Experience the best of Khorog

Khorog sits above 2,000 metres in the Pamir Mountains of south-eastern Tajikistan, where the Gunt river joins the Panj, which forms the border with Afghanistan. It is the capital of the Gorno-Badakhshan region and the main stopping point on the Pamir Highway. The town is strung along the river in a narrow valley below bare ridges, with poplar-lined streets, a riverside park and a botanical garden among the highest in the world.

From Khorog, roads lead along the Panj into the Wakhan Valley, where ruined forts, hot springs and the white peaks of the Hindu Kush stand across the river in Afghanistan, and up the Gunt towards the high Pamir plateau. The Pamiri people, mostly Ismaili Muslims, have their own languages and a building style of homes with a roof of stacked wooden beams over the main room.

Pamiri meals are simple: bread, soup, plov, yoghurt, dried mulberries and apricots, and black tea with sweets. Summers from June to September are warm and dry, and the passes are open, while winters are long, cold and quiet. Late spring and early autumn bring clear air and fruit from the orchards, and the high roads need dry weather.