The trouble with horses is…

The next twelve days were hectic, rushed and most of all uncertain. From Chilas the weather got substantially colder and the road began to climb. At Gunar Farm the first ice appeared on the road and at Teleche the real mountains began incredibly with, Nanga Parbat (naked mountain) the eighth highest mountain in the world. We were entering Pakistan ’s Northern Areas. I met some lovely people on the way including one Shah Jahan at Gunar Farm and the staff of Shaheen Flour mill who gave me a free bag of bran for the horses. However.

On my final stop before Gilgit something terrible happened. I’d decided to stop at a hotel in the village of Pari , (approximately 30kms from Gilgit). It was cold and for the first time on the entire trip I’d decided to stable both mares outside whilst I slept in the common room nearby. A big mistake. At 2am I woke with a nagging field that I should check on the animals. I can’t explain it otherwise. As I opened the outside door, three lights suddenly went berserk next to Sparks and Kabul . They stunned me at first and I didn’t immediately comprehend until I made out three human silhouettes running away through the darkness. I yelled and ran after them not quite believing what had happened. But the cretins had a good start on me and were soon lost in the maze of nearby houses. I checked Kabul’s rope and it was untied. Please note that she never moves during the night. This was the first time her rope had come undone.

I ran back inside to find the hotel Malick who refused to wake up despite all my shouting. His impish assistant was curiously absent. Whilst I was packing my belongings to shift outside, three oafish scruffy men rolled into the dorm. They said they were the ones previously outside. I asked them what they were doing? Apparently they were deputies who’d been checking my animals under the instigation of the hotel owner. Another question. Why did you run? The reply. Because we thought you were the hotel owner. It was a ruse. I eventually awoke the hotel owner who denied the charge. I didn’t sleep much for the rest of that night. It was December 20th. Eleven days to go.

Horses and headaches

On the 21st December I reached Gilgit, the biggest town in the Northern Areas and the hub of all activity. Huge rock faces enclosed the city; the last major port of civilisation before Kashgar. A mixed bag of different races and dialects. Bustling markets and bushy beards alongside the raging Gilgit River . A place of many friends. One of my favourite stops in Pakistan^[1] Good old Riaz Raja Ahmed Khan ‘escorted’ me to the PTDC motel where I was to stay for the next 3 nights. Horses were settled with fresh grass and corn but my troubles were just beginning.

Gilgit is the biggest and only major market for horses in the Northern Areas. There are four polo teams that play here and plenty of buyers. People buy and sell here so what were the problems in selling mine?

Firstly it was cold. The cost of food, especially grass, in Gilgit is incredibly high (double that of Chilas further down the KKH). Secondly, most of the polo players were at their homes in the remote countryside or playing at a polo tournament in Chilas). Thirdly, selling horses in Gilgit isn’t easy due to a local chap who has a monopoly on the import of horses from Southern Pakistan . Finally, both mares required collecting from the Chinese border at Sost which involved hiring a truck and negotiating snowy icy roads.

There were other issues as well. The Chinese border closes on the 31 st December. All foreigners and Pakistanis have to travel in a specially agreed ‘tour’ vehicle operated by NATCO transport authority in Pakistan . No Pakistani’s are allowed to cross the border after 25 th December under the China-Pak “friendship agreement”. No foreigner worth his salt would be crossing the 4700m Khunjerab pass at the end of December. The number of passengers crossing was uncertain and may well be zero. If I was the only one, the transport authority, NATCO, would have to make a special booking for me which would cost 8500Rs. I only had 4000 Rs to my name.

I also had three school visits to plan, Christmas day to organize and a raft of small jobs to do before I left Pakistan .

Fortunately I did have allies. On the 22nd December, I obtained the assistance of Ashraf Gul the captain of the Power and Water Department (PWD) polo team. He spread the word about the sale of both mares to all remaining polo teams. He also visited all the haunts where polo players are known to hang out. I visited the ‘horse market’ where two scruffy men offered a humiliating price for both mares and between many other jobs sat at the PTDC motel whilst many people came and rubbed chins, gesticulated and promised to come back. They never did. The 23^rd of December arrived.^[2]

Morning began well. The British High Commission in Islamabad had sponsored two maroon coloured high-tech horse blankets for the ride ahead and I was able to collect them in Gilgit. They proved to be invaluable in the days to come. I also retrieved a parcel that I’d posted a year earlier from India . It contained hiking boots, maps, gloves and sufficient cold weather gear to get to Kashgar.^[3]

Yet, still people came, promising to return and never did. The PTDC staff never thought to take names or numbers (despite constantly reminders) and the outlook got bleaker and bleaker. In the afternoon I rode out on the horses with big FOR SALE signs on Kabul . Curious onlookers gathered like flies whenever I stopped. Again lots of promises. I lowered the asking price to half and rode around all the major stables. Then, in one heady moment everything seemed suddenly to work out. A polo player on the PWD team offered to buy Sparks for Polo and a local stall owner offered to buy Kabul . They even offered a higher price! I couldn’t believe it. The deal was just about to go through when I dropped the news about Sust. It bombed. It turned out that nobody wanted to retrieve the horses from so far away.

At this point the only source of interest was the Northern Area Scouts Polo team but they would only purchase the horses in Gilgit. Everybody knew that I had to sell the horses and the offered price got lower and lower. Various phone calls came from Chilas expressing interest but nothing concrete. People made demands which I met and then they made more.

Could I continue? This was a truly awful position to be in and caused me no end of uncertainty. Finishing at Gilgit had a somehow hollow feel to it after two and a half months on the road. Further up the KKH the chances didn’t look good either. Nobody kept horses in Hunza (105kms) or in Sust (200kms). The only slim chance was in the Chapurson valley, near to the Afghanistan border. The Chapurson valley has long had a tradition of trade across the Afghan border with the people of the Pamirs. There are no roads so horses are still widely used for trade as well as for polo.

So what options did I have? (in order of preference):

No interested party in Gilgit was willing to send a friend to meet me at Sust. Full stop. Don’t ask me why? Even after discounting the mares to accommodate the cost of a truck, no one was willing to pay for one. They had me over a barrel. Given the tangled web of money options available and the uncertain nature of ‘buyers,’ ‘option two’ looked the mostly likely. I would have to accompany the mares back in a truck to Gilgit in order to complete the sale and see they had a good future home. The cost of a truck was the same as the current asking price for one mare. Yet it would be reasonable to say that the both mares have served me well and their value to me cannot be measured in monetary terms. The achievement of the ride, the schools and the future of the mares was more important and who knows; perhaps fate had something more in store for these two equines.

Plans were eventually set. On the 24^th December I saddled up, re-shoed the horses at NA Scout’s stables and set out into the night from Gilgit, heading for the Aga Khan Education Service (AKES) office in Nagar valley. Since the next day was Christmas, I had arranged to leave both mares at their office and return to Gilgit for Xmas dinner. AKES operates a series of ‘Diamond Jubilee’ schools throughout the Northern Areas. Many of them are operated in partnership with the local community. The plan was to visit three AKES supported and recognized schools over the next five days. AKES is a partner organization of R4E. Please click here to read more.

It was night when I left. Riding by day was a luxury during this busy time. A ray of light broke the darkness when the Deputy Commissioner (DC) of Police pulled over in his Toyota landcruiser and offered to buy both mares for use in Lahore . But he wouldn’t commit and it later transpired that he’d mysteriously not realized that neither was a thoroughbred!! No comments on that last sentence. We reached the AKES office the following morning after a cold night spent camping on the way.

Christmas dinner

Medina Guesthouse is the main stopover for every foreigner who passes through Gilgit. But today it was curiously empty. The owner is a wild chap called M. Yacoob who had agreed to have a go at cooking a full Xmas dinner!! And so he had. There were fifteen of us present; myself, PTV, a British/Canadian lady who’d been living in Pakistan for the past 20+ years called Roina and the Guesthouse staff. The party started at 1830.

If anybody ever passes through Medina Guesthouse in the future just ask Yacoob if he’ll cook you his now famous Roast potatoes. With his army of cooks, they made a fantastic dinner that made England feel that little bit closer; roast chicken, roast potatoes, mixed peas and carrots, gravy. This was all finally topped off by rather dubious Christmas cake. The bakery had used chocolate sauce instead of chocolate icing and in the warm heat of the living room the chocolate sauce had.

Final arrangements?

I didn’t return to the AKES office until late the next day. Such was the priority to finalise arrangements for the mares. It would take a book to describe my emotions and thoughts at this time; mainly anger at the spinelessness of people to do as they say and their lack of honour. I was determined to see both animals had a good home. On the 26 th December I contacted the Deputy Commissioner (DC) and arranged for a truck to be made available from Sust back to Gilgit. “Leave it to me, you have nothing to worry about.” I wanted to try and avoid returning to Gilgit at the last minute as it was inviting further problems. Despite the almost guaranteed assurance of delivery by the DC, Ashraf Gul and myself, all ‘interested parties’ would only pay on delivery. It was unreasonable to ask them to pay half up front and to write me a dated money order which I could later cash at the border!! I had already lowered the price for them and guaranteed delivery. Considering the fact they wouldn’t send a man to meet me at Sost these people just took the biscuit.

The hopeful buyer : Northern Area Scouts.

The shaky arrangements : I would accompany the horses back on the day of the 30th December, make the transaction and return to Sust by way of hitchhiking on local trucks.