MKRIDE – The Karakoram Highway

[MotoNews]

Published in: Rides

Earlier this year in March my brother Colin and I conjured up the Middle Kingdom Ride, a circumnavigation of China by motorcycle, while eating Subway sandwiches in Manhattans’ Central Park.

When folks talk about New York being a place that inspires people to chase their dreams, they are not joking! It’s a dynamic city and it dared us to think outside the box. Just five months after that meal in NYC, Colin and I were struggling through a grueling two-day training session at BMW’s Enduro Training Center in Hechlingen, Germany; and just two weeks after that we hit the road for what ended up being a 65 day – 17,674km – odyssey around China.

After heading north from Shanghai to the border of China and North Korea we followed the storied Silk Road out along the Karakoram Highway to the border of Pakistan. From there we dropped down into Tibet on the most remote road in the world, the 219 Highway which as an average altitude of 4,500m (14,763ft).

After visiting Mount Everest Base Camp, Lhasa and southeast China we rolled back in to Shanghai safely on October 17^th 2010. Below is one of my fondest memories of our journey – the ride up to Pakistan border along the storied Karakoram Highway.

* * *

The End of Ramadan festival is an important date on the Islamic calendar. After one month of sunrise-to-sunset fasting, the Ramadan ends with a large prayer, the slaughtering of sheep and dancing in the streets. Many different countries and ethnic groups, all are Muslim, celebrate this occasion in a slightly different manner. Among mainly Uygur Muslim peoples, I’ve been told that the celebrations can get very lively in the Id Kah Square in central Kashgar do that’s exactly where Colin and I headed.

Waking up before sunrise, we left the Chini Bagh Hotel with a procession of Uygur business men who had traveled to Kashgar, from surrounding towns, to pray at the Id Kah Mosque; the most important religious site in all of Central Asia.

The sun slowly began to rise over the modern high-rise buildings that are becoming a regular site in Kashgar these days. Walking the narrow laneways of Kashgar was a task as wall-to-wall people pushed and shoved their way along the mud brick corridors, no one wanted to be late for Morning Prayer. Colin and I passed through a food market, and then a crowded alleyway of men selling sheep, that would later be slaughtered for the festival.

After taking a short-cut through a hat market, we finally arrived at the Id Kah Square, already teeming with people. Uygur men jostled for space as they laid their small carpets on which to kneel down and prey. Caught up in the mix of preparing for prayer were several young children who joined their fathers for the event; women, of course, were absent.

Colin and I found a small ledge to sit on at the outskirts of the Square near a collection of bushes and trees. It was important not to get physically in-between anyone who was praying and the mosque itself, as that is a serious blunder in etiquette. We stayed well out of everyone’s way and enjoyed taking some pictures while watching the preparations for the festivities. And then, without a warning or even a countdown, it began.

A crackle could be heard over the loud speaker, situated on the walls above the central entrance to the mosque. At that moment thousands of men in the square all stopped their chatting and turned towards the Id Kah Mosque, which is also the direction of Mecca in Saudi Arabia.

Instantly the entire contingent of people in the square began to follow along with the voice on the loud speaker: “Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar,” or “God is Great.”

The main prayer had begun. Without knowing any Uygur or Arabic the prayers were a lovely mix of direct sentences and phrases as well as longer and more harmonious chorus’ that sounded a lot like songs. Had the quality of the speakers been better, the prayers would have been very pleasing to the ear, but the constant crackling left much to be desired.

It was not my first Islamic prayer, but this was the first time I’d seen thousands of people all praying and bowing, or prostrating, in front of the historic Id Kah Mosque. It was a poetic moment and just for a second I had closed my eyes and wondered what this exact festival might have looked like 100 years ago, during the golden age of Kashgar, when the city was a former Great Game listening post for the super powers of Britain and Russia. Same people. Same religion. Same devotion.

Once the prayers had finished, the dancing broke out. Colin and I pulled ourselves from the festivities and refocused on the task at hand: today we were heading to Tashkorgan, which was the last town on the road to the Pakistan border. We hustled back to the Chini Bagh Hotel to pack up.

Our guide, Armin, met us with his Land Cruiser and we loaded all our gear for our four day trip up into the China and Pakistan border region; the highest international border crossing in the world at 5,200m (16,400ft). We were really excited about this leg of the journey as it was going to be our first real high altitude experience on the bikes, and after enjoying a full day of rest in Kashgar we were both itching to get back on the road and experience more of this amazing part of the world.

With Islamic hymns still rattling around in my mind from the Morning Prayer, we hit the road and pushed hard to cover as much ground as possible. Kashgar is an oasis town and the surrounding region is mainly low-laying farming and desert, meaning the roads were flat and quick. The second half of the day would be a mix of twisty mountain roads and potentially bad weather, so we needed to make sure we gained enough ground early to avoid having to ride after sunset.

Riding at night in China, especially in remote areas, is like signing your own death warrant. Make no mistake about it, this country has the most dangerous roads in the world and we weren’t taking any chances. We needed to take advantage of the daylight hours and get moving.

While Kashgar is a former Silk Road hub and provides visitors with a wonderful display of Islamic culture and architecture, it is beginning to feel very modern and out-of-touch with its roots as development begins to take hold of the city. As Colin and I slipped out of Kashgar we passed several new high-rise apartment complexes.

It was harder to find where the old mud brick buildings of past generations might be, apart from the area immediately around the Id Kah Mosque. There was a real sense, between us, that there was a significant fading of culture and identity in the larger cities in this part of China; and Kashgar was a prime example of that.

On our ride out into the countryside we passed through several small and colorful villages that were a wonder to ride through. It seems that the festivities in Kashgar were replicated in many of the surrounding villages as people were outside lining the streets trading, eating and generally being festive.

As Colin and I passed through these villages at low speeds because of a constant procession of automobile and cattle traffic, often young motorcycle taxi riders would ride up next to us to check out our bikes, and give us the thumbs up; then many would speed off doing wheelies to show-off their skills.

The majority of Uygur people that we have come in to contact with, on this leg of the trip, had a great appreciation for motorcycles and really enjoyed their riding.

* * *

Just over one hour into our journey from Kashgar the landscape began to drastically change. We began to ascend along a river, and the farmland gave way to sharp, rigid, beautiful red mountains. My excitement grew for the twisty mountain roads that I knew were not far off. Continuing our climb into the valley we past by our first group of camels as they meandered along the edges of a dry riverbed.

Just past the camels we came around a sharp corner and the red mountains of the last twenty kilometers turned in to gray massive snow capped peaks. Stopping for water beneath the towering 6,000m (17,000ft) peaks was the first realization that we were really on the famous, and storied, Karakoram Highway (KKH)!

The KKH is the name given to the historic trading route that heads south from Kashgar and links western China with Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan. It was one of the main thoroughfares for Silk Road trade for centuries and it is said that Marco Polo also made his way along the KKH on his epic journey from Italy to Central Asia, and then on to the remote corners of China.

The ancient KKH, whose stories were well-recorded in old travelogues, was full of traders, bandits, thieves and holy men. The modern day KKH is a mostly paved road that plays host to Chinese package tourists in large Korean tour buses making the day trip from Kashgar to Karakol Lake, a stunning glacial lake in a Tajik Autonomous region about half way to the border of Pakistan.

But don’t let the popularity of the region among tourists fool you, this is a magical part of the world and the mountain landscape is breathtaking and second to none.

* * *

As Colin and I continued to twist through the mountains, we reached our first and only military checkpoint, on the KKH; and it was intense. With China sharing borders with so many unstable Central Asia countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgystan; soldiers at checkpoints are always on the lookout for any contraband flowing in either direction.

It is often rumored that increasing amounts of heroin is finding its way from Afghanistan to Kashgar each year, even with the heavy police and military presence. With that being said, this checkpoint on the KKH was intimidating: a hilltop military base overlooking the checkpoint, machine gun nest on the roof of the office building next to the road, AK-47s in the hands of dozens of prepubescent soldiers from eastern China.

I hadn’t seen this many guns since the days riding along the border between China and Mongolia. I really dislike guns, and seeing so many around left me feeling uneasy.

Passing through the checkpoints was always a tense moment for us as a team and by this stage of the trip we’ve been through dozens. Colin and I had little on our BMW F800GS motorcycles that could be deemed a problem; a bottle of water, a bag of raisins from Turpan, and some extra fleeces and base layers for the dramatic weather changes.

It’s always important to remove any GPS or Navigation systems off the bikes at military checkpoints and pocket them, most soldiers are not educated well enough to know that these are commercial devices available everywhere in Shanghai and Beijng, but they may confiscate it and brand you as a spy. And yes, I am serious.

While the bikes always made it past the vehicle checks quickly, taking the support vehicle through a checkpoint, and having to open up the back of the SUV, left me with that horrible sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. As the soldiers began snooping through our luggage and bags the questions began to fly. Yes, we had hard drives. Yes, that’s an HD video camera. Yes, those are bike mounted video cameras. Yes, those are helmet cameras, and an audio recorder. The list went on and on.

The worst part of it was that the soldiers at these checkpoints loved to fiddle with all of our equipment and open up all our Pelican cases. It wasn’t unusual to burn an hour or more at each military checkpoint. Today, however, our soldiers weren’t interested in our gear; they were looking for weapons and drugs our guide told us. We had neither, and we were free to proceed with our adventure.

The next four hours of riding, after the checkpoint, was some of the most immaculate mountain scenery, and pristine riding conditions, that Colin and I have ever enjoyed. The road was smooth and curvy. The mountains were high and snow capped, and with the intensity of the alpine sun was keeping us warm we climbed in to the upper reaches of the KKH.

We zipped past the glacial blue, nearly green, Karakol Lake, which is situated at the foot of the iconic Mustagata; a mountain which towers over the remaining range at 7,546m (24,751ft). Leaving the Chinese tourists, and endless cluster of Tajik yurts behind us at the lake, Colin and I felt like true explorers once again as we raced over high pass after high pass in an effort to reach Tashgorkan before dark.

Pulling through a final round of sharp mountain peaks and narrow river valley’s we finally entered a long, wide fertile valley. Simple farms, growing mainly wheat and corn, lined the main highway and herders used slingshots to keep their mountain goats and sheep in order, as livestock drifted on and off the main road.

The sign above the highway, next to the Sinopec gas station indicated that we’d officially reached the Tajik Autonomous Region of China. Here, and for much of the last one hundred kilometers, the faces and people had changed once again, seemingly for the thousandth time on this trip.

Pulling in to a gas station, on the outskirts of Tashgorkan, a young male station attendant approached us. His pale white skin and green eyes set me back for a moment. Was this guy for real? Was some tourist working at the gas station? Did this guy belong here? Seriously, you could have plucked this man off the streets in Berlin and no one would have known the difference. He was just as western or Caucasian as Colin and I, and yet here he was, pumping gas in this remote part of western China; where according to our guide he had lived his entire life.

The encounter reinforced the fact that China was the most diverse country that either of us had ever visited in our lives. I was 6,000km (4,000 miles) west of Shanghai of my home in Shanghai and I just ran in to a Caucasian looking Tajik, with green eyes, on the border of Tajikistan and China.

This part of the world is the original “melting pot” as cultures and ethnic groups intermingled along the Silk Road for centuries leaving the mixed races of the Central Asian people to watch over the trade routes between China and the Middle East.

* * *

When morning came, Colin and I sat at breakfast and discussed our options for the day. Huddling over our warm coffee, we both looked out the window of our guesthouse at the cold and rainy weather outside. The poor weather that we had anticipated yesterday had held off and rolled in this morning. The dilemma and decision-making began.

Do we proceed up to the border of China and Pakistan in the rain, or do we sit tight and wait a day? Tashgorkan is a town sitting in a picturesque Tajik valley at around 4,000m above sea level. It was 14C and raining; meaning that as we ascend to the border and reach an altitude of 5,200m it could easily be snowing and well below zero degrees Celsius. Decisions needed to be made.

Not knowing how many days the rain could last for, we decided to push on and try for the border. It was be a tough slog and potentially dangerous, but sitting around was not part of our vocabulary on this trip. Moving is living, and today we were going for it.

At the first checkpoint, just outside Tashgorkan, the military official looked at us and nearly laughed. He mentioned the rain, and the motorcycles, and added that we were not wise. We ignored his comments at the time, but they would come back to haunt us soon enough.

Departing Tashgorkan was a satisfying feeling, we were on a journey and it was going to be tough, but if we could beat the odds and get the miles we needed to get today then there would be a huge sense of accomplishment among the team. Sadly, the moment we left the military checkpoint behind, the sky immediately grew darker and the rain intensified.

Colin and I were communicating constantly on our helmet microphones, as we tried to give each other pep talks while watching the thermometers on our motorcycles drop from 14C to 4C in the first half an hour of being on the road.

From a light drizzle to an outright downpour, the combination of the freezing rain and the high altitude made the conditions miserable. With the outside air temperature so cold it was difficult keeping our helmet visors from fogging up, also noting that we were breathing heavier because of the high altitude coupled with the extreme weather conditions.

Colin lost the feeling in his toes first. My fingers started to go numb, even with the heated grips on full blast. It didn’t take long before Colin and I found ourselves at 4,900m and engulfed in a full snow blizzard. Our jackets and pants were collecting ice and even though we had six layers on each we were physically frigid and mentally exhausted.

It was only supposed to take an hour and a half to reach the border of Pakistan from Tashgorkan, we had been on the road for two hours already and we had no idea how much longer the journey may take.

Then our day took a turn for the worse. Riding in the lead position, I pulled over on the road ahead to take a piss (yes my hands were freezing) on the side of the road and opted to leave my bike running, for fear of not being able to start it up again in the cold weather. But when I came back and saddled up I accidently hit the kill switch, with my right glove, and turned off my engine. It wouldn’t restart.

Colin came over and checked out the situation and together we herd that fatal “click, click, click” noise that you can only get when trying to start up an engine on a dead or frozen battery. At 4,900m above sea level, in a snowstorm, my bike’s battery had failed and our day was beginning to get a whole lot more challenging. When Colin gave up on my engine he went back to his bike he realized that his bike had stalled and the engine was off.

Trying to restart his bike he also got his very own “click, click, click” noise. Yes, in the worst weather conditions you could imagine, and both our bikes were dead. Only four letter curse words could express the frustration that we were feeling at that moment. One of the highlights of our journey was going to be riding our bikes right up to the border of China and Pakistan, and now that just wasn’t going to happen.

So we did the next logical thing, we left our bikes on the side of the road and jumped in the back of our support vehicle and did the last five kilometers, yes our bikes died just five kilometers from the border, and made our way up to the Pakistan border.

The border itself was overrun with the same blizzard. Two Pakistani border police stood near us when we hopped out of the car and we were quick to get some pictures taken with them to document the moment. We did a little piece to camera about being on the border and being freezing and then we were back down to the bikes.

The wind had picked up, the snow blizzard had intensified and the bikes weren’t turning over. We had reached a new all-time-low for Colin and I on this trip. My heart was sinking fast, I felt so tired. Our bodies were exhausted, our minds shattered; negative emotions had begun to overwhelm me; what the hell were we doing up here in a blizzard? And just when things appeared that they couldn’t get any worse, Colin’s bike started up. A sign from God perhaps, but my bike was still dead.

Colin and I decided that the weather conditions were not suitable to any repair job. It was -5C and between the cold weather and the altitude I felt completely useless: my hands clumsy, my brain slow, my breathing labored. I just wanted to get off this [censored]ing mountain. Colin and I rolled my bike down the decline we were on; I tried to pop the engine in first, second and third; nothing. Then I tried the starter a few more times before pulling over again.

We made the decision that we might be able to tow my bike the 140km back to Tashkorgan. The road was quiet and although towing a bike is dangerous we thought we might be able to make it. There was no traffic, and passing trucks to pop the bike up on to; we didn’t have many options. Grabbing some rope out of our support vehicle I tied my dead bike, around the front suspension, to Colin’s and figured that if we stayed at a slow enough speed we should be able to limp the bike back to town safely.

The biggest problem we faced was that the rope was not long enough to provide me with enough reaction time in the event that Colin had to make a quick move to avoid something on the road. But still, we gave it a try. With no other options presenting themselves, it was time to keep moving; and I was getting colder by the minute.

* * *

I don’t remember much from hitting the ground, it all happened so quickly that I couldn’t process all the events that occurred. I just remember Colin hitting gravel and is bike skirting right, and my bike hitting the same gravel and then skirting left; the rope tightened between our bikes and then the next thing I know my right shoulder was driving into the ground taking the initial impact, followed by my helmet smacking the road, and lastly my hip and legs.

For what felt like an eternity, I just lay there, stunned but fully conscious; unable to really move. Slowly the reality of what happened came to me: I had fallen off my bike. I began wiggling my fingers and toes, they worked; damage was minimal. Slowly I rolled off my right shoulder, which took the brunt of the impact, and got on to my back and brought my knees up to my chest in an effort to drive oxygen back in to my lungs; I wasn’t winded, just in shock.

I needed to remember to breath. Armin, our guide, and Chad, our cameraman, were first to approach me; I was in a daze but remember just yelling, “I’m okay, I’m okay.” Colin was up ahead and managed to stay on his bike, after making sure the engine stayed on he was now hovering over me. I mentioned to the team, while still laying on my back, that we should rethink the initial idea of towing the bike back to Tashgorkan. We all unanimously agreed.

After slowly getting back up on my feet and moving around a bit I realized that my right shoulder was badly bruised, and that my right rib cage was also badly bruised and maybe ribs were cracked. My breathing was labored. My head ached. And still the blizzard and subzero temperatures wouldn’t abate.

Luckily our support vehicle was empty, as we had all of our equipment stored in the hotel, and we decided that we would load my F800GS in to the back of the SUV and leave the front wheel dangling out of the back of the car. So that is what we did, we used a few ropes to secure the bike and then we began the long ride back to Tashgorkan. I was up in the support vehicle resting as Armin drove and Colin followed us on his bike.

It was not the way I had imagined our day would go; but that was the very nature of this trip, nothing could really be planned, and nothing went as planned. We were traveling around an unpredictable country and just couldn’t depend on weather, road conditions or anything of the sort. We were at the mercy of China, it was steering our ship, not us.

Upon our arrival back in Tashgorkan we were quick to get hot showers and put on some dry clothes. My motorcycle quickly restarted once we jump-started it to Colin’s bike, a little jump was all it needed. Colin then took it out for a spin and recharged the battery for about thirty minutes. I sat in the hotel in pain.

My ribs hurt, my shoulder was stiff and painful. I wasn’t sure what tomorrow would bring, I just knew that we had about 12,000km more to do on this trip and according to our route, which takes us through remote western Tibet; the riding was going to get a lot harder than it was today.

Looking in to the camera during my video diary that night I had to ask myself whether we could continue on this journey given the current state of our bodies and minds, and I was unsure. The KKH had beaten us, and I needed to get to a doctor and see how damaged my ribs were before we decided our much of this expedition my body could handle. Today was difficult. We had survived, but just barely.

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Click here to read part I of the story: "The Road to Mount Everest"
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