Fun in Gisev

Got back yesterday from a 3 day trek in the Gisev Valley in the North-West Pamirs with two other folks staying at the same place as me in Khorog. The valley is very narrow and has no road through it, so to get to the village involved a 2.5 hour drive from Khorog, then a 3 hour trek up the valley. There are about 90 people living in this isolated village, which is loosely strung out over about 1.5 km of the valley. Everything that comes in or out goes on foot or by donkey, and there is no telephone, piped water or mains electricity. Cooking is done with wood in a traditional clay oven.

One of the local development agencies has been helping the villagers develop homestays to encourage visitors and to bring a bit of money into the valley, so we stayed with an old lady and her granddaughters at the upper end of the village. The village now has 7 homestays, which might be a bit much given that only 30 tourists visited last year - but everybody was really keen on the whole project and were enthusiastic about giving us tea and practicing english using a russian-tajik-english phrasebook they got from the agency. The place we stayed was a traditional Pamiri design of house, which is square but with 5 columns and a raised platform around 3 sides of the room which doubles as a seating and sleeping area. The only thing that placed it in the 21st century was a small solar cell that powered a single lightbulb int he guesthouse which our host turned on with great ceremony once it got dark.

The next day we hiked further up the valley, past more beautiful lakes and along the river. We were looking for the summer pastures of the shepherds and two very big lakes at the head of the valley, but didn't have time to get there (so will just have to come back in the future). The valley is really stunning, with wild flowers all over the place and snow covered peaks in the distance - I think I took maybe 150 photos. We camped in a great spot by the river and had a campfire and watched the stars coming out before heading back down the next day, stopping for lunch at the homestay. Fortunately our car was waiting for us, becuase the road at the head of the valley doesn't get much traffic at all, so it would have been a while waiting for a lift!

Tomorrow we have arranged transport to Murghab through the Wakhan valley, which will take around 4 days of easy driving - stopping at hot springs and historic sights and lakes and so on along the way. Our driver is a very nice guy who speaks great english, but his car is an old Russian jeep - photogenic, but not particularly comfortable! Nevertheless, this portion of the trip promises to be a real highlight.