This is not just another safarnama but this is yet another safarnama. Gang of nine went out for a trip to northern areas. Let me introduce you to out nine characters

Characters of Story
Bosy, Tony, Baig Shahab, TT, PracticalGuy , Maulana, Toffe, MFS and Relaxation.

Trip started: 20th July 2004
Starting Location: Karachi.
Expected End of Trip: 5th August 2004

Favorite fruit: Pear
Favorite song: Dhuwan (from the movie Charas)
Favorite game: Court Piece (the cards game)

Day0:
Everyone was excited. Everything seemed good. At 8:00 AM we started gathering at the station. We all got on to our bogey settled down and waited for train to leave. But how can the start be so simple. Yes u guessed that right, TT was still left to come. Someone called and he was on his way, but the time was 8:25 and it was only 5 mins before the train leaves. He came only a few moments before the train left but he was on board. DAMN we just missed one chance :D.

Finally we were off to Rawalpindi. We created a lot of mess in our cabin, our cabin was good we weren’t expecting one. In our Train Trip most of us became expert in Court Piece (cards game). TT played the most game and lost as many, Tony was the lucky one getting best cards always and Baig Sahab was purana paapi of this game.
Later in the night toffee’s stomach got upset as he was eating too much. He started polluting the air and guess what, Mfs could resist puking (yeah disgusting).

Day1:
Next morning we reached Rawalpindi after a tiring trip of 28 hrs. No one was able to move, so just laid on the floor of station. Someone had to come to pick from station but I guess we weren’t lucky enough.
After waiting for about 1 hour we left in search of hotel. That is not an easy task with so much of luggage. We got a better hotel after searching for 1 hour or so, and now it was food time. We got dressed up real fast and off for the food.
In the eve, we went to Faisal mosque and the place is a sheer beauty. TT was totally flipped on Islamabad, he cant wait to find a job at Islamabad. We offered maghrib prayers and off to Jinnah Super Market. There TT and Toffee reassured themselves that they just have to come back here. While we were traveling on the Murree road of Rawalpindi we saw a building named “University of Institute of Management Science”. What on God’s earth was that. We were unable to understand what it was. Was it a university or an institute or university of institute :P (what was that after all).
 

Day3:
We were off to Naran (yeaahhh). It was a long trip and we first have to reach Mansera and then from Mansera we took a bus to Naran. By today Toffe’s stomach went crazy. He never realize the aftermaths of eating, only we had to face the consequences :P. We stopped at Hassan Abdal and took a few pictures in farms. Here is a very famous cadet college. There is a very big Ordinance factory at Havelian City.

We reached mansera around 4, had our food and then off to Naran in another bus. Naran is 3 hours from mansera but we never knew that our three hour trip would be ONE of our memorable trips.

The coach that we had was a real pathetic one. The engine conditions were extremely bad but the driver just forced the car to the destination. We stopped at Paras (a small town of Kaghan Valley) for a tea break had Pears (here we never realized that pears will become our favorite fruit). After stopping for 20 mins we restarted our journey. It was already dusk now and we have decided that NO TRAVELING DURING DARK. But I guess we have to change our plan. This was not the only change of plan, but the coach also had some plans for us. The coach fuse box got burst. Ok now this is scary, consider yourself with large mountains, pitch black area and only the lights of cell phone (and ofcourse the cell phones were out of signals). We enquired the driver of problem and he goes, Pathan style: “Woo khochaa gaarii ka phuuss urh gaya”. On his style and under such conditions, we couldn’t help laughing. There were two Punjabi guys in our coach. This gave them an opportunity to make fun of the poor guy. Those two  made the phatans life miserable and we never stopped laughing. This fuse problem occurred thrice and the last one was the most dangerous of all. It was right where the land slide was happening. Even this didn’t stopped those two guys and they were constantly creating problem for the pathan.
After like 10 mins stop we then followed the lights of another coach to find the right direction for us and reached naran. Yes the trip was scary and it was actually cold in naran. We just left our things in hotel and went out for food as we were starving. This night was not a good one for Bosy, because he had a high fever.

Day4:
As it was night when we came in Naran, we never got the chance to witness the beauty of Naran. the next morning when we came out of our hotels we were actually stunned. Naran is an extremely beautiful place, large snow capped mountains (even in mid July there were a few), lots and lots of greenery and ofcourse the mesmerizing river. We all were excited about this place. There were lots of places to visit (according to local people) but first we decided to go to Lalazar and Saif-ul-muluk.

                                          
Lalazar, is surely one of the most beautiful hill tops but the roads to lalazar and certainly not. We cannot actually call them roads; it was direct climbing of mountains. The road was so narrow that at times only one jeep could pass through. We drove in such conditions for like 30 mins and reached the top. The place is worth seeing. The weather conditions were extremely great, it was drizzling. Here we witnessed some trees that had hollow trunk. We explored the area for 2 hours or so. Although bosy and toffee were the most lazy of all, they usually do not prefer to walk :P.
Our next stop was Lake Saif-ul-Muluk. Maulana was in favor of hiking to the lake, but most of us didn’t like the idea :P. We saw a few large glaciers on our way to the lake.
We didn’t like the idea of hiking up to the lake, but we did walk around the lake. The lake is a master piece. Some guide told us that no one knows the exact depth of the lake, reason being the icy cold water (that’s interesting).
It took us 40 minutes to walk at the opposite end of the lake. Here one can only find the local people. Temperature was getting lower as we were moving towards the deep of lake but the adventure was rising. We crossed a small portion of water which was only knee deep. It took of us 8-10 seconds to cross it, but 10 mins to make our feet warm again. They simply went numb.
The day was amazing, we came back to hotel around 7 and started preparing for the next day

                                                       

Day5:
Noorie Top, nearly last point of Pakistan. Indian soil was 45 mins from that place. As usual the so called road was not good, but by now we were prone to such places. This was the MOST beautiful place we have ever seen in our life. A few mountains still had snow left for us. The place is located 17368 feet above the ground. There were a few families who came from the other side. Helipad shown in the picture is one of the last helipads of Pakistan. We could only spend 2 hours at this place, because this place is 4 hours from Naran which means 8 hours of traveling.

                                                

Day6:
This day was dedicated to the beauties of Naran (I mean the natural beauties :P). We walked by the river side and actually managed to jump on one small island. We played Court piece (official tour game) on this island. On our way back we had a chance to get rid off TT :P, but somehow me and bosy killed that chance. We took a lift from tractor because no one was willing to walk 5 kilometers to hotel. Everyone jumped on the tractor and TT was the last one. TT was not stable when the tractor guy accelerated and TT was about to fell off the machine. Bosy and I saved the little chap. Damn we missed it again :P.

Day 7:
Which side of bed we woke up this morning? We actually had no idea of what we have to face today. We have to reach Mingora today. Mingora is small but developed city of swat. For that first we have to go Abbotabad, then to Mardan and finally to Mingora. Our first driver drove fairly fast. Bosy toffee TT and me started feeling nausea so we asked the driver to stop at some place. But we never knew that this was just the beginning of the end :P. We reached abbotabad around 1 PM and switched coaches. Our second driver was even worse, he drove at a speed of 120Km/hr and on the opposite side of road. There were a few incidents where we could have head on collision at such enormous speed. The weather conditions were extremely bad, it was very hot and very dry as well. Finally after a dangerous ride of 3 hours we reached Mardan.
Again we waited approx 30 mins for the next bus to mingora. This third driver was the worst. We can surely call him a superlative degree of pathan (no offenses). This guy was racing at the sharp turns of Swat Mountains :S. We sure had a bumpy ride of more than 11 hours.

This is not the end, its just Part1 of our Safarnama. Stay tuned for Part 2 in next edition.