Day 60 Vashisht

9:05 am. Raining. Really clagged in like Scotland [clag = low cloud, smog or fog, clagged = to encumber, e.g. As when the orchard boughes are clag'd with fruite]. Headache. Cold a bit better, but definitely still there. Good news: only three weeks left - I fly out Delhi on Thursday 21st August. Think I'll have a couple of asprin then have a wander about - we are actually in a town 3 km up the road from Manali proper, called Vashisht. Laid out along a single main street, lots of hotels, guesthouses, internet cafes, lots of shops selling either food or things like brass sounding bowls for gap year students. Posters advertising yoga. No point trying to climb in this weather. (Yesterday the weather was overcast, but okay - no rain really most of the day, so I have some hope. The trouble is we should expect monsoonal rains here really, I think.)

5:24 pm and the good news is that I've managed to go climbing in India. A small crag up the left hand side (5 minutes' walk from road), about 15 minutes' walk down from the Himalayan Extreme Centre in Vashisht. Climbed a 6a, called Krishna, thuggish pitch, about 15 or 20 metres. Some sort of black gritstone or maybe a basalt. Bolted, though a bit spaced. Situated amongst lush green vegetation - including lots of British things like nepeta (cat mint) and apple trees (with fruit). Light drizzle on and off. A big palarver trying to climb here at all...(a) we couldn't find the crag to start with, (b) went back to the Himalayan Extreme Centre to ask directions (c) they just said that you are not allowed to climb on the crag at all, although (oddly) they did say where the crag was which was helpful; (d) we got there and roped up - then some kid from the shop came along to tell us that we mustn't climb there unless we paid money. We tried to negotiate - there were a few of us - but I didn't really have a clue what he wanted - during all of this I was trying to get up the route - whilst saying things like "I'll pay you 500 rupees for this route", and "can you get the money out of my rucksack?"; I'd come prepared to pay something to climb. Then the kid said he wasn't interested in the money, but he wanted 5000 rupees. We sort of agreed that Lianna would pay this the next day - so long as everybody on Hot Rock could do the two routes on the crag. During all of this I was mainly trying not to fall of the route - thought that'd make me look a bit silly.

Needless to say Lianna (when we met her that evening) was very unhappy about all of this - but - as I said to T, it's only a result of their negligence in the first place...they chose to have a newbie drive the truck on a too-narrow road back by the paddy field.

The latest plan from Hot Rock is for us to go to Chattru and camp and do climbing, a few hundred km north of here. Great, except we do not have enough gear - it's stuck on the truck which is not here: all I have is a pair of flip flops for my feat - and I do not think the crampons would fit properly. Don't even have any socks here. Of course, according to Lianna, it's all our fault - not their's.

By the way I feel pretty ill indeed. Nauseous and persistent headache, which I am unable to shift with asprin. Think I am running a temperature too. Perhaps it's all down to stress.

9:43 pm. Have had supper. In a place with a big TV / DVD and gap year students discovering themselves: watched Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Difficult to follow the plot - missed the start and then there were several power cuts along the way.

Day 59 McLeod Ganj

5:55 am. Green hotel. I have a cold. Not a bad one (at the moment at least), hopefully it'll get better. Anyway, the plan is to get a taxi back to the truck, thence on to Manali. Geoff and T have organised this originally, and the plan has been adopted by Duncan et al. It's obvious (at least to me) that this is the best solution. Apparently a crane was obtained yesterday - but it was too small, and then another crane, also too small. To me you need a 20 tonne crane - in part because the truck is stuck in the mud. Also the road the thing is on is like a minor road back in the UK, so I'd imagine access would be difficult for a big enough crane.

10:15 am. En route to the hill town of Manali, in the Himalayan mountains of Himachal Pradesh province. Sat in the back of a 4 x 4 jeep like vehicle. We went via the truck to recover our stuff. Pulled out most of my important stuff - well at least all the climbing stuff. A bit short on the warm clothing front. Breakfast stop at Davnt Restaurant in Tharu Paprola; omlette and coffee - very black.

3:16 pm and just had lunch at a roadside place about 50 or 60 km short of Manali. The rock hereabouts looks better - I can see some nice climable slabs for example. But travelling in the back of the jeep thing it's difficult to see much. Particularly since we go so fast. Weather seems better too - we have left behind the mist and rain in the Tibet-esque parts. Plan is to get to either the Mountaineering Council or perhaps just a climbing shop in Manali. Rumors of a hotel near a crag. No further news about the truck. Just seen my first elephant (Indian I assume); lot of monkeys.

10:20 pm. Latest news: arrived Manali (1900 metres); Lianna has arrived. As usual, T sorted out an awesome hotel, a completely brand new non-skanky hotel. Good job T did this before the B group led by Lianna arrived! Eating in a tiny eating place - pretty much just a room with long table and chairs; the food seems to be cooked someplace on the opposite side of Manali's high street and the service is really quite slow, but food really quite good. I am having rice and garlic. Much discussion about Hot Rock - especially ways to avoid getting lost (e.g. maps). My suggestion of hiring a local man on a moped to lead the way was met from Lianna with "the problem with that is that we'd have to leave on time", the logic of which I do not follow. Anyhow the truck is still stuck; latest efforts are to include the Indian army - hope they blow the thing up.

Day 58 McLeod Ganj, Dharamshala

6:55 am. Spent the night in a town called Sihunta; plan was to stay in some sort of guest house. In reality we had to camp just outside the guest house in tents, on the concrete pavement. Apparently some sort of mess up (by the guest house) - when we got here the place was already full - despite Hot Rock having booked it up. Something along those lines anyhow. Anyway, at least I got to sleep somewhere flat for once, even if it was concrete.

Today, I hope, we get closer to Manali i.e. closer (but probably not reaching) some climbing. Rain has stopped, leaving a distinct dampness in the air.

1:35 pm. McLeod Ganj - as you can see we have failed to reach Manali, as predicted. Briefly, the truck is stuck in a paddy field, a result of front nearside wheel coming off the paved road, a perfectly good road by the way. Got out of the truck - it was clear in an instant that the only way out would be a vertical lift - and that would need a big crane. Given that there wasn't a big crane a few of us more sensible types wandered off to find some sort of breakfast, rather than fiddle about with an impossible task of trying to push several tons of scrap out of a rice paddy. A short way up the road and we indeed came across tea and omlettes - the latter so good we (Geoff, T and I) had two each.

Back at the truck - still stuck of course - we got what gear we could - not easy given the positioning of the vehicle: when I opened the side locker all my junk wanted to slide out into the field. T had real trouble getting at her stuff. Got a taxi to take us to McLeod Ganj. Now we are in the Green hotel at McLeod Ganj; further food: hot chocolate and coffee and walnut cake. McLeod Ganj, the upper part of Dharamshala is the residence of the Dalai Lama; Tibetan culture; backpacker hotels, gap year students and yoga. Light drizzle on and off.

7 pm. Green hotel reception area / restaurant. Plate of chips and a bottle of Pepsi. Chatting with the other renegades about how crap Hot Rock is...decided we need to get some control of this crazy trip; looks like we'll make our own way to Manali (and climbing). At this rate we are literally going nowhere.

Day 57 Himachal Pradesh

7:50 am. Just settled the bill for Mrs Bhandari's Guesthouse - paying for the room and a few dozen bottles of coke, fanta derivatives etc. Glad to report I had a fantastic night's sleep in air conditioned comfort. Worth every rupee: it's become very clear that we need good sleep and good food on this trip, else we get ill. And several people are pretty ill.

8:56 pm and we are somewhat short of where we should be, despite several hours' driving. But mostly this was in the wrong direction; one bridge was way too low also (it was called the Dehri Khad bridge); 30 km detour. We have stopped up at some small village and are in the process of trying to get some supper. My diet is appalling: today I have had two slices of bread; two ice creams; a Pepsi; some cheese snack puff things, and a few biscuits. Scenery changed to very green; hills and red sandstone outcrops; heavy rain started at 7 pm - making the more distant mountains misty. Not certain exactly where we are, but I think it's not far from the town of Sihunta in the Himachal Pradesh region.

Day 56 Amritsar, India

3:20 am; cannot sleep; the air is extremely humid. We are staying within the grounds of Mrs. Bhandari's Guest House, in Amritsar, Punjab, India; beautiful mature gardens; colonial buildings; swimming pool. The problem is that we are not actually staying in any of the buildings - rather we are camping, and the problem with that is that it's simply too hot and humid. Put my tent up on one of the lawns (about midnight) - but pointless - quickly ended up laying on a sleeping bag saturated with sweat; you could just ring it out. Mosquitoes - I have a net but not sure where it is on the truck. The best solution to this seemed to be the most obvious - get in the swimming pool - which I did, the problem being this was about half past midnight: a tedious waiting game for dawn and tomorrow to start. A few of us in the pool and the bats flying overhead. I have baseball cap with built in net: the rest of me is under water.

It's now 3:20 am and I've got out to write my diary. I am going to be tired tomorrow. Mrs. Bhandari's Guest House is an unusual place for Hot Rock to stay at:- it has charm. A sort of colonial charm. Apparently very little has changed here since the 1930s - the main building, a late-Raj family residence, surrounded by an English garden with brick paths, pergolas and arches, the whole being screened off from the outside world by mature trees. There is guest accommodation in various wings off the main house, and bungalows in the grounds. Given the impossibility of camping I'll investigate the option of staying in a guest house room tomorrow night, complete with air conditioning.

Earlier today we drove in the truck from Lahore to Amritsar via the Wagah border crossing. Border crossing straightforward, apart from having to take everything off the truck, take it through the customs hall and put it all back on the truck. Initial impression of India is one of greenness and also it looks cleaner than Pakistan. And one can buy beer.

Think I'll return to the pool now.

8:10 am. Well, at 4:30 am I felt a bit cooler and abandoned the pool to sleep on my foam mat in my tent. Did eventually get some sleep. Sleeping bag drying out on the swing.

7:22 pm. Have ordered macaroni cheese from the guest house kitchens (magnificent kitchens indeed: high ceilings, copper pans, the works); Geoff, T, Mel and I have sorted out a huge colonial room - the air conditioning is on maximum. Geoff, T, Mel are pretty ill in various ways; but at least they've got a chance of recovering.

Earlier today T and I went into Amritsar - a short rickshaw ride away; started off with coffee and internet. We visited two important sites in Amritsar.

The site of the infamous Amritsar massacre also known as Jallianwala Bagh massacre, named after the Jallianwala Bagh Garden in Amritsar, where, on April 13, 1919, British Indian Army soldiers opened fire on an unarmed gathering of men, women and children. Bullet holes are preserved in the brick walls. Official sources place the casualties at 379. At least 120 people died trying to escape the death by jumping into a deep well.

Walking five hundred metres to the south, via street cafe lunch stop, took us to the Harmandir Sahib, Hari Mandir or Golden Temple of Amritsar. Visitors leave their shoes at near the entrance, cover their heads (baseball cap is okay), and wade through a shallow pool (to wash feet) before entering. I guess the most famous (and sacred) part of the Golden Temple complex is the Hari Mandir (Divine Temple) or Darbar Sahib (Court of the Lord), which is the central golden structure in the lake of water. Large numbers of people around the temple complex: there seemed to be a great deal of 'hidden' organisation - some people filling buckets with lake water, some different people passing buckets to some further different people who emptied the buckets, onto the pavements.



8:25 pm. Have had the macaroni cheese and a rather nice pumpkin soup, plenty of pepper. Plus buttered toast. All served to us on a table set up (complete with pressed table cloth), in our Raj room, by Raj waiter: British Raj at its erstwhile finest. (Of course I tried to help the waiter by holding the door open for him and his trays, but he would have none of it!) Poor T and Geoff pretty ill.

Day 55 Lahore

7:20 am. Hot, the hotel room remains at a steady 35 degrees. There is a ceiling fan, but that just moves the hot air about. Breakfast at 9 am, then we are due to set off for the Wagah border and hence into India.

Day 54 Lahore

10:14 am. Coffee and two pain chocolates in Hotel Pearl Continetal - clearly a five star establishment: here with T, on the recommendation of her friend back in Ireland. We were determined to get a decent cup of coffee somewhere in Pakistan - and we've found it. Used the internet at the hotel - complete with its own mini-office, costing 580 rupees for the hour's privilege, that's about 7 dollars and worth every penny. Later on we found some fantastic and cheap street food for lunch; deep fried food: I always think this should be good to eat. Disapointed by Lahore's 'botanic garden' (or at least I think we found the botanic garden) - it's not so much a garden but rather a (nice) park; locals playing cricket, with piles of bricks for stumps. Visited the Old Fort, Shahi Qila, in northwestern Lahore, in the older walled part of the city. Huge, red sandstone structure, very hot to walk on (bare feet); carpets were spread here and there and soaked in water - these were okay to walk on though. The fort is a UNESCO World Heritage Site visited by large numbers of locals, who get a preferential rate at the gate (this is common in Pakistan - there's a tourist rate and a local rate). Rickshaw back to the hotel. 5:00 pm and it's very hot and humid in the hotel room: the temperature is an absolutely constant 35 degrees - night and day. Feels like 90% humidity. Dripping all the time.

The Wagah Border is the only road border crossing between India and Pakistan, and this is the way we'll travel into the next country, probably tomorrow. Today however we got a rickshaw (or rather, a couple of rickshaws) to take us from the hotel to the border and back again - it's a fair way (25 km maybe) and the rickshaw drivers were dubious - but then there's lots of rickshaws and it's very easy to negotiate - just say "sorry, I don't want your rickshaw", and move onto the next guy with his rickshaw. Basically I think that the drivers couldn't understand why we'd want to go 25 km in a rickshaw, rather than a taxi. In the end 1000 rupees (which got split six ways) got us the return trip - and the driver quickly entered into the spirit of the thing - ending up with the two rickshaws racing each other.

Border closing ceremony: seems to basically comprise Pakistan vs. India trying to outdo each other with a Monty Python ministry of silly walks afair: the Pakistani guards march right up to the Indian guards, until their noses are touching just about. The two sides must pick their tallest to be in the parade: I'd say we're talking 6 foot eight inches or thereabouts. The Indian guards wear khaki, and the ones wearing black are Pakistani (here the Pakistani's have the edge - the khaki tends to show much sweat, quite unsightly). Lots of loud shouting and stamping of heavily booted feet and 'rave' music and cheering. The latter cannot be good for the feet I feel.

Flags are lowered. Rickshaw ride back to the hotel. Uneventful apart from the driver crashing into the back of a bus, he seemed okay, but I think the headlamp no longer worked, and he kept looking at the front wheel.

Day 53 Lahore

8:44 am and we are stopped at a service station en route to Lahore from Islamabad. M2 motorway. Services are sort of western, but a bit crap at the edges. Almond Magnum ice cream for breakfast. Hot last night (30 degrees in my tent); still hot at 4 am when we set of this morning.

5:20 pm Lahore. Staying at the Parkway hotel, near the station. Just got back from visiting the main mosque up town, to see the Sufi dancers. In fact not so much whirling dance as just music - characterised by complicated rhythms combined with a (droning) pedal note which seemed to emanate from a wobble board, involving some sort of squeeze box instrument (with keyboard). Observations:

• walking barefoot on pavement is almost unbearable - burning my feet


• strong segregation of men and women
  

(Geoff and I sort of got drawn into the 3 pm prayer call: stood then sat at the back of the mosque; massive prayer room - 20 deep x 50 or 60 wide in terms of people. A lot of sweat.)

• back to the music (which was in a basement beneath the mosque / prayer rooms): seemed to be something of a battle of the bands going on...


• usual poseurs in the audience: here it was a couple of witch doctor types


• few dancers; just one old guy doing some sort of trance thing; another (younger) guy whirling around a bit - eventually falling over.

Got a motorcycle rickshaw back - 100 rupees for something of a thrilling ride across Lahore. Also much better value than the taxi (200 rupees). By the way, had a good lunch - some sort of sweet and sour dish with rice, air conditioned restaurant next to hotel. Need to change some dollars and find internet.

Day 52 Islamabad

6:15 am and I feel considerably better. Hope it lasts.

The town of Besham is like many smaller towns in Pakistan - a bit of a mess, yet there are plenty of people just sat about in the streets - seems no incentive to clean any of the mess up. Like the other smaller town (and larger cities for that matter), the electricity supply is on and off - yet the Pakistanis can afford (or perhaps not) to buy nuclear weapons.

7:28 pm; we have made it back to the camping ground in Islamabad. Took the opportunity to dry out the tent and sort out my gear. Still feel a lot better. Earlier, T and I had a nice lunch at a roadside cafe - some sort of rice dish for fifty rupees. Making sure I drink bottled water, and avoiding coffee too. Aprehensive about the Indian part of this trip - suspect there won't be much climbing - this trip really has very little climbing, considering it's meant to be a climbing trip. It would help if there were more keen climbers.

Day 51 Besham

Still ill. Early start today at 4 am - requested by Lianna; but when I got to the bus at the requested time, nobody (including Lianna) was ready. Eventually got going at 4:30 am. It's now 8:05 am and we've stopped at Gilgit for breakfast. Pancake and fried egg - uncertain whether to eat it or not but I think that (a) I need to eat something and (b) from a hygiene point of view probably okay (i.e. cooked in hot oil): hope it's reasonable sterile. Lots of rain.

9:55 pm and we have rolled up in Besham; we've covered a lot of miles since Karimabad. Still feel very ill. T has 'prescribed' me some antibiotics: Ciprolon 500 - looks like they should tackle most things including anthrax and typhoid (both of which one could easily contract on Hot Rock); possible side effects include tendon rupture - but that's okay since there's hardly any climbing on this trip. But I need to eat first; yet another skanky Pakistani eating place; although this time at least there's some nice looking food (rice). Worried about the forthcoming Indian leg of this trip.

Day 50 Karimabad

It's 2:16 am; camping; woken by bad feeling in my gut: need loo pretty quickly, but it's raining outside the tent; I'm a bit shivery too - definitely not well. Taken two Imodium - hope that these allow me to get through to the morning - or at least until the rain eases up. Definitely do not fancy going out in this weather, and in the dark.

8:18 am. Woken by Hot Rock voices, still raining: sounds like real English rain. Nuisance since I do not actually have a coat with me up here. I'll stay in my tent awhile to see if it eases up at all...then head on down to Karimabad and the bus. Hopefully my revoluted guts not too unstable. We will see.

4:15 pm. Feel quite ill indeed. No energy at all. Headache. Very arduous walk down to Karimabad - despite it being down hill all the way; on and on and on. Went a bit wrong in the village itself and ended up having to go back uphill. Raining most of the way down too. Pretty miserable. Lianna has secured us another cheap and crap hotel - to be fair the room is okay if basic - but the loo - as seems normal in Pakistan - is disgusting: it's beyond me why they cannot connect the thing to the water supply - I mean there is a water supply there. Just needs a short length of pipe.

5:00 pm. Despite feeling really ill, found a cafe which sells a rather nice Hunza walnut cake, had this with a hot chocolate. Met Geoff in the cafe. Goodness knows if eating walnut cake is a good idea or not - but just felt like it.

Day 49 Ultar Meadows

8:11 am. Another good night's sleep. Rained again during the night. I think today my plan is to go back down to the 'halfway' camping spot [a flat region of grass we passed on the walk up from Karimabad] - from what I remember walking up, there's the potential for some climbing there. Not much here to do at Ultar Meadows proper, except the fine views. I'll see what I can find for breakfast first though.

10:06 pm. Temperature is a very British 17 degrees. Have moved the camp down to the halfway meadow by the stream place, about thirty minutes downhill from the previous camping place. Plan was to find some climbs to do (new routes) but, despite there being much rock, there was very little new route potential: plenty of giant rock walls - which would run to dozens of pitches, with no obvious ways off, but not much else. The others seem quite keen and content to boulder, but I don't find bouldering very stimulating! But little else to do, and in the event I got into it a bit and did find a really great mini-route - a slab followed by curved arete, on a large boulder next to the path / stream. Needed a bit of cleaning - the rock being covered with a fine layer of something like mud. Getting up the slab took several attempts - demands good footwork; small boss of rock out left for layoff, thence big step on to sloping arete and delicate finish. This route's for a unique friend ;-) and is called Beryllium. The rest of the team climbed it - Ben (Hot Rock's bouldering guru) reckoned it comes in about V3, about French 6c/7a (UK 6a I would think) or something. Pleased with this: like I said before, creating a new route is not easy and despite being short I like this one very much.

Next I had a go at a finger crack splitting another boulder, a bit further up the path. The route gives just 4 metres of finger-width crack climbing, looks a bit like Stroof at Subluminal - but easier. Difficult start - I needed to stand on some small stones piled up; 2 wires placed before starting, friend 1/2 shoved in midway, friend 1 at top of crack. Mel videoed the proceedings. Funny that - here I was climbing in the Karakoram, complete with porters etc for the approach, and all I manage is 4 metres of crack climbing. Anyway, I just loved doing this route. It's called Liquid Engineering, HVS 5a. Geoff did the direct start (sans stones).

Day 48 Ultar Meadows

7:40 am and 16 degrees in the tent. It rained during the night; funny to think that I am up here in the Karakoram - in the tent I could easily been in the Lake District. Been wake for 30 minutes - so I got a good night's sleep. Feel okay, but don't know about energy levels: will find out when I actually start to move around. Definitely looking forward to climbing - even if it's just some small crag stuff as discussed by Geoff yesterday. In fact probably rather do short routes at the moment. I can hear the glacial streams and the occasional (big) rockfall / avalanches off Ultar.

7:30 pm. Back at the tent. Today: longish uphill walk - well actually just 35 minutes - but seemed longer - abortive attempt at a route with Geoff - looked good but there was a damn thorn bush thing growing out of the crack; rock has a thin veneer of crappy sandy stuff on it which doesn't help. Would have been a good route, but one cannot go around chopping trees down...Then we did a better route: slab, V groove to break; overhang to right, but again put off by loose bits and vegetation. Not bold enough to do overhang; Geoff did it and I followed. Finished off by leading Geoff's route of yesterday - a good VS 4c 4c, climbs a big crack line up the centre of a huge glacial erratic [boulder], left of waterfall at the head of the valley. Tried a variant to the right, block filled off-width, but horrible - all loose and jammed full of big loose blocks. Lowered off tape slings around loose block - scary stuff!

Currently sat about in the sun, amongst these silent mountains. Funny - it's like the Lakes in good weather - until you look up and see the high stuff. I've bogged up the food front completely: would give anything for fruitcake and custard or sunpin like that...Finally, I've decided that doing new routes is like trying to write or make music - it's easy to produce / create a load of convoluted junk which essentially leads nowhere interesting at all. Much, much harder to create even the shortest capriccio.

Day 47 Ultar Meadows

Slept okay: about ten hours' much needed sleep. Still tired - a combination of lack of sleep, being ill and altitude. Felt really lacksidasical this morning, but eventually got going enough to go and try and climb something. Sophie and I picked our way across the glacier - stones and dirt and ice to get to an obvious brown slab of rock; glacier crossing was interesting: a bit of a route finding challenge. Important to leave little cairns to mark the way back. We attempted a line up a big crack system in the slab; backed off - I was put off by the scale of the thing and the flaky rock: climbed up about ten metres or so, placed a peg and climbed back down! Eventually climbed a short scrappy pitch to the left - about 18 metres, up a slab / ramp; moves left, reasonable rising right hand crack. Good job I had the pegs - abseiled off two hammered in at the top. A completely rubbish route. Tried to find something else to climb but the rock was either really flaky or really glaciated and unclimbable at least by us!

It's now 5 pm. Light drizzle, I am in my tent. Geoff and Carolyn have apparently found some route up the valley - sounds promising and I will investigate tomorrow. It's fun being here, but I find the shear scale of the mountains big. I like the noises the glacier makes: meltwater and the occasional falling boulders - big and small, a few really big ones. These generally don't go very far - just shift a few tens of metres down the glacier. I guess eventually they'd reach the end of it. The glacier is a dynamic beast - but not fast moving.

8:49 pm. 16 degrees in the tent - have had some supper - rice and vegetables, soya and fruit salad; stomach feels okay - but suffering from a severe lack of energy. It's difficult walking uphill - get aching muscles and breathe heavily. Just need to take things slowly. By the way, the sketch is the south face of Diran Peak (7257m) as seen from my tent doorway camping at Ultar Meadows.

Day 46 Ghulmat and Hunza Valley

It's 10:30 am and we are having a very nice breakfast below Rakaposhi [at 7788 metres, the 27th highest mountain in the world]. Good breakfast: omlette, flat bread and dried apricots, sat outside beneath the mountain - very alpine in style, complete with gift shops. The latter sells Afghan rugs depicting the Twin Towers attack in New York, amongst other things ($50). Rakaposhi itself dominates the view from the breakfast table. Looks do-able.

12:20 pm and we are someplace short of Karimabad, stuck on a hill in the truck, opposite the Hotel Hunza Embassy. For some reason we cannot make forward progress - fuel starvation? Odd since we have just refuelled about 2 km back. Now we are rolling backwards.

About 9 pm. Ultar Meadows, camping at about 3300 metres. Strenuous walk up from Karimabad; not helped by the unwelcome return of gut problems. Started off carrying two rucksacks - very awkward - sort of one front and one back - but then gave the smaller one to one of our porters. Four hours' walking to get here - covering something like 750 metres in height, following some sort of irrigation channel most of the way - in the higher parts of the trek the channel was often blasted out of the cliff face. Working its way up and out of the village the path takes you past numerous apricot trees. (Apricots are everywhere around here - drying on roofs.) Further up the path is quite precipitous and rough, but not too steep. The final hour was pretty bad - the porter kept saying that it was just another five minutes, but it never was. Very tired: a big problem on Hot Rock is simply the lack of sleep. Also, carried a heavy load of climbing gear - including a dozen pegs I bought down in Karimabad ($40), and a peg hammer.

The view from the tent includes the 6000 metre Lady Finger (Bubuliomoting), Ultar I (7329m) and Ultar II (7388m), plus numerous other big mountains going off into the distance.

Will try and get some much needed sleep. Eaten a few biscuits - not enough but stomach sensitive - nevertheless need to eat something before taking anti-malarials. Fingers of both hands tingling a bit - I wonder if it's the altitude?

Day 45 Karakoram Highway, near Dassu

6:30 am. Currently stopped at a police checkpoint. Bad night. Went to the loo at least seventeen times - and the loo was pretty disgusting too: most Pakistani sanitation seems pretty slipshod. Worried about getting dehydrated; nothing to drink last night. T and Simon really helpful, and have had some of that orange rehydration drink. Headache. Suffering from real lack of sleep. Not much motivation left for this trip. The Karakoram Highway is certainly interesting - not so much a highway, rather a two lane(ish) rough track blasted out of the cliff face. Lots of massive drops down to the Indus river. Mountains - still only small foothills in a relative sense - are getting bigger as we head north. Rockslide halted progress yesterday - took the opportunity to go across the valley on a cableway thing - rickety but probably safe enough. 12:20 pm and we have broken down again. Some problem concerning the brakes - or rather, lack of the brakes. Simon has complained about the brakes not working - for the last forty days or so - and I would have thought that the KKH of all places demands good brakes! The usual story - they were bad and now they don't work at all. Henry has gone off to get some bit welded up. In fact, as I write this he has just returned carrying some bodged together bit of crap. Apparently just needs another half an hour to put it back. 2:15 pm and still stuck here by the roadside. 4:10 pm and unbeleiveably we have run out of diesel. Or at least I hope that's the problem. Not that good really since when the truck engine dies the steering goes - bear in mind where we are - fortunately we were pointing away from the edge when it happened. We have jerry cans - I think these will give us 50 litres. The really annoying thing is that ten minutes ago we stopped at a gas station to fill up - but for some reason we only had US dollars - which they wouldn't take. So, in the last 6 hours we have covered about 5 km. I think I'll get some climbing gear handy if we are going to keep stopping like this! At least there are lots of boulders hereabouts. 8 pm and we can see (I think) Nangar Parbat - a really massive mountain off in the distance to the east [Nangar Parbat is 8125 metres high]. Looks like cloud on the horizon. A beautiful sight.

Day 44 Islamabad

4:45 am start from the campsite. 6:20 am - so much for our early start - a mechanical banging noise when Henry drove out of the campsite first thing this morning - apparently a bolt has snapped on part of the steering arm or something. So now we have done a grand total of half a mile and are currently stuck at a PSO (Pakistani State Oil) gas station. Found an electric socket so we could plug in the kettle and so T and I could make respective cafetieres of coffee. Plus biscuits. No way could you do this in the UK - I mean plug your kettle into a gas station! Not sure what the state of play is now...I think they have gone off to get a bolt made - don't see whay they cannot carry a bolt kit on the bus. And to think I was totally fed up before all this crazy business. I guess we just wait here. Not clear why we are driving to Karimabad in anycase - seems to be an awful lot of effort for probably no climbing (rock) at all.

By the way, last night had a nice meal out in Islamabad - we tried to escape the masses, but people tend to herd together. T still doesn't have India visa - seems that Hot Rock shows no real concern or interest in trying to sort this out. There's so much 'fire-fighting' on this trip. Total lack of planning, e.g. truck maintenance, or lack thereof is a good case in point.

This gas station has its own security guard - like the banks and similar operations in Pakistan. The guard has some sort of shotgun, though it looks a bit rudimentary and cheap. Probably quite effective though. 9 am and the truck is fixed - until next time! Hopefully we can get going soon. 1:15 pm just had an awesome Afghan curry; fantastic rice and beef. Bhindi / okra still difficult to stomach - but trying to eat it a bit to see if it's possible to learn to like it - there's a lot of okra around. 190 rupees. Really good idea to stop on these long drive days and get a decent lunch.

10:05 pm and we are near Abbottabad staying in some totally skanky hotel. Horrid looking loo in particular. Still a long way to go (north to Karimabad) - today we managed just 280 km from Islamabad. I very much doubt that we will reach Gilgit tomorrow. Feeling very tired. Feeling dissolusioned about climbing even. That's not a good thing.

The interesting thing about Abbottabad is it's where the Karakoram Highway, or KKH sort of officially starts. The KKH goes north following the Indus river to the Khunjerab pass between Pakistan and China. Basically we are going to drive up the KKH as far as Gilgit and thence to Karimabad.

Day 43 Islamabad

6:15 am. Just woken up - Shell gas station. Very western looking. Think / assume we are near Islamabad. Odd, after weeks of hot weather and no rain, we have skies which are grey and laden. Usual traffic noise and some guy sweeping with a besom type broom. No queues for gas here. Should be staying at a campsite near here I think. Very few road signs in Pakistan - so never really sure where we are!

10:15 am Hotel Crown Palace, room 309: rented for the whole Hot Rock crew: we camp at the campsite, but get showers in the hotel room. Watching Star Trek. Lots of unrest amongst Hot Rockers: feel sorry for T -she's invested a lot of cash and time in this; trip lacks leadership. Rained earlier - very British. I think we are now free to travel without the police escort. Had a bit of a walk around the city: a much 'nicer' place than much of Pakistan which I have seen; but still much poverty too.

Day 42 en route to Islamabad

No real idea where we are (we are heading towards Islamabad), it's 5 pm and we've been driving since 4 am(!). We stopped once at 9 am - for a bit of crappy bread which looked - and tasted- like a chamois leather. Apart from that all I've eaten today is that and half a dozen cookies. The organisation here is totally appalling, and the usual blame game is being followed: it's always the customers' fault. Despite driving along a main road with lots of services we have stopped at the only services which doesn't have a shop. I am told it is impossible to stop elsewhere. We have a police escort - but since this is typically behond us, I think we could stop anywhere we liked. Nothing to drink apart from coffee at 3:30 am plus one swig of fizzy pop. Really annoyed. Some background to why I'm annoyed: this morning, for reasons I cannot fathom, we followed a totally crap road for about 90 km, taking something crazy, like five hours. Perhaps to be fair this was indeed the only road - but perhaps not. I cannot help feeling that it might be worth Hot Rock buying a few maps of the areas we are traveling through. Last night we stayed in a police compound at a place called Loralai - difficult to sleep because of the mosquitoes - tried sleeping on the roof of the truck - but too hot in sleeping bag; my fault - should have put up my tent. But we arrived pretty late and I knew we had a very early start - plus it's virtually impossible to open the tent locker anyhow, what with the truck being unmaintained. In the end, Simon, T and I just abandoned trying to sleep and chatted to the police who were on duty for most of the night. They took us out on 'patrol' - in reality they called in at some street vendor to buy us a bottle of coke, after driving around the streets a bit.

Day 41 en route to Quetta

Just spent a hot and mostly sleepless night on the roof of the hotel in Dalbandin; apparently what little sleep I managed to get was through the most interesting bits - there was gunfire (automatic) and there were light signals (red flashes with white flashes responding); ad-hoc commotions in the streets below. But I slept through all of this. Set off really early in the morning, still dark. Road pretty crap: something of the quality of a residential driveway which badly needs resurfacing. Stopped for breakfast in a town called Nushki. Just 20 km or so south of Afghnistan. Got a very nice plate of spicy rice from a street stall. We create a lot of interest wherever we turn up, and Nushki is no exception. One of the most noticeable things about Pakistan so far is the almost complete absence of women.

Evening: just stopped to get a meal in an unlikely looking roadside building: mud bricks, single story. Red plastic Coca Cola crates stacked outside. Again lots of interest and attention from the locals: I was shown one guy's prized camel collection (he had about seven camels). During the meal we all sat on the floor of the place and were served up okra, rice and chicken legs, with all the locals looking on. I have real difficulty with okra - I believe that the technical term which describes cooked okra is mucilaginous. This leaves little to the imagination.

Day 40 Zahedan

Parked up outside a police compound in the city of Zahedan, about 50 km from the border with Pakistan. It's 5:30 am. Worried that I am not eating enough: crappy kebabs last night (again). 8:10 am and we are still here. 27 degrees C. Henry has turned up from Tehran - he'll be driving. Should be heading off to Mir Javeh, on the Pakistan border.

11:05 am and sat in the customs' hall on the Iranian side of things. Cannot change Iranian money here - don't have very much but might be able to change it on the other side. Bought several small bottles of some cola drink - yuck. A big customs' hall -much more modern than the one back at the Turkish border crossing. The building is called the Mir Javeh Border Terminal. 11:58 am and we are no on the Pakistani side of things. Crowded, but some organisation. Lots and lots of people. Lots of dust blowing about outside. Hot winds blowing fast across the desert. 3:25 pm - we've been driving some time but now stopped at a police roadblock - we have to write all our names and passport numbers in a small ledger being passed around the back of the bus. Sand blowing about - gets all over the place - and in between one's teeth - gritty. Something like 500 km to Quetta in north-western Pakistan. 7:45 pm - we've stopped for the night in some small town about 300 km from Quetta cheap hotel. The town is called Dalbandin. Walked along the town's main road (a linear town - like a cartoon strip - watermelon shops repeating every fifty feet). Stopped by the police - very professional - had Simon, T and I surrounded. Grabbed Simon's arm - lots of guns (AK47s); ubiquitous pickup truck, complete with man in back behind electric window (lowered), wearing dark glasses: told in no uncertain terms to return to the hotel and not to walk about the town - for our own safety. At this point we were about 500 metres from the hotel, walked back - all okay so far. Tonight we sleep on the roof of the hotel - I think simply because it's very hot and there aren't enough rooms in anycase. Wish I was climbing. Long drive day tomorrow - talk of 1000 km to beyond Quetta: but there's no way we will cover that sort of distance on these roads in one day. For the first time since leaving Turkey we can get beer: available in hotel; incredibly no beer bought for Simon by Hot Rock - despite him having driven for something like 36 hours. Appallingly rude.

Day 39 Bam

5:45 am. About 125 km short of Bam; Simon driving all night. Chilly. Desert environment. Managed to sleep for about four hours - stretched out across four sets - but with annoying gap between the two pairs of seats. Not 100 % comfortable. 7:35 am and we have arrived in Bam. Long, wide, poorly surfaced roads, eucalyptus trees; no real shops as such - locals selling their goods out of ISO containers (the sort that go on container ships); no sign of any food or coffee. Already hot enough for a tee shirt.

Four and a half years ago, (26th December 2003), most of Bam was destroyed by a devastating earthquake; magnitude 6.6, leveling 70 percent of the buildings according to news reports at the time. Spent some time walking around the 'modern' part of Bam - I can see now that the ISO containers are being used as temporary shops - presumably replacing buildings destroyed in the earthquake. Some rebuilding work was evident - but the people involved in this seemed to be hopelessly ill-equiped - e.g. shovels and spades, no heavy earth moving machinary. The dust was pretty bad - it's so arid here.

On a more everyday note, found a supermarket - in a more regular building. Not big, the sort we used to have in the 1970s in the UK. Managed to spend the remains of my Iranian currency - I am followed around the store by staff afraid that I am acting in a suspicious manner. (I get this in all shops I go to, nothing specific to Iran! The best sort of shops are those on two floors - I go up and am followed up; then I go down and am followed down; up and down, up and down...keeps the shop staff fit.) Anyway, managed to buy cans of tuna, cookies, tins of pineapple and some cartons of juice. Also, managed to find an ISO containerised shop selling Iranian music CDs - have been trying to get a CD of Iranian music since Tehran - but difficult to make myself understood - there are lots of CD shops in Iran - but they seem to be selling computer games or perhaps videos rather than music - after much hand waving etc managed to buy something - goodness knows what sort of music it has on it - clearly not a proper CD but something homemade - I mean it's a CD-R disc with something written in Farsi in a marker pen.

Later in the afternoon we moved the truck to the older part of Bam, near the historical Citadel of Bam, Arg-e-Bam. This is a giant complex of buildings made from unbaked mud bricks, clay, straw and trunks of palm trees, dating from something like 300 AD. It's a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Arg-e-Bam was seriously damaged in the 2003 earthquake and is under the process of reconstruction. (High resolution satellite images before and after the earthquake ) Spent about an hour walking about the site. Once again, like so many sights in Iran, we pretty much had the place to ourselves.

2:37 pm. We have left Bam and are en route to our final Iranian city, Zahedan, in southeastern Iran, located near the borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan. Sat in the back of the truck - it's just too hot to do anything other than sit and feel hot. 44 degrees C in the shade (according to my digital thermometer on my alarm clock). Driving through seemingly endless desert terrain. Really nothing much here at all other than the road, desert and the sky and the heat. We have a police (or army) escort.

4:56 pm. Two shots fired - from our escorting patrol's 4x4 pickup. We were directed by the patrol to pull over to the left - something to do with a third vehicle the patrol had pulled over on the right hand side - this vehicle then sped off whilst being shot at. Apparently the fugitive vehicle was something to do with Afghan drug smugglers - they did not have the correct documentation or something when questioned by our escorting patrol.

Incredibly hot - now the thermometer reads 49 degrees C - that's about 120 degrees F, out of direct sun in the back of the truck. And then you get the odd even hotter blast of air in from outside. No habitation or anything on this desert road - except once when we stopped at some sort of army base, and got some ice cold water. Very welcome: we have nothing cold on the truck.