Heavy snowfall in Pamir
 

Hi everybody, i will be in kirgizstan & tajikistan next august.
Third time for me and my friend, and i'm just thinking about...we want to do the Bartang Valley, do you think that the heavy snowfall of this winter could be a major problem for high rivers?
I know...it's april and august is three months ahead...but i'm worried now :rofl:
What do you think? Do we have a chance?
Somebody is going before us?

Hi rombodituono. I am going to try it -not sure- in early or late June. I will try to keep informed you on this post.

Thank you, good luck !!!

snow
 

We had snow in August not too far away from Zorkul. Not all that much, but the road turned into muddy snot which kept us from riding for a day.

We also tried Bartang, but had to turn around where a river had washed out the road (East of Roshorv). With the two of us we did not want to fight walking the bikes thru the river. It was flowing fast and deep, It is pretty lonely there, not much help if you need it. There might have been a way around (I added that bypass to OSM), but we did not know if we would have enough gas if we had to turn around later down the road. The situation can change rapidly, we went over some sections were clearly the river had flowed over the road the last 24 hours, while for us the river level was below the road elevation.

It is all part of the adventure. If I were you I would go for it, worst case you have to turn around and still have a great ride. Make sure you know your limits and keep an eye on your gas situation.

Hi Batelumes,
if you plan to early June I may be able to join you, let me know.

I'll be entering Tajik and should start my Pamir journey by May 7th. I'm currently in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

Cheers,
Abi

Hi khpostma.

From where did you start it? Going up or down of the valley? What time was it? And you talk about "way around" at Bartang Valley....man, there are no many places there where is posible to do that....

For sure there are diferents conditioners: dates, time of the day, wheather forecast....and also try to ask to differents local drivers about the track status and even with all this information is not guarantee of success. But it will be great to try it. :thumbup1:

PM sent.

bier

It would be grat if you could get some info. Are you going to try it, also?

Regards!

We went from the West towards the East. As mentioned we got stopped by a river East of Roshorv crossing the road. There is a bypass around that river crossing North of that village, which was not clear to us at the time, but which I found after we got home. We rode it for a little ways. It starts 5 km's or so West of Roshorv and routes you North and then East. I added it to OSM, but I have no idea about the actual condition of that bypass. Locals seemed to think it was rough going.

By the time you get there things will have changed anyway.

Just go for it and see how far you get.

Yes. I'm exploring Uzbek until Muynak and heading back to Samarkhand on 2nd May. I'll cross the Uzbek-Tajik border on 5th May. 6th and 7th, I will be in Dushanbe and prep the bike for Pamir. I should Start toward Khorog on 8th May and take the Vrang road along the Afghan border. Will know about the status of the roads and weather only when in Khorog.
Where are you now?

I will re-start my trip late May from Almaty
I am still working at the moment.

Ride carefully between Kongrad and Muynak. I had an accident there in 2015 because of a flock of sheep than jumped suddenly on the road just few meters in front of me. Vegetation of both sides on the road prevented me of seeing them on time.

Thank you Batelumes!

Sent from my XT1572 using Tapatalk

I'm currently thinking about doing the same route in the end of May, would be nice to have some information about the conditions you find as Batelumes already mentioned. :thumbup1: