dalbandin police station

the escort group on the pakistani side consisted of more people than i had expected. there were elias and anna who i already knew, of course. together with me and a dimitri, a russian, we made up the backpacker section of the group. additionally, there were two friends from serbia and bosnia on motorbikes and matthieu, a young french bikepacker. together with him and elias, i shared the front seat of an absolute monster of a vehicle, a huge converted army truck belonging to petra from germany.

there was always at least one levie car accompanying this group, although, sitting in that truck behind 2 inch bulletproof windows, it felt more like we were escorting them, not the other way around. at least every hour or so, we had to stop at a checkpoint, show our passports, and wait for a new police vehicle to escort us. it started out fine, but after some time, the constant stopping and waiting, which could be organized a lot more efficiently, drove especially the drivers insane.

the landscape on the first day wasn't too scenic, but fascinating nonetheless. mostly just empty, flat desert with a few camels sprinkled throughout. we did however see a very recent train wreck right next to our road. also, petras truck was so huge that she snapped two wires hanging above the street in a village we went through, so i was assigned to be on the roof and hold up the cables. when we finally arrived in our safe house, the police station in dalbandin, where we would be spending our night, we cooked some food together and got settled in an empty room.Read more