Karachi to Gwadar: A road trip
I am hardly an adventurer. Unless I am on my road bike, I stray away from exploring places. If I am visiting a restaurant where I have dined before and liked a particular item on the menu, I’d order it again and again. I detest public washrooms, and have trouble sleeping on beds not my own. So, when Ali and my long due plan to visit Gwadar — the most popular and controversial port city of Pakistan, situated on the edge of the Balochistan province, at a distance of almost 650km from Karachi — by road in a car began to materialise, I was not only surprised but afraid. Sitting on a toilet seat at 4am on a Friday morning at home, having put in less than four hours of sleep the night before and not being able to ring Ali from sleep — which I later found lasted half of what I could get in — I harboured serious doubts about our plan. My mind raced with every ounce of strength in my body to find reasons to give up after the second attempt to awake Ali failed, and go back to sleep. One doubt after another trickled down and compelled me to question whether it could even be done. Half groggily, I decided that I would try once more, and if Ali didn’t wake up, I’d call it quits. I had no qualms about giving up at that point; low sleep, and a long, difficult and risky journey were enough to rationalize quitting in my mind. As I dialed my phone for the last time, what followed from that point onwards became history! And I am here to tell you that story.
Situated to the west of Pakistan, Balochistan is one of the largest provinces by land area. It is mostly barren, its soil infertile, yet it is known to be home to a large reserve of various hitherto untapped natural resources. It’s home to the Iranic Baloch people and the Pashtuns, with the Pashtun belt separating the population. To the Southern and South-Western border, the vast Arabian Sea kisses the long coastline, lending access to exotic white-sand, greenish blue shorelines. With extremely dry desert-like climate and limited access to running water, the landscape is dominated by mountains and coastal semi desert sand, with limited pockets of greenery. Further along its coast lies the promising deep water seaport of Gwadar. In 2004, as work completed on the 653km long Makran Coastal Highway, a long scenic and well-built route opened up for rest of the province and granted direct access to Gwadar for the first time.
When we breathed life to our plan on paper, we had two goals:
- Have a risky, daring adventure on road.
- Visit Gwadar to see in real how much it has been developed.
Ever since Gwadar came into the limelight and development of a deep seaport began, real estate has cropped up all over the place. Recently, several new and influential real estate projects have begun heavily advertising their plans of developing residential and commercial properties in and around Gwadar. Riding on the promise of being a future economic hub, property in Gwadar has begun attracting potential buyers and investors in droves. But since the city is so far off, and not easy to visit, whatever you get to know of Gwadar and the many projects brewing inside it are through massive advertising. However, the prevailing sentiment among people looking to invest in Gwadar is primarily that of apprehension. Most suspect that it will take many, many years for the port city to take off. Others are less hopeful. We both had our interests piqued by several readily affordable housing schemes that advertised themselves, but didn’t take the plunge, harbouring the same fears. This road trip would hopefully give us the insights we needed to make a sound investment decision.
The road from Karachi to Gwadar is long and daring. For almost 550km out of a total of 650km, there are no proper fuel stations, hotels, mechanics, or places where you can get emergency supplies. There is fuel available no doubt, but it’s the raw, unfiltered kind that makes its way from Iran. If you subject your car to fuel of such below-par quality, it is bound to run into trouble. Having your car break down in the middle of literally nowhere with little to no chance of help is not even the last thing you’d want. If that wasn’t difficult enough, for over 500km, all communication links are broken. No mobile signals, no Internet, no traditional phone lines. There’s hardly any infrastructure. Given that we had never ventured as far as the border between Karachi and Balochistan, traveling all the way to Gwadar alone with these constraints meant that we had to prepare ourselves well.
First and foremost, it meant doing the maths on how much fuel we’d need. We had to have a car with a good mileage. We decided to use Ali’s Daihatsu Move. He had claimed his 660cc car was perfect for this. The car I had, with a big 1500cc engine, shamefully boasted half of the mileage Ali’s car did. The decision was a no brainer.
People who had visited Gwadar before had told us that there was some elevation that an underpowered car would struggle with. But because those were merely suggestions and not warnings and we couldn’t find data to corroborate those suggestions, we decided to take the risk.
We researched the best way to carry backup fuel in the car. People who had used plastic bottles warned us not to from risk of leaks and, worse yet, bottles exploding completely. More experienced travelers recommended jerry cans, which were built for this use-case. We began looking for jerry cans, but couldn’t find any. Eventually, we ended up getting a 20-liter oil can from a market in an area we had not been to in a long time: Shah Faisal market. It cost us PKR 300 in total. Not bad.
Being a spreadsheet person, Ali quickly created a Google spreadsheet listing all possible items we’d need. There were all sorts of items in it, from towels, mosquito repellants, tooth brushes and tooth paste, soaps, towels, snacks, water, to more important things such as identification papers, fuel, spare tyre, flashlight, tools, etc. There was also GoPro in the list, which we didn’t own, but decided to get a colleague to lend us. We definitely did not want to do this trip without a GoPro.
On Thursday night, several hours before we had planned to start our trip, we finally ticked off the last thing on our checklist. Now all we needed were a good night’s rest, and an unwavering alarm clock to wake us up on time.
With twenty eight litres of backup fuel in our car and with all manner of supplies we suspected we might need, we set off at half past five. We did not know the route out of Karachi and into Balochistan, let alone through Balochistan into Gwadar. We put all our trust on Google Maps, and because we knew that Internet would disappear as we crossed over into Balochistan, we made sure to keep offline copies of the map on our phones.
Here’s a caveat though. Google maps limits how much map space you can download for offline use. The area on the map from Karachi to Gwadar was too big to fit into that window. So, we decided to divide the map into two parts, and save them. Surprisingly, when we tested in offline mode, we realized that even with one half of the map data saved, we could still get Google maps to give us step by step directions all the way to Gwadar. And in hindsight, it worked perfectly well, both ways. Not only that, we used it to navigate our way inside Gwadar too.
We boarded the Lyari expressway, and took the best route Google maps offered us out of Karachi. I was navigating, and Ali drove. Before exiting Karachi, we passed several goths — rural settlements — that we had heard of only in the news. Ali quipped that he had always wondered where these were. Karachi is that big: you can spend your entire life living here, but not know a majority of the areas.
After you exit Karachi, you travel only on national highways — N10 in our case. These are two-lane expressways that see heavy traffic running both ways. As you move further into Balochistan, these expressways become deserted. However, you do see big trucks loaded beyond their maximum capacity and large buses speeding past you. There are speed limits throughout, not crossing ninety or hundred. However, most vehicles capable of driving faster tend to drive beyond the limit. There is motorway police, but their vehicles are few and far between. Because of that, these two-lane expressways are difficult to drive on. You have to be extremely careful. If you are driving a light-weight car, such as we were, any big vehicle swooshing past you will create enough wind resistance to sway your car. If you aren’t careful enough, this could potentially lead to an accident.
Compared to Karachi city, the cities we passed after entering Balochistan were anything but urban. The landscape transformed to the characteristic dull brown that we would find would stay by our side throughout the trip. These towns had shops, relatively clean restaurants, inns, and fueling stations with good fuel available. We would soon find that all of these would disappear completely.
The last town we crossed was Winder. It was the last proper town before who knew when. It had the last proper fueling stations before who knew when. We refilled from a shabby station with a single fuel pump at the edge of that town, and said goodbye. In hindsight, we do suspect that there’s a possibility it did not have as good of a fuel as we expected, but because it didn’t cause problems for us, it didn’t matter. There would be no proper fueling stations for the next 540km. We knew that and we were prepared.
Patches of greenery continued to greet us from time to time. Sixty kilometers after leaving Winder behind, we reached an important crossroads: the Zero Point. A statue of the Princess of Hope stood tall in the middle. A structure of a state owned petroleum station had been erected that would some day come into shape and become functional — taking the place of the last proper fuel station before who knew when. Beyond that towering statue was a road that led to Uthal, Lasbela, Quetta and beyond — the other half of Balochistan. To the left lay the glistening Makran Coastal Highway. That is where we were headed. When we were inspecting the route on the map earlier, we noticed that there were a couple of important diversions that could get us going in the wrong direction if we didn’t pay attention. It wasn’t a simple straight path that led you straight to your destination.
After crossing the toll point into Makran Coastal Highway and paying a PKR 30 worth of toll, the landscape turned completely dry and dull.
Thirteen kilometers from Zero Point, we were met with another crossroads. The expressway we were on did curve to the left in the correct direction, but there was a prominent crossing to the right that led to Liari. If we did not know better, we would have gone in the wrong direction. Here we lost all mobile reception. For good. The only establishments we saw were small houses built out of sand. They looked deserted. Beyond was barren land as far as the eye could see. There wasn’t a soul in sight.
For the next hundred kilometers, all we did was shuffle in our seats and drive. The surroundings did not change. From time to time, we passed shabbily built houses, most out of sand, some out of brick and mortar, but all of them united in their state of decay.
We stopped at one such establishment. It looked to be an inn of sorts. We both had an urge to relieve ourselves, and get a cuppa while we were at it. When we asked the boy waiter working there for a possible outhouse we could use, his reply amused us for a long time — it still does. He pointed to the barren wasteland beyond the small house and told us to take a leak in the jungle somewhere. Never mind the fact that there was no jungle for hundreds of kilometers, the idea of taking a leak behind a rock — because there were no bushes or trees — didn’t excite us in the least. Needless to say, we passed up on the offer.
The next ad hoc inn — if you could call it that — we stopped at hardly looked different from the last one. There was a family of two middle-aged couples sitting on the benches and having tea. They had a black Crossroads parked outside. We asked for an outhouse. The proprietor pointed to a small, single room outhouse built out of sand. With red paint, in an immaculate brush, somebody had written in Urdu, Ladies Latrine, on it. Why any lady would want to go in there, much less do anything inside, was anybody’s guess. Inside was a sight to behold. Needless to say, if our stomachs were aching, the sight was sure to cure us of that ache right away. There was an ill-fitted water closet, along with a big cylindrical tub that may have carried water at some point in the past, and two plastic lotas. There was no water. But that was the least of our worries when inside. The water closet was clogged, with feces floating around. Some even smeared on the steps of the water closet. You can thank us for not having taken a picture of that mess.
We didn’t want to take any chances. For all we knew, there might not be a better alternative any further. No, not might. There likely was not. So, we did what we had to. We had water in bottles in our supply, and soap. Thank goodness for that!
If there was one thing good about that inn, it was the tea they made for us. It tasted different. It tasted good. We still think it had to do with the milk they used. Was it goat’s milk? I did see a couple of donkeys, but no goats. Oh, well!
Having a sensitive stomach all my life, I had decided to limit what I ate during the trip. Ali only agreed with my strategy. The state and scarcity of outhouses only bolstered our conviction. He had brought home-made kebabs. We bought a packet of fresh bread before starting our trip. With a cup of goat-milk tea, we rather enjoyed our simple meal. Thank the Heavens for such blessings!
An endless coastal semi desert surrounded us. What surprised us were small ghost-like bushes spread all over the plane. They weren’t green, they weren’t burnt. They were just gray. Without leaves. As gray as hair on an old man’s head. Spooky too. We had never seen anything like that. It’s an arid mountainous region throughout. It is hard to say whether they were a particular species of bushes that lent them that look, or whether they were green once. But why so gray and devoid of any life?
The horizon on the right was marked with an outline of mountains. There was a dense layer of fog on them. As the sun broke further, they came into view. The mountains were naturally cut into intricate patterns, running in two sets of contrasting colours. Despite the dull surroundings, the sky remained uncharacteristically stark blue. It didn’t stand out so much during the trip. It was only when we looked at the pictures did we notice the consistently blue skies.
Exactly when we entered the massive Hingol National Park area, we didn’t know. First, it was the green area on the map that took our fancy. Then, it was the sign boards, few and far between, that began sprouting up. From reading the signs we found out that it was home to several habitats, and different endangered species of mammals, amphibians, reptiles, and birds. There were signs prohibiting poaching. Others talked about keeping the park clean. The rest highlighted the risk to endangered species. The only animals we saw were goats and camels.
Hingol is so big you can’t quite grasp it. Not big. Massive. For one, you don’t know when it starts, unless you’re constantly looking at the map. The landscape shifts very gradually, and then drastically. But even after driving for an hour or two, you realise you’re still inside Hingol.
It’s also home to two main attractions: the Kund Malir beach, and the Princess of Hope, a statue of which we saw at Zero Point earlier. There’s one other mysterious attraction people don’t usually pay attention to. We’ll talk about it later.
We passed over what was once a lively Hingol river. There was only a remnant of a river that remained in its place. We would pass over more rivers in our journey, each dried to the bone. It was a depressing sight. Where did all the water go?
Before long, signs of the Arabian Sea appeared to the left. As we drove farther, the gap between the sea and the road shortened. We stopped when the road curved into a beautiful, mostly inhabited beach. One part of the shore was lined with worn-out small houses. We could finally see people milling about. This was the Kund Malir beach, a place that has become a tourist attraction of sorts. As the sun glistened off the steady waters of the Arabian Sea, we took pictures, and continued with our journey.
We almost missed a small settlement to our right. It was built on top of a mountain. It consisted of several houses the size of a single room, hardly a feet apart from each other. The only way up was through a precariously dangerous off-road track. Being in an underpowered car, we did not take the risk of attempting to go up. At that height, overlooking the ocean, it would have made for a great vantage point.
The most spectacular, breath-taking part of the ride was only beginning. The desert disappeared, replaced completely by mountains on either side. The asphalt became darker. It became increasingly obvious that the path was cut through many layers of hard mountains. The altitude gradually increased. The engine of our car groaned on ascents. As the air pressure changed markedly around us, we felt our ears getting blocked.
The mountains took a different shape. They were cut differently. It is hard to explain it. But the mountains that preceded and those that followed were different from what we saw here. Unlike the formations we had seen before, these mountains had a man-made touch to them. As though they had been carefully carved out at some point in time, and then slowly left to wear out. There was very little naturalness about them.
The ascent was accentuated by sharp bends. There were no mirrors on any corner. If a vehicle was coming down, we did not know until it was right in front of us. Broken guard rails after every bend told a gruesome story. The road was uncharacteristically black. If you stepped out, you smelled the overpowering scent of oil. It wasn’t too long before we realised it really was oil sticking to the asphalt on the road. Oil spilled as a result of countless past accidents. It had gelled in with the asphalt, half of it sunk between the cracks, leaving the surface noticeably less slippery than fresh oil. Yet, greasy nonetheless.
These twisting two-lane expressways would be more dangerous when we would come down the next day. If we weren’t careful, we could smash into a wall in a mountain on one side, or fall off a cliff into a bed of rocky mountains on the other side. Tyres lost traction because of the oil. Even if we kept our foot away from the accelerator, the car sped down on its own. Braking was average at best.
Thrilling, as well as scary! But the only way forward was up, and up we went.
When going up this snaky route, we had kept the air conditioner in the car off. Partly to preserve fuel over the course of the journey, and partly because the engine was grinding at max on the climbs. Our windows were rolled down half-way. As we crept up the path, cross wind was fierce. It slashed against windows, leaving a constant loud buzz behind. But the moment we killed the engine in the middle of this part of the world, every sound died down. You could hear the drop of a pin if you had one on you and dropped it. The silence was so deafening our ears began to vibrate inside. Outside, in the middle of nowhere, in the midst of absolute silence, there was not a trace of wind. It was as though the wind didn’t exist. It gave us goosebumps the first time we encountered it. Such absolute quiet. We could so get used to this.
The Sphinx of Balochistan isn’t something you are likely to have heard of. Ali had, but I hadn’t. If you are passing by, it’s very likely that you will see it but not know what it is.
This controversial piece on the Graham Hancock website argues that the Sphinx of Balochistan is a man-made, architectural gem, that has gone unexplored for too long. Ali told me about it. We both knew we had to observe the Sphinx closely, carefully. When we reached the unmistakable, unavoidable Sphinx-like statue, we killed the engine and stepped out.
The Government of Pakistan has long held the view that this is a natural formation. They have kept it under wraps, not letting any archeological teams access to the site. If you read the details alluded to in the article above, and then look at the pictures and the video below, you come to the same conclusion we did: that it is undoubtedly a man-made piece of architecture. It’s too intricate, too detailed, too Sphinx-like, to have been formed naturally. Not only that, the platform on which the Sphinx rests, the carefully spaced, carved pillars, layered steps, a temple like structure that has withered away over time, they can’t all just be a big coincidence.
There is a rich archeological history to this place. It has not been explored. It has not been documented. The Government denies it.
What mystery lies in this part of Balochistan!
Merely standing at the edge of the road, looking at the towering structure, in absolute, ear-deafening silence, we couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed. I can feel a chill run down my spine as I write this, rebuilding the scenes in my head.
A few miles ahead of the meditating Sphinx stood the statue of the Princess of Hope. We had seen an imitation of it at Zero Point, many kilometers behind. This was the real thing. Unlike the Sphinx, there was a blue placard placed on the side of the road introducing the Princess.
We ask you: Could nature have made this?
It took us several hours to cross Hingol National Park. Our next stop was Ormara. An old coastal town with a rich history, Ormara is now home to an airport, a port, a fishing harbour, several white-sand beaches, and the Jinnah Naval base. The more exotic part of the beach is now off limits for the general public. It is inside the Naval base now.
We stopped at a junction at Ormara. To the left was a long road leading into the Naval base, and therefore off limits. To the right was a Coast Guards check post — there would be many from here on out. We did not notice it then but on the way back we found two public washrooms built across the road from the Coast Guards check post. These were relatively clean, and with water available.
The Coast Guards check post we passed wasn’t the first. It won’t be the last. Many would come. Some unmanned. Some with personnel sitting outside. At two, in particular, we were stopped and asked for identification. But that was it.
Having exited Hingol National Park, we found that the landscape automatically went back to what it was like before we got into the rocky terrain. It was a straight, level road, stretching as far as the eye could see. Sand drifting across the road became more frequent in this part of the province. Often, it would become so heavy, the way fog hangs densely in the air when temperature drops, it would impair visibility. At one point the visibility was impacted so severely by sand that we couldn’t see what was coming from ahead.
The N10 expressway we were on from the start moved away from the ocean after Ormara. It went straight for a long time, twisted left and right, before moving along the outskirts of the Muzi Makola Wildlife Sanctuary. We knew this because we kept a constant eye on the map. We passed several dried up rivers along this route, that were once connected to the Arabian Sea.
We passed two inns at a considerable distance from each other. Both were better than the one we had stopped at, from the looks of them. We had no need to make a stop. We had kept a good supply of biscuits with us, which kept us refueled throughout the journey.
The next crossroads was before Pasni city. There’s an air force base, as well as an airport next to Pasni. We had no plans to explore Pasni. We travelled along the outskirts of the base, towards Gwadar. In another two hours, we were closing in on Gwadar city.
The first shock that greeted us upon our arrival at Gwadar was the check post we had to pass through. It wasn’t a check post like any we had seen so far. There were no buildings, no barriers, only an uneven road with round objects put on them for creating temporary diversions. There were army personnel posted there. They asked us for identification, why we were visiting the city, and let us go in. Before we knew it, we were on what’s known as the Airport road. We had assumed we would find a big gate and a walled structure around the city. There were none. Like Winder or the other small towns we left behind, Gwadar city simply came into being, without really introducing itself.
A colleague who had been to Gwadar had told us to book a room at the Royal Resort. Three days earlier we had called it up, asking for details. The room would cost us PKR 6000. But, it was supposedly clean, with running water. Once more, we relied on Google maps to get us to the resort. After filling up the fuel tank at Winder, we didn’t refill again. By the time we reached the resort, which was thankfully on the same Airport road we were on, the fuel gauge was blinking the reserve light. The average mileage reading on the dashboard displayed a whooping 21km/l. Excellent, we thought.
No pictures unfortunately of the resort. But you can find many online.
The proprietor at the hotel, a middle age local of Gwadar city, dressed in a neatly starched white kurta shalwar, spoke in a funny accent. It reminded us of a former colleague of ours. We wanted to negotiate the price of the room, but had to give up mid way. He complained about how it was becoming increasingly difficult to run his hotel. There was no water in Gwadar, despite being surrounded by the Arabian Sea. He told us he had to get a water tank all the way from Lasbela city, which cost him PKR 15000. There was hardly any electricity in Gwadar. Grid stations in Iran supplied a meagre eight hours each day. He had to run the entire hotel on a generator. Even if there was only one guest, he grumbled, he had to turn the generator on. His dad, granddad, and earlier generations were from Gwadar. When he was a kid, they promised that once the port was built, there would be power and water and gas. He’s in his late thirties now. It’s hardly any different. He whined continuously about the lack of infrastructure in the city, about how without proper infrastructure you can’t do anything. But the one thing that stuck to us was when he said, “There are two Gwadars: One that you see in the media; and the other you see here.”
When we drove into the hotel parking, we noticed the familiar black Crossroads jeep parked there. There couldn’t be two black Crossroads. A short while later, those two middle ages couples we saw at that unfortunate inn appeared. We were sure they’d suspect us of following them.
Our initial plan was to spend Saturday in Gwadar, and leave early the next morning. The first couple of shocks we got since getting into Gwadar convinced me that there was very little else left to do here that couldn’t be done in what time we had. We had reached Gwadar by 4:30pm. There was plenty of time before the sun set. Ali brooded on this. For the time being, we paid a single night’s rent in advance, and checked into the room to wash ourselves. Mobile signals had resumed, and 3G/4G were available. However, Internet was spotty. I could finally upload pictures home.
We read somewhere earlier that there was one fuel pump in Gwadar that had good fuel, but it sold out before evening. In the rest of Gwadar, you only found Irani petrol, which was no good. Since the tank in our car was on reserve, we refilled eight liters from our backup supply of twenty eight. This was more than enough to get us by for a while.
Our next stop was this mountain in Gwadar, that is supposedly the highest peak, from which you could see the whole of the city. It’s located in an area that looks like an inverted T. We didn’t know where that was though, or what it was called, but we took the only route that went towards the Gwadar port.
Little did we know that it would take us through the old Gwadar city. It looked less like Gwadar, and more like Lyari, an (in)famous city in Karachi inhabited by the Baloch. The road was narrow and bumpy. It got narrower and narrower, until we were navigating our way through thin lanes between small houses. There was a sports goods shop, soccer team jerseys hanging on its front glass wall. On a big wall, the flag of brazil along with a football were painted. If you were to ever visit Lyari, you’d find the same sights. Soon, the city ended. Had we not had Google maps, we would never have made it out of that city easily. The dense dwellings cleared away, the road widened and we reached a crossroads. We breathed a sigh of relief. From the left, we could see the glorious CPEC port, with towering white metal structures coming out of the edge of the deep sea port. It looked functional enough, but civilians weren’t allowed inside. Instead, we took a gnarly path that took us all the way up a mountain in front of us.
Pearl Continental Hotel towered on one edge of that mountain. The multi-story high-rise was erected so close to the edge it gave the impression that if the earth shook even a little, the entire hotel would fall off the cliff. On the map we could see that there were two things on that mountain besides Pearl Continental and a marine resort next to it: a Naval base, access to which was of course barred; and, one of the most expensive real estate property in Gwadar, the Singhar Housing Scheme. If we wanted to gauge how well development of real estate is progressing in Gwadar, we had conjectured, looking at the state of its most expensive, and fully bought out housing scheme would give us the best idea.
At the top, we found nothing. There were roads around the boundary of the area earmarked for the housing scheme. There were poles without lights on them, covered in layers of rust. On map the housing scheme was shown as being divided into different blocks. Up there, there was nothing else except rocks and sand. This abandoned sight took us by surprise. Here was perhaps the best looking piece of land in Gwadar, the peak of Gwadar, overlooking the Arabian Sea, that had been heavily advertised in the media. But in terms of development, there was nothing to show for. We roamed around dejectedly. The sun drooped in the horizon. It looked like a circular shade card, lightest on top, darkest at the bottom. I had only seen a sunset this close on TV. We were famished, and decided to head to Pearl Continental for a decent meal.
The 5-star hotel presented a painful look. It was magnificent in its exterior, and tastefully built inside. But it wore a deserted look. There was a single concierge standing in the massive lobby. The typical hotel music greeted us. He told us there were two restaurants in the hotel but one was closed for renovation. We entered the other one, a traditional Chinese themed diner, Tai Pan. The only waiter was sitting with his shoulders hunched, staring at the floor, in the guests’ waiting room. We took a table, and ordered a course of soup and salad, and club sandwiches. A young, neatly dressed manager showed up. He spoke in less than fluent English with a weird accent. Ali thought he was a local. When we later asked him, he said he was from Larkana, a town in Sindh, and that the management had given him a room here to stay. As our food was served, we quietly asked the waiter if tonight was an exception. With a grin he told us it was empty most nights. When I walked across the lobby to the washrooms, there was no one in sight. No bellhops, no washroom attendants. Even the concierge was gone. And it was all so quiet.
When we had driven into the parking lot of the hotel, we had noticed that same black Crossroads jeep again. Both of us chuckled. “Now, they will be certain that we are following them”, we quipped. This wasn’t the first, or the second, but the third coincidence. We didn’t find the two middle aged couples inside at first. While our food was getting ready, they walked into the same restaurant and took a seat. The coincidence kept growing more unsettling.
The food wasn’t bad. The chicken corn soup was hot, but the black vinegar tasted awful. It gave the soup a weird aftertaste. The salad Ali ordered was good. The bread for the sandwich was toastier than normal, and the chicken tasted odd. We were careful not to eat anything that might leave our stomachs upset. As we had our soup and salad, three Chinese came down from their rooms to have dinner. Along with the two middle aged couples, that was about the extent of the patrons present. The hotel was burning fuel in generators to keep the entire hotel alive. Ali and I both agreed that they were definitely running at a loss.
Passing the lobby on our way out, we saw the former IG of Sindh sitting on a sofa with his legs crossed, dressed immaculately as always. Accompanying him was general Asim Bajwa, and several other army men we couldn’t recognize. In the parking lot, there were security personnel from their entourage lounging about. Being already devoid of street lights, the area outside the hotel was drenched in complete darkness. The path we had taken to get to the hotel was difficult enough as it was in day light; it would be impossible to maneuver in pitch darkness. On the map we had seen an alternative route, starting from the base of the mountain. It was called the marine drive. What a smashing name. The kind you’re likely to encounter on your visit to Dubai. We asked the guards manned at the hotel gate about it. They were confused. Trusting Google maps and our instincts, we decided to go for it.
It turned out to be the right way into and out of that mountain. The tar was newly laid down. The road, a two-way, multi-lane highway of sorts, ran along the ocean on one side. It avoided the old Gwadar city altogether. There were no lights there either, and the fresh asphalt appeared darker under car lights. Most people visiting Gwadar don’t know about it. But if you are there, and want to go to PC or to the top lookout on Gwadar, look for marine drive. Some day when all of this is developed, what an exquisite drive this would prove to me. Not least during sunset. Oh, how the sun would look up close from the window of your car, starkly shedding its different colours as it bids farewell to the day.
Before long, we were back at our resort. The parking was full, and the restaurant next to it too. We sat in the garden, I with a warm bottle of Barbican, and Ali with a chilled bottle of some beer that went by the name of horse. He couldn’t finish it. We ordered tea, but the waiter told us it would take the better part of an hour to prepare it. Who takes so long to make two cups of tea? “The restaurant is overflowing with patrons, and we’ve got our plates full,” the waiter told us. We got some dessert instead. Pre-made kheer, kept in the fridge. It wasn’t bad.
A hot shower was all it took for us to fall asleep. And the fact that we’d hardly had any sleep the night before. As Ali slept soundly, I remember waking up several times during the night. There were several power breakdowns of five minutes each. And maybe once I woke up thinking somebody was in the room and calling us out. I guess it was the air that got to me.
We had breakfast at nine the next morning in the same restaurant that was overcrowded the night before. It was empty now. We ordered omelettes and parathas and tea. We had to wait a while, but it was worth the wait. The parathas were oven fresh, and the omelettes tasted great. Tea paired up well with the parathas. The middle aged couples — who probably thought we had been following them — must have come back late last night. We didn’t see them when we rolled into the resort, but their black Crossroads was parked in the morning. They appeared from their rooms later, took a table in the garden and ordered breakfast.
The first thing we had to do after checking out was locate the only petrol pump in Gwadar with clean fuel. On the map it was listed as Hascol, next to Bank Al Habib. One of the locals at the resort told us it was next to Al Habib. The owner of the super store next to the resort said only Irani petrol was available in Gwadar. We went looking despite that.
In reality, it was Caltex, not Hascol. Or whatever was left of it. It was next to Bank Al Habib. There was a pile of cow dung rotting away next to the depilated fueling machine. Ali almost stepped on it. We didn’t think the pump would work, with its parts falling apart. But it did. The proprietor cranked some lever behind the pump, and filled the tank. There was construction going on around whatever was left of the fuel station. The proprietor said they were in the process of building the fuel station up. The fuel was good enough, though.
The majority of real estate projects are outside of the main Gwadar city and Airport. We thought we’d take a look on our way back. But when we realized the place was another 65km north east of Gwadar, we gave up. It was already 10am. We were running late. We had to avoid driving in the dark.
We took several stops on the long road back home. We stepped on to the beach at Ormara without taking off our boots, and Ali looked for empty sea shells. We took a bathroom break at the check post there. Descending down the treacherous bends at Hingol, we stopped at several crucial points, stepped out in the silence, and marveled at the scenery. That was my idea of peace!
The air conditioner was on all the way in the car. Unlike the day before when the weather was cool, it became hot quickly. With a chilled car, the drive became more enjoyable. It, however, severely impacted the running mileage of the car. Right after the expressway had become level and steady, having crossed Hingol, we stopped on the side to refill from the backup fuel can. There was still a long way to go, and the tank was half spent. Evening was fast approaching, and we didn’t want to have to stop in the dark to refill. We spent ten minutes refilling from the big can, first transferring into the small can, and then into the car. During all that time, we didn’t see a single vehicle pass us by. No soul, no animals in sight. An unsettling quietness hung in the air. Nobody would want to have a mechanical break down in the middle of this. You’d have to wait a long time before somebody came along.
We met a lot of heavy traffic, having exited Zero Point. It was dark now. There were no street lights: A side-effect of having poor infrastructure and electricity network in all of Balochistan. Nearing Hub, the traffic increased in intensity. The check posts we had crossed easily yesterday, became jammed. There were customs’ personnel, closely inspecting large trucks carrying god knows what.
By half past eight, we were safely at our homes.
I realize that I have not put up links to the videos we recorded with the GoPro. It will take us a while to get up on the Internet. Once that is done, we will have them available here.
Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed our story!
