The valley around Taxila is one of those places where the past is stacked in layers, and you can feel it as soon as you leave the road. Just north-west of Islamabad and Rawalpindi, in the foothills of the Margalla Hills, the broad plain was for more than a thousand years a crossroads for traders, armies, monks and scholars moving between Central Asia, India and the Persian world. UNESCO listed the ruins in 1980, and the Giri complex belongs to this wider landscape.
The great age of the region was Gandhara, a Buddhist kingdom that mixed Indian, Persian and Greek influences. According to tradition, Alexander the Great marched through in 326 BC and was received by the local ruler, and later the Mauryan emperor Ashoka held the city, and the Kushans made it a centre of Buddhist learning and art. Monasteries, stupas and universities spread across the surrounding hills, and the ruins of several of them can be visited in the valley. Gandharan sculpture, in which the Buddha looks something like a Greek god with wavy hair and a robe, is one of the great hybrids of art history.
It is the sort of place where the real pleasure is in the setting, the dry hills, the terraced fields and the haze over the plain, and in having it largely to yourself on a weekday.
The riding in the area is easy. The roads from Islamabad are good, though traffic around the cities is heavy, and the lanes close to the sites are narrow and dusty. Watch for livestock, carts and motorbikes carrying whole families. Summer heat is severe, with temperatures well over forty degrees, so go in the cooler months of October to March or early in the morning. Haze from dust and smoke can reduce the view.
Fuel is easy, since Islamabad is about fifteen kilometres away, and the highway towns have stations. Small tea stalls near the sites sell chai and samosas. Taxila Museum, in town, is a short drive and shows many of the finds from the valley.
Go with a flask of water, a hat and some patience, and give yourself time to wander.