PAMIR HIGHWAY

PAMIR HIGHWAY - THE SECOND HIGHEST HIGHWAY IN THE WORLD After exploring Karakoram a few years back. Pamir became one of the top in my bucket list. Considered as the second highest highway in the world, it stretching more than 1,200km between the cities of Dushanbe in Tajikistan and Osh in Kyrgyzstan while looking into Afghanistan, the Pamir Highway (M41) is one of the wildest roads in the world – Remote, rugged and incredibly mesmerizing. For the intrepid traveller and thrill seeker, this spectacular road will definitely give you the most epic road trip. There's a few ways to do this trip, you either start from Dushanbe and end it in Osh or vice versa. It would be a dream to drive on your own, riding a bike or bicycle or hitchhiking through Pamir, but these days it all seem too extreme for me (God I'm getting old 😅😂). So I settled with the most common option - hiring a car with a driver. (I shared it with two other travelers). Ohh ... one also can ride a share taxi or marshrutka where you can squeeze in a car with the locals. Choose whichever ways that suit you best. How many days you should spend to complete it? It depends on how fast you want to move, how frequent you make a stop or a detour, ranging from 5 days to 12 days. But a shorter days means you spend more time in a vehicle, trust me you don't want that, it's exhausting. It took us 8 days 7 nights for this trip and except for the first 2 days when we drove 9 -10 hours a day, the rest of the trip we’d spend only about 3 to 4 hours driving each day leaving plenty of time to explore and enjoy the beauty of the surrounding. From my personal experience, for a trip like this you have to take it slow, stop as many time as you want, breath in the fresh mountain air and soak up the experience or there's no point of doing it. We been blessed with a beautiful weather for the whole trip, clear blue sky, it can be scorching hot during the day but the spring breeze make it perfect but at night it can be bitterly cold. Since now considered as a low season, hiring a ride can be slightly cheaper and same goes to an accommodation along pamir highway. ($15 - $16 per night compared to $18 - $20 in high season). Beware of Acute Mountain Sickness (AMS).Damn it's no joke. I knew that I'm easily get an AMS. I got it when climbing Kinabalu and when I was in Karakoram. I even bring a medicine for it, but I'm too lazy to take it 💁🏼. So it's no surprise that I got sick for 2 days during this trip. I can't even drink a water or I might throw up. It was so bad. Paling teruk masa bermalam di Bulunkul, merupakan kampung paling sejuk di Tajikistan. Masa sakit tu Aku dijaga oleh host home stay and couple dari Russia, siap panggil doktor kat kampung tu lagi mai check blood pressure, Kalau X baik jugak esoknya memang Diaorang nak bawak Pi hospital kat kampung sebelah 😅. Our body react differently towards attitude inclination, so I can't say how risky you are to get an AMS unless you experienced it first hand.