coming from miles away thanks to
our broken exhaust). They wanted
nothing more than a high-five and
to practise their English. Families
welcomed us into their homes for
tea, cake and traditional plov; rice
drenched in animal fat (tastier than it
sounds). We couldn’t have felt safer.
The one thing we had to be care-
ful of - other than the perilous cliff
edges - were wild dogs. They’d also
heard our bike coming but weren’t
interested in high-fives. Snarling
beasts sprinted across fields, charging
at the bike, barking and chomping at
our ankles. Friends we made along
the way had bad crashes when dogs
jumped in front of their bikes.
But swerving around giant rocks
and dodging dogs is just half the fun.
Riding sand traps and hidden paths to
secluded lakes and remote villages is
the other. It pulled us into a trance,
mesmerised by a magical kingdom
that had been hidden from the world
by towering mountains. But when
our pannier rack snapped and the
weight imbalance nearly sent us
flying into a huge rock face and down
a cliff, we decided it was time to stop
day-dreaming and find a town … and
a welder.
We ratchet strapped the rack
together and headed for the nearest
town. While there we spotted an
Afghanistan flag, marking an embas-
sy. Two days later we left with two
shiny Afghan visas. Within a week we
were riding in Afghanistan’s Wakhan
Corridor, drinking tea with incredibly
friendly military, visiting remote vil-
lages and camping in one of the most
remote parts of the world. Locals dub
it the ‘Roof of the World’ and it’s easy
to see why. One week, a million self-
ies with border guards and a hundred
AK-47s later and we left Afghanistan
with some of the best memories of
our trip. But the XT didn’t share the
sentiment.
Despite leaving most of our luggage
in Tajikistan to be as light as possible,
the rear shock completely failed, we
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