Bit of an airport adventure this morning. SRB and I woke up bright and early to see if we could get her on the PIA flight to Gilgit. There's a music festival and conference up in Passu this weekend, in the upper Hunza valley, that's being hosted by my colleagues. She's friends with the festival organizers and they invited her to play. But their plan for getting there -- four buses driving through the night, including through some iffy territory security-wise -- made her uncomfortable. Rightly so: I'm not allowed to travel through there by road without a really good reason and plenty of advance notice and clearance from our security.
So our admin manager spent hours yesterday trying to get us both on the PIA flight. Managed to get me a seat but not her, but then it turned out a helicopter mission was going up with plenty of extra seats. She's not allowed on the heli but I'm cleared to go anytime if there's a spot. So we woke up at 5 AM, made some coffee, got to the airport, and went straight to the ticket counter. The flight was booked but we asked if she could buy a standby ticket. The guy said sure, I'd brought enough cash to pay for it (about $100 for a foreigner ticket), and so she ended up taking off. Miraculous.
Unfortunately, the helicopter got up over the Margallas an hour later and turned right back around. Visibility over there was terrible, not more than a couple hundred meters and then everything was lost in the haze. Ordinarily we'd have waited to see if it would clear up but no dice: the haze only gets worse before it gets better and the pilot was worried that by the time it cleared up enough to fly over Abbottabad and into the mountains it'd be dicey in Gilgit. Disappointed!
On the plus side, SRB made it just fine and one of our drivers met her at the airport and took her to the Serena for breakfast before departing for Passu. Not sure if anyone else was riding with her but I wouldn't be surprised if so; apparently it's going to be a big event. She's never been up north before, so even if I have to stew down here for another day I'm glad she's getting to see Gilgit and Hunza. With any luck I'll join her tomorrow.
So our admin manager spent hours yesterday trying to get us both on the PIA flight. Managed to get me a seat but not her, but then it turned out a helicopter mission was going up with plenty of extra seats. She's not allowed on the heli but I'm cleared to go anytime if there's a spot. So we woke up at 5 AM, made some coffee, got to the airport, and went straight to the ticket counter. The flight was booked but we asked if she could buy a standby ticket. The guy said sure, I'd brought enough cash to pay for it (about $100 for a foreigner ticket), and so she ended up taking off. Miraculous.
Unfortunately, the helicopter got up over the Margallas an hour later and turned right back around. Visibility over there was terrible, not more than a couple hundred meters and then everything was lost in the haze. Ordinarily we'd have waited to see if it would clear up but no dice: the haze only gets worse before it gets better and the pilot was worried that by the time it cleared up enough to fly over Abbottabad and into the mountains it'd be dicey in Gilgit. Disappointed!
On the plus side, SRB made it just fine and one of our drivers met her at the airport and took her to the Serena for breakfast before departing for Passu. Not sure if anyone else was riding with her but I wouldn't be surprised if so; apparently it's going to be a big event. She's never been up north before, so even if I have to stew down here for another day I'm glad she's getting to see Gilgit and Hunza. With any luck I'll join her tomorrow.
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