Bullseye’s Blog

We were all at least a little concerned about going into Pakistan – after all, the whole Taliban in the Swat Valley thing is very recent (if not ongoing, depending on if you believe the Pakistani government).  We aren’t going to the Swat area, but the Karakoram Highway goes within 100 km of it on the drive between Islamabad and Gilgit.

All that said, we’re now in Gilgit and the drive was completely without incident.  In fact, the people here are almost nice to a fault.  As we drive through towns everybody waves, and when we stop to eat or stay in a hotel, people are really excited to see us.  Not only that, but this area is really beautiful!

The truck parked along the Karakorum Highway, on the way to Gilgit

Even the police are quite excited to see us, as I imagine tourism has pretty much ground to a halt over the last six months (we haven’t seen a single westerner since we’ve been in Pakistan).  We got several police escorts, but one guy was particularly colorful.  I was sitting up front, and all of a sudden he pops up out of the hatch on top of the cab with his AK-47 and started posing for us to take pictures!

He even indulged our curiosity and fired off a couple of rounds into the wilderness, and then passed his gun off to our trip leader, Danny, who also took a shot.  I would have liked to have had a go at it, but unfortunately I wasn’t riding in the cab with them…

I’ll update again once we’ve done some climbing here – we’re driving tomorrow to Skardu to check out new routing possibilities around there.

Now that I’ve finally gotten photos collected from the group, here’s a post about what has so far been not only the best part of the trip, but the best climbing I’ve ever done anywhere – Chatru and Chota Dhara in the Indian Himalayas..

View of the mountains from Chatru

Chatru and Chota Dhara are known (or at least they should be known) for the vast supply of boulder problems that litter the valley in which they lie. A British fellow has spent quite a lot of time there and put up hundreds of really high quality problems mostly in the higher grades. That said – I’m not much of a boulderer. After a couple of days of getting thrown off really hard problems and rubbing my fingertips raw, I decided enough was enough, grabbed Jeremy and decided that even though the nearest hospital was six hours away, this would be a great time to try two things for the first time – new routing, and leading multipitch trad.

Rather than recounting that particular epic in full detail, I’ll just throw in this picture of me and Jeremy huddling in cave – cold, wet and with yet another rappel to go.

We probably would have looked even more unhappy had we known that while yes, the ropes did BARELY reach the bottom on the last rappel, they would then get stuck and require not one but TWO trips back up a full 60 meter pitch to fix.

Luckily the rest of my climbing went significantly better (and Jeremy is still willing to climb with me). Not counting that first route, I lead seven first ascents. Most were not anything particularly special, but on one trip into a nearby canyon I saw a line that immediately called out to me – a really fantastic looking corner crack. At first I was hesitant – on the con side it was definitely two pitches with a hanging belay and definitely looked difficult. On the pro side, it looked like there was fairly good protection the whole way up save the crux, it looked like great climbing, and most of all, I just really wanted to be the first one to send it.

Luckily Danny was on hand to sit back and take pictures (or go run for help). In the end it was fantastic climbing, definitely pushed my limits, and Dave and I went up and down without incident.

Pulling hard on Black Widow (5.10c) in Chatru

On the crux of Black Widow (5.10c) in Chatru

Now I’m back in Manali, relaxing for two days before we drive to Amritsar. We can’t legally bring any alcohol into Pakistan, so before we leave we have to deplete the stock of the truck bar and celebrate Ed’s birthday. I’m looking forward to that, but not the fact that yesterday in Amritsar it was 100 degrees!

Over the last three weeks I had some opportunities to venture out with my camera and capture some of the awesome beauty of the Indian Himalayas…

Bridge over the Beas River in Manali

On the road from Manali to Chatru

Me on the first ascent of Spliff and a Chowmein (5.9) in Chatru

Jeremy leading Blood on the Rocks (5.7) in Chatru

Me messing around after a day of climbing in Chatru

Chatru is really just a river crossing that happens to have a couple tea shacks – pretty rustic

Moonrise in Chota Dhara