Notes on the Geography of Pakistan: Chaprot

Chaprot lies in a side valley off the Karakoram Highway between Gilgit and Hunza.

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A jeep running up the Karakoram Highway from Gilgit can cross the Hunza River on this suspension bridge and head up the tributary valley to Chaprot. Think the bridge is old-fashioned? I draw your attention to the fifth chapter of Algernon Durand's The Making of a Frontier, 1900: "In the whole course of the river only two bridges existed, both of them twig rope suspension bridges..., and there was no other means of crossing the river when in flood."

The day is chilly and wet.

A girl casts a wary eye.

Later in the year. You can bet there's an irrigation channel running at the top of the green.

Rakaposhi rises above the staple apricots drying on the roofs.

Apricots, apricots, drying everywhere.

Each household finds its own drying surface.

The doorway to the house is there on the left.

A grandmother sits on the porch of a house more open to the world.

The venue was his choice.  How many American men would choose to be photographed surrounded with flowers?

Father and sons. Any question about which is the eldest? Their father said the valley provided everything one could want--food, water, and wood for construction and fuel--but he still wanted all his boys to go down to the Punjab and seek higher education.

After the formal picture--and better.

No such luck for daughters, expected to withdraw from the world at about age 12.