Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
LAKE¨SAREZ:¨AN¨ACCIDENT¨WAITING¨TO¨HAPPEN
Geologits warn that Tajikitan faces a potential natural disater of Biblical proportions
in the shape of tark 3239m Lake Sarez, a disarmingly placid-looking body of turquoise
water formed in 1911 when an earthquake dislodged an entire mountain side into the
path of the Murgab River, obliterating the villages of Usoi and Sarez. A deep lake, now
60km-long and half the size of Lake Geneva, gradually formed behind the 770m-high
natural dam of rocks and mud known as the Usoi Dam. This 'dam' is currently con-
sidered table. However, if an earthquake broke or breached it, a huge wall of water
could come sweeping down the mountain valleys, wiping away roads and villages as far
away as Uzbekitan and beyond. Experts warn that it would be the larget lood ever
witnessed by human eyes. Villagers in the Bartang Valley (who would be mot afected)
have been drilled on escape procedures. These are pretty simple - head for the hills
when the doomsday alert arrives.
Visiting Lake Sarez requires advance planning as permits are required from Dush-
anbe. These can take a month to issue, and even then they are usually only available as
part of a tour: ask Khorog agencies. The Sarez trailhead is at Barchadiev which, along
with lovely nearby Savnob, has hometays.
Homestay owners can help organise
guides if you want to cross over the pass to
the Ravmed Valley (two tough days, camp-
ing en route). Once across, there are further
(unsigned) homestays at Ramved village and
at Khijez, 18km downstream, where that val-
ley meets the Basid road again. Ask a local to
help you find them.
A Khorog-Basid UAZ minibus runs
between Basid and Khorog most days
(40TJS), leaving Khorog around lunch-
time, but there's little other traffic, public
or private.
Khorog
Хорог
%
3522 / POP 28,000 / ELEV 2100M
Cowering beneath arid, bare-rock peaks,
likeable little Khorog is the GBAO's adminis-
trative centre and the Pamirs' one real town.
It's a fine place to meet fellow travellers and
organise exploration into the region's re-
mote mountainscapes and fabulous valleys
including the fabled Wakhan. Community
tourism organisation PECTA, along with
several small tour agencies, make chartering
4WD transport much easier from here than
from anywhere else in the region apart, per-
haps, from Murgab.
Khorog has one of the best educated pop-
ulations of any town in Central Asia. English
seems much more widely spoken here than
in Dushanbe, while the laid-back Ismaili
form of Islam means that Muslim strictures
are generally less widely observed.
Although at an altitude of over 2000m,
Khorog's daytime summer temperatures can
sometimes climb into the sweltering 40s.
September is the most pleasant time here.
There are few sights per se, though the
lovably Soviet-style
regional¨ museum
(lenin 105; foreigner/local 10/1TJS;
h
8am-noon
& 1-4.30pm Mon-Fri)
has some mildly inter-
esting curiosities and the elegantly de-
signed
central¨park
(
h
6am-midnight)
is a
8
Getting¨There¨&¨Away
A taxi to the cable car costs around 150TJS
from Rushan, curiously not much more than
you'd pay from Khorog where vehicles for hire
are actually easier to ind. getting back you'll
generally need to pre-arrange a pick-up as
there is minimal traic on the Bartang road nor
shade in which to wait. Walking back to Rushan
(26km) is punishing.
gulsha at the irst Jizeu homestay can often
organise a car to Khorog for 200TJS to 250TJS.
But it will take time as he'll have to walk to the
cable car with you to get mobile phone recep-
tion (then only Megafon).
Basid & Bardara Басид & Бардара
The lovely village of Basid, 85km off the
Pamir Highway, boasts shrines, scenic
forests, good hiking, two homestays and
the possibility of joining
PamirLink
(www.
pamirlink.org)
, a three-week live-in-Basid
working holiday experience.
There are two more homestays, 9km up
a rough side road in Bardara which has
two more shrines, a village ice-house (
kha-
lodelnik
) and trails leading up to summer
pastures and beyond. Ask a local to point
you in the direction of a homestay.
