Well I’m back in Kashgar again, after cycling some 850 km from
Rawalpindi.
So the end of the first leg, and on to the hardest leg to Ali now.
Traveling in Pakistan is still excellent, easy to get around and people
are friendly. The rumors about Pakistan being dangerous are not true,
its quite safe in Northern Pakistan, lots of Police and Military around
and some trouble at the start of the year in Gilgit, but the hotel
operators are hoping that travelers will start coming back, and the
police are not waring people not to travel.
Its not impossible to cycle all the way across the pass into China now,
the Chinese are saying that its too ‘dangerous’ to cycle that part, so
the cyclists have to take a bus from Sost (the last town in Pakistan)
to Tashkorgan (immigration in China), there is no arguing with the
Chinese rules.
The Chinese are re-building the KKH on the China side, so the road is
the worst is has been since being built. They have taken up about 300
km of the road and its now a combination of dirt, rocks, gravel etc.
The one finished section (about 80 km down hill) is excellent, but the
rest is about the worst road I have cycled on. I expect that a lot of
Tibet will be like that though. At one point to see how fast I could
get, I managed 30 km/h on the flat on a very rocky road, it was very
rough on the bike though.
I’ve had no major problems with the bike, an today I managed to send 2
kg of stuff home that I don’t need.
I herd that this year there were already about 15 cyclists cycling
along the KKH, some just in Pakistan and some all the way to/from
Kashgar. I meet some Malaysians cycling from Finland home to Malaysia
(about a 2 year trip they estimate).
I did meet two Spanish cyclists in China and cycled into Kashgar for
the last 2 days together, they were also going to Tibet, but one of
them has a problem with his right eye, so they are returning home
again, it did look like I would have some company for the trip to Ali
in Tibet, but looks like its going to have to be solo.
The next 1400 km to Ali are going to be the longest leg, camping, dirt
roads and not good food. The good news is the I did hear that the
Police are letting people cycle this road at the moment.
I think it will take about a month to get to Ali, and I expect to be
able to email there and should be there before about the 5th of July.
Kirsten and I are going to try and meet in Saga another 700-900
(depending on which map I look at) on from Ali, and cycle either to
Lhasa or direct to Nepal depending on how I’m going at the time.
