Karakul Lake, Day 5 of the trip

I woke up to the father of the family doing his morning prayer towards Mecca a few feet away from me, which was extremely cool.  Walked out to the lake to watch the sun make its appearance over the mountains and passed all of the Yaks and donkeys grazing in the valley  who were generally making a ruckus.   

House in the village at first light

Karakul lake

View down the valley back to the town from above the lake 

For breakfast we ate and drank yak byproduct again, with some bagels (Uighers are espescialy known for their bagel producing skills)

After we had stuffed our faces we went with the son and his friend on motos up to the base camp of Muztagh Ata (7,546 meters), the huge mountain which toweres over the village.  It really felt like you were indeed at the roof of the world, and I was not satisfied with just the base camp so I kept hiking up much to the chagrin of our two guides, and Jeremy, who I soon left in the dust.   I probably only hiked a few k, but it seemed like an eternity from the lack of oxygen - every 60 steps I had to sit down because my legs were burning lactic acid.   Every single ridge I crested revealed another behind it, but FINALY I made it to the snow line where you would have needed crampons, or at least not Pumas, to go any further.   While I was struggling upward in such a slow fashion the guide who had been trailing me took a nap for 30 minutes and then bounded up the mountain to join me, doing in 10 minutes what had taken me 45... I guess you get used to the air. 

View from the top

Riding down the mountain... to get this picture I had to turn completely around with both of my hands stabilizing the camera while rocketing down the hillside at a very high rate of speed. 

Muztagh Ata

After our motorcycle ride we had some lunch back at the house and chilled with some of the people in the village for a while, all of whom were very interested in us, before heading back to Kashgar.