We were up early and both of us were preparing for the days ride  I think we were a little less chatty than normal, probably due to the armed escort and crossing into Pakistan.

The escort arrived on time. A car with two officers and a motorbike with a very boyish looking officer carrying a  Kalishivov.

We set off and as headed for the boarder which was a ride of approx 70km through pretty Barron land. The ride was interspersed with stops at various police checks where our passports were required to be produced for some reason?

We finally made it to the boarder and were ushered  us to the front of the que and left in the hands of the boarder control police. Fortunately this worked in our favour as we had  personal offical ensuring we completed all the paperwork (including having our bike Carne’s signed) ready for our entry into Pakistan.

Passing through the Pakistan boarder control went pretty smoothly apart from having to reinforce that our Carne’s needed signing to ensure the bikes were cleared for entry.

Once we were cleared, and we thought we could be on our way, we were then escorted accross what could only be described as an old rubbish dump to a compound, creating a destinct concern for both Steve and I. As it turned out this “compound” was the local Police compound which was to be our home for the night as we were advised we could not proceed without armed police escort until tomorrow.

Within the compound we found ourselves sharing with a “people smuggler” who was locked up and appeared to be pretty much forgotten about, half a dozen young Afgan boy refugees (between 16 & 23y.o.) who were due to be handed over to Afgan officials any day. We were suddenly seeing the reality of what life in this part of the world is like.  These boys had trecked hundred’s of kilometres in a search for a life only to be arrested and now looking at a fate of being handed back to the authorities from where they escaped! You can only wonder what the fate of these boys will be over time?

Steve and I were joined later in the evening by a German couple who had also crossed from Iran into Pakista, however they were travelling by bus. They also had been instructed to stay put until an escort tomorrow.

Ralf and Yin (the German’s) were a lovely couple whom we would spend the next day’s travelling through Pakistan with. Tonight however we all had to bed down in the Taftan Police compound, which Lonely Planet described as “hell on earth, and worse in summer”.

Let’s hope tomorrow is a better day………