Skardu Skardu Skardu Oh people have been telling me to go to Skaro for about one year and finally just a couple of weeks ago I got to see Skardudo for myself and now I want to tell you whether it's worth going to Skardudo or whether perhaps you should go to the neighboring Musa instead much be revealed in this video but first of all let me tell you a little bit about Scotty Skardudough is basically the Gateway to all the other attractions and places all across Palestine which is part of
Gilgit-baltistan this is where you would come if you wanted to access places like K to do site planes or even nanga parbat I'm gonna give you a little spoiler skardu left a really special impression on me but I'm gonna go back to the beginning and tell you all about my journey there are two ways to get to skardu from the rest of Pakistan and let's take a slum about as an example you can either fight or you can take the road look I'm not gonna lie to you if you take the road it's gonna be a really long journey probably about 20 hours and that is without the possibility of landslides but along the way you're gonna get to see some incredible places including the valleys of naran and possibly kaghan as well as babu sar that was our past is basically a road that goes up to over 4170 meters that is really really high and then you'll get to drive along part of the Karakoram highway probably the most scenic road in the world and then at one point you're gonna turn off onto a tiny little road that's not very well maintained and eventually after about 10 hours you might get Skardu it didn't have that much time so I flew here's the thing about the flight it set me back $200 for a one-hour flight
and that's all because there is only one airline serving this route which means they basically have a monopoly doesn't matter ultimately the views out of the window more than made up for it you fly into Skardu among some of the world's most majestic peaks and you land at what is probably one of the most scenic airports in the world I am not exaggerating our friend Mustapha . Thoreau there picked us up from the airport and his big 4x4 and that was really the beginning of our Skardu adventure
nothing could quite prepare me for what I saw next, to be honest with you guys I expected Scotty to be a little bit like Hunza but it is not at all like Kunz except for the really crazy massive mountains in Hunza you've got the one big road the Karakoram highway that directs all traffic in a singular direction in Skardu there is no such road and the blossom comes late in Skardu as well much later than in who's which means that we have the place all to ourselves it was practically empty which was great but it did have some drawbacks, for example, some places being literally shut down so
this is the famous lower cultural lake in Skardu the one that you see in all the pictures the heart-shaped one with the amazing resort the resort is closed you just get on with it and you find alternatives this is a perpetually
but guys we have a lot to cover and very little time so I'm gonna whip through all the other places ISIL and Scarlet the very goopy so that you can decide whether it's worth going there no after Africa to our lake we decided to make our way towards shigar fort on our way to Chicago out of the corner of my eye out of the window of the car I caught a glimpse of a place that looked really quite interesting so we had to take our 4x4 and drive down this really tiny little dirt track until we got to a place that looked like a pasture in the middle of the mountains right by a winding blue river
I've always imagined places like this to be a ASIS in the middle of a desert and right here you got an oasis in the middle of the mountains surrounded by rock rock inhospitable inaccessible rock and yet here we are anyway from this green pasture we continued along our way to shigar a fort I have seen pictures of shigar fort before but there's a few things that I only found out once I got there shigar fort is a 17th century fort which is kind of nestled in the middle of the mountains and its name apparently translates to rock fort or the fort on the rock it was recently restored by the a Gahan foundation and now there is a really lovely boutique hotel in the fort so yes guests can actually stay inside the food in the fort rooms isn't that cool but it is quite pricey so not really for most people's and budgets from shigar fort food we continued along the way towards mantoka waterfall it was a good couple of hours before we got there because the road is really quite bumpy and although the drive is really slow it is oh so scenic [Music]
eventually, we arrived at mantoka our waterfall
it's really pretty and you can have lunch there you can have some freshly caught river trout right in the restaurant at mantoka from under her waterfall we went back to Skardu along that ever bumpy road and on the way, we stopped at the place that for me topped all the other places I've seen probably in the north of Pakistan trust me this one is good
Welcome to the saw Franca cold desert this place is an actual desert with sand and sand dunes and all that jazz but it's not anywhere in the south of the country it's actually at an elevation of a good couple thousand meters above sea level in the middle of the Karakoram mountains landscapes like this are things that you normally see in like fantasy drawings and fantasy films it didn't seem real I could not get my head around the fact that this place is really really it's right there the cold desert of Skardu and by the way, it's not the only one okay there's just one more place that I really want to share with you and if you are not familiar with the religious history of Pakistan you're gonna be pretty surprised about this one because we stumbled upon a place called the giant Buddha Rock yes this is an actual stone carving that depicts the Buddha this statue was created in the ninth century
that's about 1200 years ago given the fact that Pakistan is the Islamic Republic and probably not very widely known for religious diversity this is pretty surprising but it's only one of the many buddha rocks dotted across the northern parts of Pakistan
okay guys that's it for me I wanted to show you what I saw of Skardu and I'm sure there's a lot that I missed so I can't wait to go back and see the rest so here's my argument for going to Skardu do-over Hansa but going to Skardudo I believe that you will be contributing towards their evening out of tourism across the north because as many people know there are many attractions and destinations in the North that are right now suffering from over-tourism especially in Skardu those neighboring Hunza so your card might be a slightly more difficult destination to get to the road might be a bit bumpier the infrastructure of restaurants and hotels may not be as well developed as Hunza but you'll be seeing a place that is so beautiful so mind-blowing Lee epic and doing something good for tourism in Pakistan..