Our guide Jabbar told us proudly that we were booked into the most expensive hotel in Gulmit. We were delighted. This hotel just HAD to have electricity. By now we were looking pretty bedraggled and still suffering from the past stomach problems. Well, we didn't have the luxury of a lot of electricity but fortunately Jabbar pleaded with the hotel and we managed to have enough power to wash in hot water. It was bitterly cold with gale force winds and by this time, we were having difficulty in making light of our lack of power that had meant no hot water, no lighting and no heating. Luckily the food had been excellent….

The food throughout our travels in Pakistan was fantastic . To our surprise it was not very spicy (even though we love spicy food) and even more surprisingly it was very low in meat and fat content. What a refreshing change from the robust meat dominated and fatty Russian food of Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. The people of the Hunza Valley are well known for their longevity. With the high altitude and a healthy diet, it is perhaps no wonder they live such long lives.

Gulmit and Jabbar’s nearby home village of Gulkhin were delightful and pretty villages. Both are essentially small farm communities. We were surprised to see almost a mono culture of irrigated potatoes, interspersed with only some wheat and lucerne. How these mono culture crops do not succumb to major plant disease outbreaks is extraordinary. We guessed the altitude and very cold conditions must play a large part. The plots are small, each being divided by ubiquitous stone walls. A few goats and calves were the only animals we saw on our visit.

The local houses are usually square, flat roofed and made out of stones and mud bricks . Inside there is an entrance "hall" (to obviously deflect the cold winds coming in) which leads to a large square room that doubles as a kitchen with a central oven and floor sitting area, surrounded on the perimeter by flat sleeping areas. Everyone sleeps in the same room, even newly wedded couples. And weddings may mean up to forty or so people must be accommodated in one house. There is no room for privacy here.

Jabbar invited us to his family home in Ghulkin where we met his wife, son and mother. These experiences were very special to us and we realised how privileged we had been to be guests in private houses. It certainly gave us an invaluable insight into how local people live their day to day lives. By our standards the very cold conditions and rationed electricity made for pretty tough living.

Jabbar was a great guide for us. A caring and generous man, he is of Tajik origin and like many of the Tajik people in northern Pakistan, his family are from the Wakhi Corridor of present day Afghanistan . In fact, he still has family in Afghanistan. Always wearing a cap, Jabbar had a serenely calm appearance with sad green eyes that crinkled with his ever spontaneous smiles. For someone so slim, he ate an enormous amount of food. Even Jabbar remarked on how much food he ate. Jabbar's special love was a simple meal of rice and dahl eaten with his right hand using a chapatti as a scoop. Jabbar explained that this was "The Muslim Way". His parents had never used knives and forks.

Jabbar is a trained high school teacher and had also managed a five star hotel for some years in Lahore. Like many professional people in northern Pakistan, he had given up his teaching career to go into the well paid tourism industry during the 1990's. And like many who did so, had fallen on hard times since the precipitous decline in tourism in Pakistan since the events of 9/11. He explained that jobs in tourism these days were so scarce that he had had to take on labouring jobs, breaking rocks by hand on roadwork sites . And now in his mid forties, this was demeaning, sheer tough work. But as he explained, he had to pay for his family and for his youngest son's education which for him was a considerable amount of money.

The emphasis this country has on education is most impressive and we were surprised at the amount of foreign funding for schools. In fact at Gulkhin there were three separate schools almost side by side; one government, one community and one private. There is a strong focus on English language and computer skills. The headmaster of the private school believed these were key skills for his students for the future. And we were again reminded of the Aga Khan’s values of health, education and tolerance with a strong emphasis on preserving the local culture.

Local children were friendly and articulate in at least three languages. English is widely spoken. The Pakistani children we met were mad about cricket. On virtually every occasion a headmaster introduced us to a class of children and asked them what they knew about Australia there was a spontaneous chorus of "Australian Cricket - Ricky Ponting, Brett Lee!". Asked if they could name any other Australian cricket players we were amazed that these little children, some as young as five years old, could recite as many names of Australian cricketers as we could think of.

Our visit to Gulmit included the well known, amazing Hussaini and Zarabad suspension bridges. These bridges are suspended on cables with thin wooden slats placed at precariously uneven intervals. We remembered well the blog stories of those intrepid travelers who crossed these bridges and their comments on how sea sick it can make you feel looking down while you are swaying above the gushing waters of the Hunza River. And by not looking down you could well miss your step because of the unevenness of the planks.

We walked out a short distance (shamefully to have our photos taken) and were surprised that although it looks so precarious, it wasn't quite as scary as we thought. At least you can hang onto the hand ropes. We stopped in our tracks however when Jabbar told us of a soldier who recently lost his footing, fell and drowned in the swirling snow fed river below.  Although quite a few locals were crossing with apparent ease even with huge sacks of flour strapped to their backs, we gave the adventure opportunity to cross the entire bridge a miss.