For additional safety reasons Ishaq Ali had cancelled our accommodation booking at a four star hotel in Islamabad. Tourist hotels were becoming a Taliban target and it was only just before we left Australia that the Taliban had "declared war on all of Pakistan", in particular the cities of Lahore, Peshawar and Islamabad.

We spent a very pleasant two days at the Hunza Embassy Lodge located in a residential area of Islamabad . The lodge was well appointed and comfortable, and the staff was both friendly and helpful.

We enjoyed the company of Ishaq Ali's colleague Amin and a German guide and friend of Ishaq Ali’s nicknamed “Ranger” and his 16 year old daughter Melanie (a school student) who also stayed at the guest house. Ranger and Amin are both in the travel business and both very interesting people. Ranger owns a travel business in Germany and Amin runs a travel company in Islamabad. Amin is involved also in the television coordination industry, taking film crews into Afghanistan, Iran, central Asia as well as Pakistan. One of Amin’s more recent tours involved taking a Japanese team into Afghanistan to interview the Taliban. He said he could take us into Afghanistan if we wanted to go. We have always wanted to travel there but given the current political situation, we suggested we would put this offer on hold! Despite our different backgrounds and languages, we had a lot of fun with these very entertaining people .

Islamabad is a very attractive, leafy and green city. The houses around our guest house were large and expensive, similar to the homes in Sydney’s exclusive suburb of Vaucluse. We were told that former President Pervez Musharraf still resides in the area. It certainly lured us into a feeling of security although we must admit that our guest house was fully barricaded and guarded 24 hours a day by three armed police, all with pump action shot guns swung casually over their shoulders.

Islamabad was very hot, around 40 degrees C. We did however undertake a few walks to a really interesting local supermarket. The tandoori chicken, sliced boiled egg and coleslaw sandwiches were wonderful (we now make these sandwiches often - we call them our "Islamabad Sandwiches"). And we thoroughly enjoyed beer at long last.

One afternoon, Ishaq Ali and his colleague Amin organised a trip to one of the Islamabad local bazaars and showed us a great bookstore, the Saeed Book Bank. The store was probably one of the best book stores we had ever seen with a huge range of books in English. Totally absorbed in our browsing, we were approached by a softly spoken young Pakistani man. He seemed to appear from nowhere and asked us if we were tourists. In eerily low tones he warned us to be very careful in his country and told us under no circumstances should we travel to Peshawar. We told him that we had no intention of going there, given the recent suicide bombings. The man disappeared as quietly as he had appeared. It was quite a surreal experience and left us with a spine tingling unease.

We were somewhat distracted by our conversation with this strange young man but we did manage to buy two books on Pakistani cooking. I always try to re-create at home similar dishes to those on our travels and I just had to find out how to make chap shuros!

An evening drink of fresh mango juice in the shadows of the bazaar before a wonderful meal at an Afghanistani restaurant with Ishaq Ali, Ranger, Melanie and Amin made for a perfect ending to our stay in Islamabad.

We flew out of Islamabad’s Benazir Bhutto Airport on 14th June, sadly farewelling our friend Ishaq Ali (who of course had escorted us to, and made arrangements for us through the frantic airport) and this remarkable country that we had come to truly love. It had been a fantastic and fascinating adventure. We know we will be coming back to Pakistan.