To reach Fairy Meadows, you must first get to Raikot Bridge.

Fairy Meadows in Pakistan is a challenging place to reach. First off, it’s in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by nowhere, atop of nowhere with a beautiful field and the stunning Nanga Prabat set as the backdrop. But if you do want to visit, read on.

When we started to plan our five-week trip to Pakistan, Fairy Meadows kept coming up as a must-visit location, yet we had never heard of it. However, seeing it mentioned on blog after blog was all the convincing we needed as to why we should add it to our Pakistan Itinerary. Regardless of the monstrous trek, we needed to see Fairy Meadows with our own eyes, and if we were to do that, we would need to head to Raikot Bridge.

It continues to be a stumbling block; if Pakistan is full of such incredible sights of which Fairy Meadows is one, why is tourism not at the forefront of the Pakistan economy? In fact, why is Pakistan not regarded as a must-visit, must backpack location? It contains all the natural wonders and even more so than countries with tourism geared towards nature lovers, such as Chile, Nepal, Austria, Switzerland and Canada, to name a few. Of course, those locations have other factors, but other than a handful of places within those countries, none quite have the view that fairy meadows within Pakistan provide. Those are my thoughts anyway.

I’m not naive as to why Pakistans tourism industry hasn’t grown.

That is simple and has nothing to do with the actual county, its people or the sights themselves. I speak of this because we met many people on our trip, especially within Fairy meadows. They all told us the same story: tourism was booming some twenty years ago, and then. It stopped.

The people suffered, and the economy suffered. Let’s talk about the present situation.

Pakistan is a place many can visit safely and affordably.

Fairy meadows is an adventure in itself, one I am so happy we partook in regardless of how challenging it was.

We arrived at Raikot bridge somewhat under peculiar circumstances. You see, we had agreed on a fee of 700PKR per person for a shared car to take us to Gilgit, but we asked to be dropped off at the intersection before and head to Raikot. The price rose to 2,000 PKR.

We started to have a bit of banter, and then these local guys got involved and said they were heading that way and would take us. Free of charge.

We accepted their offer and started our ascent into Hunza, out of the commotion and into Raikot Bridge. The drive was fascinating, and the conversation was lovely. They were such kind guys travelling on their annual brotherly trip to the northern parts of Pakistan, and we had seen them earlier on in the day when we were exploring Rama lake.

Upon entry to Raikot bridge, we settled into our hotel and prepped for tomorrow. Our trek to Fairy meadows would be challenging; we had to be prepared.

Our main concern was finding someone to share the cost of the Jeep Ride (8,000PKR) at the start of the trial considering no other guests were staying at the hotel despite being told that the hotel was fully booked in my conversation with them earlier on in the day. There was nothing we could do about that, so we packed what we would travel to Fairy Meadows in a small backpack with the thought of keeping our larger bags at the hotel.

Tomorrow arrived, and we rose early, eager for our trip to commence. We didn’t want to miss our chance at sharing a jeep at Raikot Bridge, the drop-off point for many wishing to reach Fairy Meadows.

We were hopeful other guests would arrive; they did not.

We had a quick stroll around Raikot Bridge before breakfast, and the area was as fast asleep as possible. There were no jeeps, no people; there was no noise. Raikot Bridge was empty. So much for being the drop-off to Fairy Meadows, eh?

Anxious, we returned to the hotel for breakfast, and then around 9 am, the doors swung open. Our saviours had arrived.

We hustled into the jeep after swapping pleasantries with our new friends and were about to embark on a colossal journey. The Fairy Meadows are not easy to reach. A stomach-churning 90 minutes where you WILL BE swinging from side to side on the world’s 2nd most dangerous road, in a British Made jeep some sixty years ago was our only protection from cataclysmic death. You get to witness majestic views and lose the calories as you sweat out so much due to the sheer danger, which I suppose has a plus side. There is less weight to carry up on the gruelling three-hour trek.

Who doesn’t like easy wins?

Toodles

USEFUL TIPS FOR BACKPACKING PAKISTAN:

How to Visit Fairy Meadows in Pakistan

Your route to Fairy Meadows will depend on where you begin your journey exploring the north of Pakistan. If you fly into Gilgit and then first explore the Hunza Valley, you must head south. Shared cars will take you to Raikot Bridge, the drop-off point for Fairy Meadows. Our hotel will help you to arrange it.

If you head south from Gilgit, do not miss Fairy Meadows. from the thrilling jeep ride where you’ll dangle off a cliff for ninety minutes on a truck made some sixty years ago to the challenging hike to the picturesque scenes of fairy Meadows itself, do not miss it. For that to be possible, you must first make it to Raikot Bridge.

If you start in Skardu, as we did, you will likely be heading to Raikot Bridge after visiting Astore. We had a bit of trouble making this trip. Whilst there are buses, they are infrequent but do run daily. Predominantly in the morning but in the afternoon, your options will be limited to either a shared car or hitchhiking. A shared vehicle from Astore to Raikot Bridge should cost 1,000 PKR per person, but our guy changed his mind and tripled his rate at the last second (Astore seems to have a history of this), so we had to take an alternative route instead. Check out how we made this journey from Astore to Raikot Bridge.

Your driver will drop you off wherever you are staying at Raikot Bridge and I suggest you get an early night; tomorrow is the ascent up to Fairy Meadows. A trip you shouldn’t take lightly, watch here to find out what to expect.

Enjoy! and don’t forget to tag Calamity Travels on Instagram. We’d love to see if you enjoyed backpacking Pakistan as much as we did!