Jeep Safari Pakistan

Trip highlights

• A night on the Deosai plateau

  843 square kilometres above the treeline at an average of 4,114 metres, crossed in a day and slept on for a night. In July it is wildflowers to the horizon, marmots on every bank, and a real chance of a Himalayan brown bear at distance.

• Four passes above 4,000 metres

  Babusar at 4,173 m, Khunjerab at 4,693 m on the Chinese border, and the two crossings onto and off Deosai.

• Both halves of the north

  Hunza, Karimabad and the Karakoram Highway on the way up; Skardu, Shigar and Baltistan on the way back — joined by the Deosai track rather than by driving the same road twice.

• Fairy Meadows and the Raikot face

  Nanga Parbat reached the way it should be: the jeep track up from the Karakoram Highway, which is the most talked-about piece of road in Pakistan.

At a glance

• 14 days, July to mid-SeptemberThe only window when Babusar, Khunjerab and the Deosai tracks are all open.
• 4x4 with driver throughoutFour to a jeep. No middle seats, and everyone gets a window.
• Four passes above 4,000 mBabusar 4,173 m, Khunjerab 4,693 m, and both Deosai crossings.
• Deosai plateau, 4,114 mSecond-highest plateau on earth. A night camped on it.
• Hunza and Baltistan in one tripMost itineraries make you choose. This one does not.
• Hotels, and one night under canvasEverything booked ahead. Deosai is the exception, and it is a camp.
• Maximum three jeepsTwelve people at the most, and usually fewer.

Day by day

1. 1Day 1Arrive Islamabad

   Met at the airport and driven to the hotel. Dinner, a briefing, and a look at the jeeps and the drivers who will be with you for the next two weeks.

2. 2Day 2Islamabad to Naran, up the Kaghan valley

   

   Out through Abbottabad and into the Kaghan valley, following the Kunhar river up to Naran at 2,400 metres. Six to seven hours, the last of it climbing. This is the gentle start: tarmac, pine forest and a night that begins your acclimatisation for tomorrow.

3. 3Day 3Over the Babusar Pass — 4,173 m — to Chilas

   

   The first real jeep day and one of the best. Up past Lulusar lake and onto the Babusar Pass at 4,173 metres, where the Kaghan valley ends and the Indus basin opens out in front of you with Nanga Parbat somewhere in the haze to the north. Down the far side to the Karakoram Highway and Chilas. The pass is only open from about April to September, which is one of the two things that set this trip's season.

4. 4Day 4The Raikot track and the walk to Fairy Meadows

   

   The jeep track up from Raikot Bridge — narrow, unsurfaced and cut into the side of the gorge, and by a distance the most discussed piece of road in the country. It ends at Tato, and from there it is an hour and a half on foot or on a pony up through the pines to Fairy Meadows at 3,300 metres, with the Raikot face of Nanga Parbat filling the end of the meadow.

5. 5Day 5Fairy Meadows — a day on foot

   The one day with real walking in it, and it is optional. Up to Beyal camp and on towards the Nanga Parbat base camp viewpoint, four to five hours return, for the closest legal look at the Raikot face. Or stay in the meadow and do nothing, which plenty of people choose and nobody regrets.

6. 6Day 6Down to the Karakoram Highway and north to Karimabad

   

   Back down to Raikot and onto the Karakoram Highway proper — the old Silk Route, following the Indus and then the Hunza river north past the Rakaposhi viewpoint to Karimabad. Three nights here, and a hotel with a view of Ultar after two nights at altitude.

7. 7Day 7Karimabad — Baltit, Altit and Duikar

   

   Baltit Fort above the town, seven hundred years old and properly restored, and Altit Fort below it with the royal garden. Up to the Eagle's Nest at Duikar for sunset over Rakaposhi, Diran and the Ultar spires. An easy day, on purpose, before the pass.

8. 8Day 8The Khunjerab Pass — 4,693 m

   

   North through Gojal on the Karakoram Highway: Attabad Lake, the Passu Cones, Sost, and then the climb to the Chinese border at Khunjerab, the highest paved international border crossing in the world. Yaks, marmots and usually a queue of trucks. Back down to Karimabad or Gulmit for the night.

9. 9Day 9Hunza to Skardu

   

   Back down to Gilgit and then east along the Indus into Baltistan — seven hours on a road that was one of the hardest in Pakistan until recently and is now mostly sealed. The landscape changes completely: wider, drier, bigger, with the cold desert around Skardu at the far end.

10. 10Day 10Skardu and the Shigar valley

    

    Kharpocho fort above the town, the Shigar valley and its restored fort, the sand dunes of the cold desert, and Upper Kachura lake. A day off the rough roads while the jeeps are checked over for Deosai.

11. 11Day 11Onto the Deosai plateau — 4,114 m — and camp

    

    Thirty kilometres and a world away. The track climbs out of Skardu and onto the plateau, and then there is nothing above you but sky: 843 square kilometres of high grassland above the treeline, no trees at all, wildflowers through July, marmots on every bank and streams the colour of glass. Camp is pitched near Sheosar lake. It is cold at night, even in August, and the sky is as good as it gets anywhere.

12. 12Day 12Across Deosai to Astore

    

    The rest of the plateau in the morning, which is the best time for bears — there are about seventy-eight Himalayan brown bears on Deosai now, up from nineteen in 1993, and while nothing is promised, the drivers know where to look. Off the western side and down into the Astore valley, losing two thousand metres in an afternoon.

13. 13Day 13Astore to Naran, or down the Karakoram Highway

    Out of the Astore valley to the Karakoram Highway and south. If Babusar is open and the weather is settled we go back over it into Kaghan, which is the better road; if not, the KKH all the way, which is longer and equally fine. A long day either way.

14. 14Day 14To Islamabad and onward

    Into Islamabad by early afternoon. A day room at the hotel, time to wash two weeks of Deosai dust out of everything, and a transfer to the airport for an evening flight.

Good to know

**The season is narrow and it is set by the passes**

July to mid-September. This is not a preference, it is arithmetic: Babusar is open roughly April to September, the Deosai tracks are under snow until late June, and Khunjerab is a summer road. The only window when all of them are open at once is high summer, and even then an early snowfall in September can shut Babusar overnight. We carry an alternative down the Karakoram Highway for exactly that, and it costs you a view rather than a day.

**What fourteen days in a jeep is actually like**

About half the route is sealed road and about half is not. The unsealed half is corrugated gravel, river crossings on plank bridges, and a certain amount of shelf road with a drop on one side. The drivers do it for a living, the vehicles are maintained for it, and it is safer than it looks — but if exposure bothers you, this is the wrong trip and we would rather tell you now.

Four passengers to a jeep, which means everyone has a window and nobody is in a middle seat for two weeks. Days run from four to eight hours of driving, with stops.

**Deosai and the night on it**

The camp on Deosai is the only night not in a building, and it is the one people remember. At 4,114 metres it gets close to freezing after dark even in August. Bring a sleeping bag rated to 0 °C — you can hire one in Skardu, but bringing your own is better. Full camp kit, mess tent, kitchen and crew are ours and included.

Altitude is worth a thought. You sleep at 2,400 m in Naran, 3,300 m at Fairy Meadows and 4,114 m on Deosai, in that order, which is a sensible progression and not an accident. The Khunjerab day is a drive-up to 4,693 m and back down, which is where people most often feel it.

**Brown bears**

Deosai's Himalayan brown bear population has gone from nineteen in 1993 to about seventy-eight in 2022. That makes a sighting genuinely possible and nowhere near guaranteed, usually at distance and usually in early morning. Bring binoculars. Anyone who promises you a bear is selling something.

**Who this suits**

People who want to cover ground and are not interested in trekking. There is one optional walking day at Fairy Meadows and nothing else longer than an hour. It suits photographers, it suits anyone who has done a Hunza road tour and wants the half of the north they missed, and it suits families with older children. It does not suit anyone who dislikes long days in a vehicle, because that is the trip.

Questions about this trip

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