let you know if my passport is still there....

Ur man in Pakistan.

C.