Hunza to Khunjerab Pass Chinese Border
Drive the Karakoram Highway from Hunza to the Khunjerab Pass at 4,693 meters — the highest paved international border crossing in the world, where Pakistan ends and China's Xinjiang begins on a high-altitude plateau where yaks graze and Marco Polo sheep roam, the pass crossing the Karakoram range at its highest accessible point.
- 1
Sost Last Pakistani Town
Sost — the last Pakistani town before the Khunjerab Pass, the location of the Pakistan customs and immigration post, the bazaar selling the last Pakistani goods before China and the Chinese goods that have flowed down the Karakoram Highway since the border opened to commerce in the 1980s.
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Khunjerab National Park Entry
Enter the Khunjerab National Park — the protected area established specifically to protect the Marco Polo sheep and snow leopard habitat on both sides of the Karakoram range, the park where the highway ascends from the valley through the wildlife sanctuary toward the pass.
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Marco Polo Sheep Habitat
The high plateau habitat of the Marco Polo sheep above 4,000 meters — the large wild sheep with their extraordinary curling horns that can span over a meter, herds visible from the road in the protected national park where hunting is prohibited and the population has recovered from historical overhunting.
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Khunjerab Pass Monument
The Khunjerab Pass marker at 4,693 meters — the monument marking the border between Pakistan and China on the treeless plateau, the air noticeably thin, the temperature cold even in summer, and the extraordinary feeling of standing at the highest point of the ancient Silk Road trade route.
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Chinese Side View
The view into China from the Khunjerab Pass — the Chinese customs post visible a short distance beyond the monument, the landscape opening into the wider valleys of Xinjiang beyond the pass, the Karakoram range falling away on the Chinese side into the high plateau of Central Asia.
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Yak Herder Pastures
The yak grazing grounds on the high plateau approaching the pass — the domesticated yaks of the Pakistani herders grazing at altitudes that would be impossible for cattle, their thick coats adapted to the extreme cold of the Karakoram pass, the herding families camping in summer tents on the plateau.