Tashkorgan (2)

In the heart of the old town is the one major historical site Tashkorgan is famous for, the 1300 year old Stone Fort (or Princess Fort). It is also one of the few ancient sites out this way that has not as yet been tastelessly restored or completely rebuilt for the 'benefit' of tourists. It is thankfully still in its natural ruined state.

As we wandered around the fort we came to a back entrance into it and not wanting to get stung a ridiculous amount to see it officially we climbed up the steep path and entered this way. From on top of the fort you get a fantastic view of the river and grassland below (perhaps 2 kms wide and 20+ kms long) and the mountains all around. We took our time wandering around and taking pictures till we were spotted by the only official working at the site and beat a hasty retreat back the way we had come before she caught up with us. We figured it would be wise to avoid the area of the fort for the rest of the day lest we be recognised and went back to the hotel till dinner time.

The next morning we took the bikes and rode up towards the mountains to the west of the town. We found a small dirt road that looked as though it lead into a valley in the mountains and when we asked a local he confirmed this was the road through to Afghanistan. Our intention was to only go a few kms up this road to get a better view of the valley from a more elevated position so we set off.

The dirt road followed a small stream but after a couple of kms the road became a track then the track and the stream became one. We could go no further so we stopped and took a few photos before turning round and starting back down again.

We had not gone far when we were met by a well dressed man and woman who introduced themselves with a flick of their ID badges as local police. They had followed us up here (possibly after others had told them we were here) and wanted to know what we were doing. We explained we just wanted to get some nice photos and only intended to go a few kms up towards the hills. They informed us that the mountains were full of army personnel and that they were off limits to us. They then took our passports and asked us to ride down and wait for them at the main road.

At the main road we were met by 2 more policemen and 3 army soldiers. One of the policemen asked to see Neil's camera and started looking through all the photos. He explained that we were not allowed to take photos of the mountains at all which was a nonsense given that every tourist that has ever passed through Tashkorgan will have photographed these same mountains themselves but at this particular moment we were not really in a position to argue. Fortunately Neil didn't have any recent pictures of the mountains on his camera but I did.

While the policeman was busy with Neil I quietly removed the memory card from my camera, keeping it inside my bar bag the whole time, and hid it away. As it turned out I was not asked to show my camera at all - perhaps they thought we only had 1 between us.

Both the soldiers and the police recorded our passport details while the policewoman who had stopped us initially took her shoes and stockings off to wash the mud off them and her feet in the nearby stream. When she was done we were informed she would take our passports and return them to us later in the day at our hotel. We apologised for getting her all muddy on our account and then, free to go, headed back into town and our hotel for a rest and some lunch.

At 4.00 the policewoman came to the hotel to drop off our passports. She explained one last time that the mountains were off limits to us as this was a frontier region patrolled by the army and that we would need to stick to the town or the grassland from now on.