Pakistan Travel Guide: Planning a First Trip North

There is a statistic about Pakistan that nobody quite believes the first time they hear it: five of the world's fourteen peaks above eight thousand metres stand inside one country, and four of them are clustered within sight of a single glacier system in the Karakoram. Concordia, where the Baltoro and Godwin-Austen glaciers meet, is the only place on the planet where you can stand and see four eight-thousanders at once.

The second statistic is the one that shapes a trip. Pakistan receives a small fraction of the international visitors that Nepal does, despite holding a larger share of the same mountains. What follows from that is not hardship — the roads are better than expected, the guesthouses are comfortable, and the hospitality is close to overwhelming — but a genuine absence of infrastructure built for foreigners. There is no well-trodden circuit. There is no equivalent of the Annapurna teahouse trail. You are largely on your own, in the good sense and occasionally in the inconvenient one.

This guide covers what you need to settle before booking: how the visa system works now, when the northern valleys are actually open, what the journey from Islamabad to Gilgit really involves, and how to structure two weeks so that you are not spending nine of them on the Karakoram Highway.

The short version

Entry and paperwork

Pakistan rebuilt its visa system to encourage tourism, and the practical result is that most travellers now apply online rather than queueing at an embassy.

The e-visa covers the large majority of nationalities and is applied for through the official government portal. You upload a passport scan, a photograph, and usually a hotel booking or an invitation letter from a registered tour operator. Processing is typically advertised at around seven to ten working days; allow longer, because it frequently takes longer.

Visa on arrival is available to tourists from a shorter list of countries, generally with a booking through a registered Pakistani tour operator as a condition. It is convenient and it is also the option most likely to change without notice, so confirm it directly with the portal rather than relying on a blog — including this one.

Permits and No Objection Certificates. This is the part most travellers get wrong in both directions, either assuming permits are needed everywhere or assuming they are needed nowhere.

• Most of Gilgit-Baltistan — Hunza, Gilgit, Skardu, the Karakoram Highway to the Chinese border — is open to foreign tourists without a special permit.
• Areas close to the Line of Control, parts of the Afghan border region, and certain restricted zones do require a No Objection Certificate.
• Some high-altitude trekking and all mountaineering above defined thresholds require permits, and expedition peaks require formal royalty payments and a licensed liaison officer.

Indian passport holders face a separate and considerably more restrictive process, including designated points of entry.

When to go

Pakistan's travel calendar is really two calendars — the plains and the mountains — and they barely overlap.

Late September is the answer for most people. The monsoon has cleared the south, the high passes are still open, the poplars in Hunza are turning, and the air is at its clearest for the long views that are the point of being there. It is also the shortest window, which is why it is worth building the trip around.

The Khunjerab Pass, at 4,693 metres the highest paved border crossing in the world, is typically open from around the start of April to the end of November, and closes on weather rather than on schedule. Deosai, the high plateau between Skardu and Astore, is generally accessible from around July to September and impassable outside it.

Getting there, and getting north

Most trips begin at Islamabad International (ISB), which is the closest major airport to the northern routes and by some distance the easiest arrival. Lahore (LHE) suits a trip weighted towards Mughal history and food. Karachi (KHI) is a different country in most respects and rarely combines well with a first northern trip.

Then comes the decision that defines the trip's logistics: how to cover the six hundred kilometres from Islamabad to Gilgit.

The mountain flights are spectacular and unreliable in equal measure. They fly visually rather than on instruments, which means they cancel whenever the cloud sits low over Nanga Parbat, which is often. Book the flight, and plan the trip as though it will not operate. Travellers who build a schedule with no road contingency lose days they cannot recover.

The road itself — the Karakoram Highway, built jointly with China across the collision zone of two continents — is not a means to an end. It is one of the great drives on earth, and breaking it over two days with a night in Chilas or Naran turns an ordeal into the best part of the first week.

What it costs

Pakistan is inexpensive by almost any international comparison, with the significant caveat that private transport in the north is not, because distances are long and vehicles are hired by the day.

The line that surprises people is vehicle hire. A jeep with a driver for the Hunza valleys, Fairy Meadows access, or the Deosai crossing is charged per day regardless of distance, and it is often the single largest item in a northern budget. Sharing it across three or four travellers changes the economics entirely — which is one of several reasons why the small-group model is standard in Pakistan and largely absent in, say, Japan.

Carry cash. ATMs exist in Gilgit, Hunza's main town of Karimabad, and Skardu, and they are not dependable. Draw what you need in Islamabad.

Where to go: the northern shape

Three valleys account for most first trips, and they are genuinely different from one another.

• Hunza is the accessible one: a broad, terraced, orchard-filled valley on the Karakoram Highway, with two forts, a string of villages that are easy to base in, and views of Rakaposhi and Ultar that begin at your guesthouse window. If you have one week, spend it here.
• Skardu and Baltistan are the serious mountain end — the gateway to the Baltoro, K2 and Concordia, with cold desert, high lakes and a landscape that scales up considerably. Reaching it takes a long day from Gilgit.
• The Astore side and Fairy Meadows face Nanga Parbat, the ninth-highest mountain in the world and the most dramatic single wall visible from any accessible viewpoint in Pakistan.

Beyond those, Chitral and the Kalash valleys hold a distinct pre-Islamic culture and a festival calendar of their own, and Swat is green, historical and much closer to Islamabad than any of the above.

A fourteen-day route that works

1. Days 1–2 — Islamabad and Taxila. Acclimatise to the country rather than the altitude. Taxila's Gandharan sites are a UNESCO property and an hour away.
2. Days 3–4 — The Karakoram Highway north. Overnight in Chilas or Naran. Do not attempt it in one push.
3. Days 5–8 — Hunza. Base in Karimabad or Gulmit. Baltit and Altit forts, Passu and the Cathedral Ridge, Attabad Lake, and one long day to the Khunjerab Pass.
4. Days 9–11 — Skardu. Shigar and Khaplu valleys, Shangrila and Upper Kachura lakes, and the cold desert at Katpana.
5. Days 12–13 — South, with a Nanga Parbat viewpoint. Fairy Meadows if the season and the jeep track allow.
6. Day 14 — Lahore or Islamabad. Finish in the Mughal city if the flights work.

Ten days means cutting Skardu entirely rather than compressing everything.

Food

Pakistani food is regional to a degree that surprises visitors who arrive expecting one cuisine. Punjabi cooking in Lahore is rich, wheat-based and heavily grilled. Sindhi food in the south is hotter and more sour. Pashtun cooking in the northwest reduces to meat, salt, fire and bread, and is superb at it. And Balti and Hunza food in the far north is something else entirely: apricot, walnut, buckwheat, mulberry, and a soup-and-bread tradition that has more in common with Central Asia than with the plains.

Eat chapli kebab in Peshawar or Islamabad, nihari early in the morning in Lahore, karahi anywhere it is cooked to order, and chapshuro — a meat-filled bread — in Hunza. Drink the salt tea in Baltistan at least once, and then decide.

Culture and etiquette

Pakistan is socially conservative and personally extraordinarily hospitable, and the two facts sit together without contradiction.

• Dress modestly. For men, long trousers. For women, loose clothing covering shoulders and knees, and a scarf carried for mosques and rural areas. The local shalwar kameez is comfortable, cheap and appreciated.
• Ask before photographing people, especially women. This is not a formality.
• Accept the hospitality, or at least accept it once. Refusing tea repeatedly reads as a rejection. You will be invited into homes more often than you expect.
• During Ramadan, eating and drinking in public during daylight is inappropriate in most of the country. Restaurants in tourist areas remain open with discretion.
• Friday afternoons slow considerably. Plan around midday prayers.

Safety, honestly

Pakistan's international reputation and the experience of travelling in Gilgit-Baltistan are two very different things, and any useful guide has to say both.

The northern valleys that make up almost all of the tourist route have a security profile unlike the border regions that generate the headlines. Independent travellers move through Hunza and Baltistan routinely. Foreign visitors are conspicuous and generally treated as guests.

That said:

• Read your government's current travel advisory before booking, and read it by region rather than by country — advisories treat Gilgit-Baltistan very differently from Balochistan or the areas bordering Afghanistan.
• Road safety is the largest genuine risk, not crime. Mountain roads, night driving and overtaking culture cause far more harm to travellers than anything else. Refuse to travel at night in the north.
• Altitude is the second. Skardu sits at 2,200 metres and the Khunjerab Pass at nearly 4,700. Ascend gradually and know the symptoms.
• Insurance matters here more than usual. Confirm that your policy covers Pakistan, the altitudes you will reach, and helicopter evacuation.
• Some regions assign a police escort to foreign travellers. It is routine, non-negotiable, and usually more tedious than reassuring.

Solo travel, and solo women

Solo travel in Pakistan is common among men and increasingly so among women, and the practical picture is more nuanced than either the alarmed or the dismissive version.

Solo women travellers report a great deal of hospitality and a great deal of attention — staring is persistent and largely non-threatening, but it is constant and it is tiring. Practical measures that experienced travellers consistently recommend: dress conservatively including a scarf, avoid arriving anywhere after dark, use women-only sections on public transport where they exist, stay in guesthouses with a family presence rather than anonymous hotels, and be comfortable being firm. Hunza in particular is widely regarded as among the easiest regions in the country for women travelling alone.

Accessibility

Pakistan is a difficult destination for travellers with limited mobility, and it would be dishonest to present otherwise. Step-free access is rare, pavements in cities are inconsistent, and the northern sites involve stairs, steep tracks and unpaved ground almost without exception. The practical route is a private vehicle with a driver throughout, and a realistic acceptance that several major viewpoints will not be reachable.

Official resources

• Pakistan Online Visa System — the official government e-visa portal. Apply here and nowhere else.
• UNESCO World Heritage: Pakistan — the country's six inscribed properties, including Taxila, Mohenjo-daro and Rohtas Fort.
• Gilgit-Baltistan Tourism Department — regional permits, road status and seasonal notices.

What most first-timers get wrong

They underestimate the distances. Looking at a map of Gilgit-Baltistan, the valleys appear adjacent. On the ground, Gilgit to Skardu is a full day, and Skardu to the Deosai plateau and out the other side is another. Two valleys in fourteen days is a good trip; four is a driving holiday.

They also arrive with the wrong expectation of what the country is for. Pakistan is not a sightseeing destination in the way Italy is — the monument count is modest outside Lahore and the Indus sites, and the museums are few. What it has instead is landscape at a scale that recalibrates your sense of scale, and a culture of hospitality that will interrupt your itinerary repeatedly and improve it every time.

The mountains are the reason you go. The tea you get invited to on the way is the reason people go back.

Give the north two weeks, take the road rather than the flight, and leave the last three days unplanned. Something will fill them.