A Heaven on Earth-Kumrat Valley
At the height of 8,100ft above sea level, Kumrat Valley is located in the Upper Dir region behind Gabral, Swat Kohistan. In the summers, the temperature ranges from 20°C to 25°C, while in the winter, the temperature drops to -4°C to - 10°C.
We started our trip from Upper Dir with Ayaz Zaman, a local jeep driver from Bijli Ghar, a small town close to Upper Dir.We had known him for a while, and he had organized tours for friends in the past also. He was delighted to show us Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa (KPK) and said, “After the visit of Imran Khan to Kumrat Valley in 2016, this valley got the attention of tourists, and thousands of them began to visit this place every year, and fell in love with it”.
We took the Kumrat road via Biar bridge, which is a non-stop zig zag ride for almost 2.5 hours, until we reached the village of ‘Thal’. We were greeted by a welcoming cold breeze which swept off the Panjkora river and the lush green mountains around the village. As we entered the bazaar, we saw a crowd of people walking their herds.
The main market was small, but filled with dry fruits and Chitrali ‘Pakol’ hats. The village also has a distinctive Jamia Masjid that is a hundred years old, with its wooden structure still intact despite landslides and heavy rains. Thal is also called the ‘gateway of Kumrat’, and the rest of the journey beyond Thal had to be on a 4x4 jeep.
The entrance to the valley was full of vegetation, mostly cabbages. There were no rugged mountains anywhere, so the only thing you could see was the river and the sound of its gushing water. After an exhausting jeep ride, we decided to stay at the first hotel we saw. The people were welcoming, and the views from our rooms were wonderfull. We only needed to take a few steps out of our rooms to dip our toes in the river. As a Karachiite, I was excited to finally be able to use a shawl, and that too in the middle of July!
Ayaz looked up at the clouds and predicted rain. Sure enough, it started raining within five minutes of his prediction. We ran to our rooms and enjoyed the sound of rain with music, tea and board games. The very next day, Ayaz suggested that we should go to Kala Chashma and the Kumrat Waterfall, the most visited spots in the area, but were constrained by the intermittent rain.
Written by: Zainab Naseem
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