Tashkurgan is a small town in the far west of China's Xinjiang region, high on a plateau among the Pamirs at roughly three thousand metres. After crossing the Khunjerab Pass, at about 4,700 metres one of the highest paved border crossings in the world, it is the first real place you reach on the Chinese side. For anyone coming up the Karakoram Highway from Pakistan, it feels like arriving at the end of the earth and the beginning of a new one.
The people here are mostly Tajik, an Iranian-speaking mountain people quite unlike the Han Chinese or the Uyghurs of the plains below, and the county is officially a Tajik autonomous one. The faces, the clothes, the singing and the drum dances all point toward Central Asia. Above the town stand the remains of an old stone fort, and the name itself is thought to mean stone fortress. For centuries this was a stop on the Silk Road, where caravans from Kashgar and from the passes to the south exchanged goods and news before the next stage of the trip.
The setting is wide and austere. The valley opens into broad pastures edged by bare brown mountains, with snow on the higher summits and wind that comes through in cold bursts. Yaks and camels graze along the road. Further north, toward Kashgar, the highway runs past the vast Karakul Lake and the huge, glaciated mass of Muztagh Ata, over 7,500 metres, a mountain that turns pink at dusk and appears to float above the water.
The road itself is generally good asphalt, wide and well engineered by Chinese crews, though high altitude, cold nights and landslides can interrupt travel. The border crossing is seasonal, typically closed through the deep winter, and crossing it with a foreign motorcycle involves official permission and arrangements that need to be made well ahead, so this is not a place to improvise.
Tashkurgan has the facilities of a border town: fuel, simple restaurants, guesthouses and a market. Altitude matters, so take it gently, drink water, and expect a headache the first night if you came up fast. The lamb noodles and fresh bread are good, and the tea is hot.