Overland to London - Peshawar via Kabul to Kandahar

Local transport in the Khyber Pass

On my first Overland journey in 1970, I travelled the classic route through Afghanistan & northern Iran to the Caspian Sea, then south through Tehran to Isfahan, Shiraz and Persepolis before travelling through to Tabriz and into Eastern Turkey and following the Black Sea coast from Trabzon to Samsun and finally to Ankara. For this itinerary I have drawn on the diary I kept during this tour and other sources.

 Sun 8 March 1970 PESHAWAR – KABUL                                                                                                                                                                          283 kms

Regimental plaques at Shagai Fort in the Khyber Pass

     The Khyber Pass begins just a few kilometres out of Peshawar.  The little Pakistani town of Jamrud is at the entrance to the Pass and it is interesting to note that the pass is still closed each day between the hours of 3pm and 6am. The Pakistani Government controls the road in this area, but just a few yards off the tarmac, Pakhtunwali – the way of the Pathan rules.

Road sign in the Khyber Pass

As James Spain explains it in The Way of the Pathans: “The first and greatest commandment of Pukhtunwali is badal, revenge. The obligation to take revenge for a wrong, real or fancied, falls not only upon the man who suffered it but also upon his family and his tribe. Neither the Law of Pakistan nor that of Imperial Britain before her has ever held sway in the tribal territory. Hence revenge there is uninhibited and, since both insult and retaliation involves clans as well as individuals, the blood feud flourishes.” James Spain goes on: ”The Pathans are proud sensitive men; the number of things which they construe as insult or grievance are legion. Most frequently the trouble centres on zar, zan or zamin: gold, women and land.” 

Near Shagai Fort are plaques, attached to the roadside rocks, of British regiments that served in, what was then,  the North West Frontier Province, now known as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The pass itself is rugged and very barren, but not so bad as one would expect, and near the top of the Pass is a side indicating routes for motor-vehicles and horse and camel traffic, the latter being the old Moghul road.

Boredom at the Torkham border

At the town of Torkham we cross into Afghanistan and we can expect a delay, possibly of several hours, while immigration and Customs formalities are completed. Once clear of the border, the road proceeds across a barren plain before the spectacular Kabul Gorge is reached. The gorge offers some of the most dramatic scenery seen since leaving Kathmandu. The road first follows the turbulent Kabul River, surrounded by snow-peaked mountains, before winding steeply up a rock face. This is one of the most spectacular views on the journey but unfortunately daylight will be fading as we finish driving through the Pass.. 

Road through the Kabul Gorge

        It was after dark when we reached Kabul, capital of Afghanistan.. We are staying at the Jamil Hotel. That evening we had a meal at the Khyber Restaurant, a favourite meeting place for Overland travellers.

Mon 9 March KABUL

        Kabul is located at an elevation of 1790m (5873ft) in the Hindu Kush mountains. The city has been known for 3500 years and a settlement called Kubha (believed to be Kabul) is referred to in the Hindu Rig Veda as an ‘ideal' city set in the mountains. The city was part of the  Achaemenid Empire, during which it was a centre of learning for both Zoroastrianism and Buddhism. After Alexander the Great defeated and annexed the Achaemenid Empire, Kabul came under his control, then in the late 3rd century BC the city became part of the Indian Maurya Empire under Chandragupta and Asoka. Many other invaders occupied Kabul over the centuries, including  the Mongols, the Timurids, the Moghuls and the city became an important trading centre on the Silk Road. In the mid-18th century Kabul became capital of the local Durrani Empire and was first occupied by the British in 1839, which led to the disastrous retreat and massacre in 1842. A further massacre of a British mission led by Sir Pierre Louis Napoleon Cavagnari occurred in 1879 which led to the Second Anglo-Afghan War and a furious battle at Kandahar. The British, led by Field-Marshal Frederick ‘Bobs’ Roberts re-entered Kabul. After establishing a permanent British Mission in Afghanistan, the British forces withdrew, and although the British considered Afghanistan to be an independent state, the British controlled foreign affairs (to counteract any movement into the area by the Russians as part of the ‘Great Game’),  In the early 20th century Kabul was modernised, and after the Third Anglo-Afghan War of 1919, when the Emirate of Afghanistan invaded British India in the Khyber Pass area, hoping to coincide with a planned insurrection in Peshawar, the resulting armistice resulted in the British giving back control of foreign affairs to the Afghans and the recognition of Afghanistan as an independent nation. It is interesting to note that the British used aircraft to bomb Jalalabad and Kabul which shocked King Amanullah who: "... protested to the Indian viceroy, Lord Chlemsford, that after Britain had denounced the barbarism of German zeppelin attacks on London, Britain itself had proven no less savage." (Stephen Tanner  - Afghanisan: a Military History). 

Street scene in downtown Kabul, Afghanistan

`When King Zahir Shah came to power in 1933, he embarked on a modernisation of the transport and communication networks. In the 1950s the Soviet Union funded infrastructure development including  a highway from Kabul to the Soviet border, airport development and Soviet-style housing developments. In the 1960s the first Marks & Spencer store in Central Asia was opened in Kabul, and tourism flourished, particularly during the days of the ‘Hippie Trail’. 

In July 1973, Zahir Shah was deposed as king. Daoud Khan became president until he was assassinated in 1978 and his two pro-Soviet successors (Taraki and Amin) suffered a similar fate in 1979, when the Soviet army invaded, installing Babrak Karmal as President, and setting in action what has turned out to be continuous warfare ever since. 

Late afternoon by the Kabul River, Kabul, Afghanistan

        A free day to visit the markets and particularly  the fur stores of Chicken Street with the karakul leather coats, made famous by John Lennon on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album of 1967. These coats have become a necessary item of apparel for any young person passing through Afghanistan.  Chicken Street is the main foreign meeting place in Kabul, with cheap hotels, cafes and stores catering for the transient hippy population that drifts through Afghanistan en route to Kathmandu or Goa. The amount of furs and skins in the stores is incredible, although some of the karakul coats have a definite odour to them.  Kabul is a modern city, but after rain the ‘pavements’ and streets can be very muddy. The people  are colourful with the various tribal groups of Pathans in their distinctive woollen pakol hats rubbing shoulders with Hazaras, Uzbeks, Tajiks and Turkomen from Central Asia. Most local women are in complete chador and there are many armed Afghan soldiers on the streets. Russian influence here is great. The food  in Kabul is among the best so far on the tour, and the cheapest! I noted in my diary that I went to the Spinoza Hotel for a roast turkey dinner - 60 afghanis - 'the best and cheapest since I left home.'

Tue 10 March KABUL – GHAZNI – KANDAHAR                                                                                                                                                     495 kms

The snowy Afghan plains between Kabul and Ghazni

    We left Kabul at about 9am for Kandahar driving across plains which are snow-covered in winter and early spring, this time of the year. We reached Ghazni, the one-time capital, at lunchtime. Ghazni was occupied by the armies of Alexander the Great in the 3rd century BC who called it Alexandria in Opiana and by the 7th century AD it was a major centre of Buddhism. In the late 7th century Arab armies brought Islam to the area and in the late 9th century it became the capital of the Ghaznavid Dynasty whose most famous ruler was the vicious Mahmud of Ghazni. Under Mahmud, Ghazni became a significant cultural, commercial and intellectual centre in the Islamic world, much of which was funded by plunder from conquered cities and temples in India. It was said that Mahmud of Ghazni invaded India 17 times in 27 years. In the 13th century the city was sacked by the Mongols. Babur, the first Moghul Emperor, conquered Ghazni in 1504 and wrote in the Baburnama: ‘Ghazni is a very humble place; strange indeed it is that rulers in whose hands were Hindustan and Khurasan should have chosen it for their capital.’ The city remained under Moghul control until the Persian Nadir Shah, invaded in the 18th century, after which it became part of the Durrani Empire of Afghanistan. During the first Anglo-Afghan War, the city was stormed and captured by British forces in 1839. 

The muddy street of Ghazni, Afghanistan

        Ghazni lies at an elevation of 2219m (7280ft), and after snow or rain the streets are very muddy. We ate local fare in a small Afghan restaurant called Sultan Mahmoods. On the outskirts of Ghazni are the mudbrick remains of the Citadel which in 1970, was still occupied by the Afghan Army.

Mudbrick buildings in Ghazni

The fort at Ghazni

        After leaving Ghazni the road passes through barren, rock-strewn countryside with sharp, rugged, mountains, some snow-covered. Kandahar is the second city of Afghanistan situated at an elevation of 1010m (3310ft). The city was founded by Alexander the Great in 330BC who named it Alexandria in Arachosia – Kandahar is believed to have evolved from ‘Iskandar’, the local name for Alexander. The city passed through the hands of similar conquerors to Ghazni and was captured by the British after the Battle of Kandahar, during the 2nd Anglo-Afghan War in 1880, after which the British General Frederick ‘Bobs’ Roberts became the 1st Earl Roberts of Kandahar. 

92nd Highlands & 2nd Gurkhasstorming the Gaudi Mullah Sahibdad at Kandahar, 
1 September 1880  by Richard Caton Woodville

       After some time looking for somewhere to eat, and we entered some wild joints thick with hashish smoke, we finally settled on the balcony of the Kandahar-Herat Gate Tourist Hotel, where tasty sheesh kebabs were the main, and only, course, watching the antics of a lone policeman on a traffic island, directing the odd car than came down the main street in a direction the driver had no intention of going. With a shrug of his shoulders and his hands clasped behind his back, he would walk around his traffic island to spring to attention when the next car came along - plenty evening excitement here in Kandahar! 

text & photographs ©Neil Rawlins 

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My paperbacks and ebooks on my Overland travels in Asia, Europe & Africa in the early 1970s and the experiences of a tour guide on the Asian Overland routes & leading Camel Safaris in Rajasthan in the 1980s are available from Amazon.