Why Pakistan Should Be Your Next Adventure Travel Destination

I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and staggered out of my tent into the cool morning air.

The predawn sky was a soft dove gray, while the frost-hardened grass crunched pleasantly underfoot. Snow-capped mountains rose on either side, their sheer rock faces dwarfing our solitary camp. Watching for the first rays of sunlight on the distant peaks, I listened to the icy stream gushing and the birds chirping. Cows grazed nearby while large yaks roamed the steeper slopes, the terrain of the rarely seen Himalayan ibex and the even less seen snow leopards.

This is not the first time during this trip that I have wondered how so many nature-loving travellers – myself included – have overlooked Pakistan.

Five days earlier, I had landed in Islamabad, where I met my trekking group. The city, a purpose-built capital built in 1967, is strikingly green, receiving enough rain to remain lush even in the intense heat of May and June, when temperatures can reach 43°C. It was quieter than I expected, and easy to navigate on your own.

With tourism relatively uncommon, people were openly curious about our presence. One of my fellow travellers proved particularly popular with photo requests; he happened to resemble various moustachioed Australian cricketers (Merv Hughes, Travis Head, a noticeably taller David Boon).

Cricket is hugely popular in Pakistan, played everywhere from city streets to mountain valleys. Imran Khan, the captain of the 1992 world champion team, became prime minister and retained strong popular support after being imprisoned on dubious charges. (“Talking politics is a national pastime,” said Aneeqa Ali, founder of the Pakistani travel agency The Mad Hatters, whom I met in Islamabad. But religion, she added, is more taboo.)

Islamabad sits at the foot of the Margalla Hills National Park, a haven for urbanites fleeing the heat (and a population of leopards). Early one morning, I joined a local trail running group, panting and whistling as I climbed switchbacks carpeted with pine needles to a peak overlooking the city. I could hear the distant sound of traffic below, and birdsong. We ran along the ridgeline and back down to the parking lot, a warm-up for the main event of the trip.

Pakistan offers many opportunities for trekking and mountaineering, particularly in the Karakoram range, adjacent to the Himalayas, which includes some of the world's highest peaks and valleys of breathtaking beauty. Yet tourism figures do not reflect this reality.

In 2019, approximately 28,000 foreigners visited Pakistan on tourist visas, compared to 1.2 million tourist arrivals in Nepal and nearly 11 million in India. Security perceptions dating back to the September 11 attacks, the government’s lack of interest in promoting tourism, the relatively small number of tour operators offering trips, and a lack of information for interested travelers are just some of the factors contributing to this phenomenon.

In 2020, while exploring the mountains of his home country, Pakistani entrepreneur Umer Latif realized how less-visited regions could benefit from a responsible tourism model. He founded trekking operator Beyond the Valley, and at an adventure travel summit last year, he reconnected with Erica Kritikides, global product manager at travel agency Intrepid Travel. It didn’t take long to convince Kritikides to form a partnership, and in 2024, they launched Intrepid’s first trekking tours in Pakistan.

While traveling with Intrepid on one of their first departures, I found myself deep in the Nangma Valley, looking down at the rocky trail winding between two 3,300-foot rock faces.

From Islamabad, our group of 12 (including Kritikides and Latif and our ever-cheerful guide, Muneer Alam, from Baltistan) flew an hour north over a spectacular landscape of colossal peaks, landing in the gateway town of Skardu. This is Baltistan, part of the territory of Gilgit-Baltistan, sometimes called Little Tibet. This high-altitude region is home to five of the world’s 14 8,000-metre peaks, including K2, the second-highest point on the planet and one of the most serious challenges in mountaineering.

The area is popular with Pakistanis fleeing the sweltering heat of cities (especially as heatwaves have become more intense and frequent due to the climate crisis), and flights from Islamabad to Skardu are booked months in advance, Latif says. The number of hotels in Skardu has more than quadrupled in the past decade, putting a strain on infrastructure. Not everyone is here to hike: “Pakistanis just like to relax,” Alam tells me with a laugh.

We headed to the village of Kanday, at the foot of the Nangma Valley, along narrow, winding roads carved into cliffs above jade-green rivers. That’s where we met the 26 porters and leaders who would accompany us on our trek, all from the immediate area. Booming local tourism means they now have less need to travel far from home in the hope of landing work on difficult and sometimes dangerous expeditions on K2—the trekking here is much easier and the pay is the same, Latif said. Intrepid also provides tents, food allowances and insurance for its porters (which isn’t always the case).

The Nangma Valley is a great place to take advantage of the early boom in tourism and the economic opportunities that come with it. Visitors are as excited to be there as many locals (especially those in the trekking industry) are to see them. I think it’s impossible to sustain, but developing sustainable tourism—prioritizing hyperlocal employment, respect for cultures, and generosity—can create a model that works for everyone.

Ibrahim Ali, one of our porter team, told us that before Latif’s first clients arrived in 2022, fewer than five trekking groups would visit each season from May to September. Previously, Ali said, organizers would say no one wanted to come here. But this year, by mid-June, about 40 treks had already left. (We saw one other group, as well as a solo trekker with a guide, during our trip.)

It’s hard to imagine how this place—full of fragrant, traditionally sacred juniper trees, a glacial stream rushing down the valley, grand views in every direction—could have been overlooked. I thought our first campsite, a flat, wooded area between towering peaks, was something special. But the bar was quickly raised the next day when I crested a hill near the top of the valley and looked down on our second camp. Our tents (already assembled by the team of porters who had set out on the trail ahead of us) were pitched on an open meadow near the stream, at the foot of the towering Green Tower rock face. The surrounding mountains included the intimidating Shingu Charpa; Cho Nono, with its needle-like pinnacles, said to resemble vanished hunters, according to porter Liaqat Ali; and Amanat Brakk, named after Ali's son by the Hungarian climbers who first reached the summit in 2022. Many of the peaks in the area remain unexplored. Aside from the cows, we had the place to ourselves.

The hike wasn’t exactly easy, but it was doable for most people in good physical shape. Ranging from 9,500 to 13,100 feet (plus an optional hike to Amin Brakk Base Camp at 14,750 feet), the trail was steep in places and sometimes soft underfoot. We stopped regularly in the shade to catch our breath, hydrate, and snack on the trail mix Alam had prepared for us.

Arriving at the camp, we were treated to tea and chef Khadim Hussain’s chicken noodle soup. Latif said Hussain had been to K2 dozens of times, including on winter expeditions. “So he really knows what to feed people at altitude,” he explained. On the last night, in addition to staples like daal and pilau rice, he prepared a dinner of “mountain pizza” and fried chicken (live birds were brought with us), followed, remarkably, by flan.

The afternoons were naturally devoted to cricket. I watched the porters politely play softball with their guests, reserving the aggressive fast balls for themselves. It started to snow, so we found ourselves huddled in the mess tent, drinking tea and comparing the symptoms of altitude and meeting celebrities.

The scenery may be one of Pakistan’s main draws, but repeat visits seem to be driven by deeper connections to the country. Aneeqa Ali, who also runs Intrepid’s culture-focused tours, said that while tourists come to see the mountains, he “thinks it’s the hospitality of the people that keeps them coming back.”

On one of our afternoons at camp, I stood on the grassy pasture in front of jagged peaks tickling the brooding sky above. But what caught my (amused) attention was the Pakistani-Canadian-Australian cricket team huddled together, heads together, earnestly plotting a game plan to demolish their opponents. Ali was right. I may have come to see the mountains, but the fun I had with the people along the way is why I will return.