We have just completed our journey along the Pamir Highway, Wakhan Valley and Kulob roads, broadly travelling east to west from Osh in Kyrgyzstan to the Tajik capital of Dushanbe.
The Pamir Highway, if not perhaps the Wakhan detour, is I think the primary reason many travellers visit Tajikistan. The highway traces an ancient Silk Road route connecting Central Asia with gateways to China and India (via Pakistan). This intersection is represented geographically by the conjunction of the Pamir and Panj/Wakhan Rivers; and ultimately by a nexus known as the Pamir Knot, where the Tian Shan, Hindu Kush, Himalayas, Karakoram and Kunlun mountain ranges come together.
Image credit Caravanistan, the go-to resource for travellers in Central Asia
For the Greeks, this great plain north of the Hindu Kush, bordered by the Pamir mountains (to the east) and Tian Shan mountains (north) was known as Bactria. Following his defeat of the Achaemenid Empire it was the furthest reach of Alexander’s advance into Asia. Almost a millennium later, it represented the furthest reach of the Sassanid Empire, centred on Damascus, defeated in turn by the Rashinid Caliphate, and subsequently became the cradle of the Timurid Empire centred on Samarkand.
In the 19th Century the Wakhan Valley, and the Panj River in particular, became the demarcation line between the Russian and British Empires. To this day, the northern shore of the Panj River (known in the upper reaches as the Wakhan River and in the lower becoming the Amu Darya) is Tajikistan, the southern shore is Afghanistan.
Setting aside the political map, at a local level is a complex combination of peoples and cultures.
The Lower Wakhan through which we travelled is, from Ishkashim northwards, peopled by the Wakhi, who speak a unique local language known as Khizik. Historically, but less so today, higher altitude pasture along the same valley was peopled by Turkic Kyrgyz nomads. Further upstream to the east are the Indo-Aryan Khowar people, also with a unique dialect. Going in the other direction, downstream of Ishkashim, the population is primarily Tajik, from a Persian ethnicity. These communities have distinct religious and/or sectarian traditions.
A quiet Wakhan lane
Notwithstanding the collision of political and cultural maps, at ground level in the Lower Wakhan Valley from Khargush to Ishkashim we found an oasis of calm - perhaps the friendliest, most hospitable people we have encountered so far. Farmers pause in their work as you drive by, waving their welcome from the middle of a field. Everyone is enjoying the fall weather - men harvest hay or drive plough teams while groups of women chatter and laugh. It’s a rural idyll.
Across the river, the Hindu Kush rises like an anvil against which this fragile way of life might be hammered.
An Afghan hamlet
As one moves downstream following the Panj River gorge, the ongoing threat to security is made visible with a military presence patroling this crucial road. With precipitous drops, boiling rapids below and Afghanistan a stones' throw away we treated this as ‘do not stop for photos’ territory and hastened on through.
Reading about this place when studying grand strategy or history is one thing; but encountering the autumnal landscape and a welcoming community in these unyielding mountains was like stumbling upon Shangri-La.
We both feel very fortunate to have made the difficult journey in (and out!).
Find a gallery of photos here.