Sunday, June 14, 2009

The first few days - Musaffarabad (Kashmir)

Hi,
Well, I've finally got a bit more time to tell you about our adventures so far. It feels like I have been here a month, not a week.
We landed in Islamabad on the morning of the 7th June, and were taken to our somewhat delapidated hotel. We had planned to reconfirm our onward flights to Gilgit (up north) for the next day. However, for technical reasons, that was not to be. In the end, we spoke to Brad who had a plan to Paraglide up the Khagan valley S-> N (thus negating the need for a plane). The next day we set off for Musaffarabad in the early afternoon. After about 3 hours of hair-raising driving, with 18 people packed into a high-ace van, we were off-loaded at a police check. There was a problem with the certificate which we required to enter Kashmir. The police were very friendly, but told us that there was no chance without this document. Four hours later,after phoning a well connected local paragliding friend named Sajjad, we were granted special permision from the police chief to pass. It turns out that our friend and a local official in Musaffarabad had been moving all sorts of wheels to get us through. It was now completely dark, and we arrived at 11pm to a typical Pakistani warm reception from Brad, Sajjad,Quasi and Farooq. After some great food, they took us up to a beautiful hotel 1 hour up a track. The views were spectacular; there was a grassy lawn and balconies looking out over huge mountains and the valley twinkling far below.
The next day we got all geared-up for a 3 day bivouac flight, but the day was very stable and we were unable to make the leap into the big mountains. We did manage to top-land next to the hotel, and spent the rest of the night chatting in the hotel and enjoying the fantastic food - which leads me on to another theme: the food here is simply great. I thought I was going to suffer, being a vegetarian, but there is a huge selection of tasty treats and juicy mangos, and samosas, and dhal and...and..and..
The next day we again tried to get into the big mountains, but this time it was too unstable. You could fly around the valley easily enough, but the pass we needed to cross was blocked by huge CuNim clouds. We had a nice flight none the less, and all landed in the stadium together, where we were immediately inundated by curious kids.
This area has great potential as a paragliding site. It is 3 hours from Islamabad (normally); is very beautiful; has lots of good take-offs and landings and a friendly local population. The whole region was devastated in 2005 by an enormous earthquake, and I hope that one day a thriving paragliding industry with a school and local tandem pilots could create some new tourism in the area, both domestic and international. Just before I arrived, it had hosted its first paragliding festival, organised by Sajjad.
The day before yesterday, I arrived in Hunza, but that is a different story.
Hope I haven't bored you. Bye.

ps. I lost my camera (lucky I guess - I'd only had a chance to take a few snaps)


Demian.

3 comments:

  1. Joder, Demian:
    hace muchos años que te conozco y creo entender la emoción que ahora mismo vuela contigo. Te deseo, muchisima suerta y todo lo bueno que puedas cargar contigo en tu parapente. Estas cosa ocurren pocas veces en la vida y solamente porque TU las provocas. Eres grande y te admiro:
    Besos de Jorge , Harmony y Cyan.

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  2. Demian,
    Awesome! Take good care of yourself.
    Anne, Hannah and Adam,XXX

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  3. Missed the trip to fly with you guys. I had a plan but unfortunetely..... commitments.
    ANyway see you soon

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