Route Dushanbe → Kalaikhum → Khorog → Ishkashim → Langar → Bulunkul → Murghab → Karakul → Sary-Tash → Osh Distance 1600 km, with the Wakhan loop Duration 11 days, ~50 hours in the saddle
Two rest days built in to acclimatise Best Months Mid-June to mid-September
Snow closes the high passes the rest of the year World Heritage Tajik National Park (Mountains of the Pamirs)
Sulaiman-Too Sacred Mountain, at Osh Parks & Protected Areas Tajik National Park
Zorkul Nature Reserve
Karakul, Bulunkul and Yashilkul lakes Signature Roads Ak-Baital pass, 4655 m
The Wakhan Corridor track
The M41 itself

Route Map

Open in Google Maps The Plan

Eleven days on the second-highest road on earth, from the capital of Tajikistan to the edge of the Fergana valley in Kyrgyzstan. A gorge with Afghanistan on the far bank, a corridor under the Hindu Kush, then up onto a treeless plateau above four thousand metres and held there for days. The one I keep coming back to on the map.

Notes

The Pamirs need a GBAO permit on top of the Tajik visa, added at the time of the e-visa or sorted in Dushanbe. Without it you are turned back at Khorog. Kyrgyzstan lets most nationalities in without a visa.

Fuel is the real planning problem. It is scarce and poor east of Khorog, so fill at Khorog and Murghab and carry jerry cans; the octane drops with the altitude and the engine feels it. The main road is paved but broken; the Wakhan and the Khargush stretch are gravel, washboard and the odd river crossing.

Everything above Khorog is spent between 3500 and 4655 metres, which is why the rest days are where they are. This is a big-tank adventure bike on knobbly tyres, and a rider happy on high gravel.