Here Photographs from the Grand Opening of Atlantis Hotel in Dubai
The opening night was marked with the biggest fireworks of the century! according to Guinness book of world records.
Cheapest rates for a room per night is $35,000
Popularity: 21% [?]
By Khalid Nasir
Citing downbeat expressions for Pakistan have become quite a norm these days. However, a trip to Hingol National Park or Hinglaj, as it is locally known, is guaranteed to toss out all the negativity that has amassed and replaces it with a remembrance of magnificent wonders of nature this area offers. All you have to do is to make a round day trip to Hingol National Park, Nani Mandir, the breathtaking Buzi pass and Kund Malir beach by taking a pleasant four-hour road ride out of Karachi.
And that’s exactly what I did with my comrades of late. Considering the completion of the Coastal Highway, the journey could easily be made using any 4-wheel vehicle that has been declared fit to run miles. Before you start your journey, check the weather. If it has rained recently or there is a forecast, better delay the plan as you might not be able to go to Nani Mandir across the Hingol River in your vehicle. Failing that, you have to get off at the river, cross it on foot and walk to Nani Mandir that is 6kms one-way walk from the river bank.
Try to visit the area on a holiday so that you find less traffic on the highway; check the security situation before setting off, and keep your car’s documents handy as you will come across many security check posts on your way. It is advisable to keep extra fuel. There is one petrol pump at Hub from where you can get the last tankful of ‘Pakistani’ fuel because you will only get a slush called ‘Irani fuel’ at places ahead.
To make the most of the trip, start early in the morning. Get to the Coastal Highway by taking the Hub River Road that will get you out of Karachi and onward to Balochistan. The road is smooth and offers to check your limits of insane driving. The turn-off point to the Mekran Coastal Highway is well-marked on the left side of the road about 10kms of Uthal. The smooth road leading into the horizon will make even 130kms per hour seem far too slow.
It takes about 3 hours from Karachi to get to a blue road sign on the right just short of the Hingol River Bridge, directing way to the Nani Mandir. Since the visit to Nani Mandir by the former Indian foreign minister Jaswant Singh in 2006, the 15km road to Hingol River bank and 6kms onwards to Mandir have been paved and offer a pleasant drive by the river. If you have chosen the visit day wisely, there are chances that you will actually find nobody in the vicinity except few local children who look at you shyly. Otherwise, you will find worshipers making their way to the Mandir.
The Mandir is situated near an underwater stream in a cave-like form that is bounded by mountains. The end of the cave houses the holy relic that is covered by red clothes and vermilion. As narrated by Maharaj Gopal, Nani Mandir is an important Hindu pilgrimage. The visit or the pilgrimage is also called ‘Nani ka Haj’. Since the Mandir is located in a desert which is called Maru in Sanskrit, the shrine is referred in holy texts as Marutirtha Hinglaj which means Hinglaj — the shrine of the desert.
Mandir is also the last remnants of the Hindu society that once inhabited the region. Area for rest has been built some half a kilometre away from the Mandir and offers basic amenities to visitors.
A visit to Mandir is an out-of-the-ordinary experience that takes you back in time for a while. A visit to the Mandir is a two-hour round trip; to get back to continue your journey towards Buzi pass.
Just across the Hingol River Bridge begins the Buzi pass that offers wonders of nature along the Coastal Highway. But before you throw yourself into this awe of nature, do make a stopover at the roadside dhaba near the bridge that offers tasty mixed vegetable, daal with hot roti made on wood stove.
Wonders of nature could be witnessed as soon as you enter the Buzi pass. On your left you can see the beautiful expanse of the sea while the other side puts you in the rocky rakishness. The best time to be around Buzi pass is between 3 to 4pm so that you can see the breathtaking landscape. You will find yourself amidst towering rock faces, interesting contrasts of rock and pinnacles.
The winding road keeps opening up panoramic vistas for you to behold. The most wondrous is ‘Princess of Hope’ that could be seen while driving through Buzi pass. It is nature’s crafting of a mountain that resembles a lady wearing a robe and hood and standing upright in a royal pose. Then there is another rock outcrop, the ‘Sphinx’ that appears to have a head of lion and body of a human being. It looks like the guardian of the valleys around and resembles the original Sphinx in Egypt to the extent that you will wonder for hours that perhaps the same civilisation crafted it too thousands of years ago.
Every turn on the Buzi pass reveals magnificent rock patterns and valleys. It is advisable that you make short stops alongside the road to take pictures of the spectacular views with ‘Princess of Hope’ and ‘Sphinx’ in the background.
On reaching Ormara, you can make a U-turn on the Buzi pass once you see the ‘Princess of Hope’. This turn will enable you to get back to the city the same day. If you have been able to stick to your scheduled time, you now should be able to relish the beauty of the dessert beach of Kund Malir on your way back to Karachi. In fact, you cannot resist getting your feet wet in the cold clear waters at the Kund Malir, and also fish here. There is a small fisherman village nearby from where you can buy a fresh catch and witness seagulls and other sea birds sitting on the beach, fearless of your presence.
Some Related Sites for more information on Hingol National Park:
Popularity: 30% [?]
A South Korean climber has become the first woman to scale 14 of the world’s highest mountains.
Oh Eun-sun reached the summit of Annapurna and planted a South Korean flag.
She beat a Spanish rival for the right to call herself the first woman to climb all 14 of the highest mountains in the Himalayas.
Annapurna, at 26,545ft above sea level, was the last of the 14 Himalayan peaks above the 8,000-metre level she had wanted to conquer.
She narrowly beat Edurne Pasaban of Spain to the 14th peak. Pasaban had only the 26,330ft Mount Shisha Pangma left on her list.
Oh Eun-sun also tried to reach the peak of Annapurna last year but turned away near the summit because of bad weather. Snow and wind also stopped her from making the trek last weekend.
“I gave it up because of a sudden ominous feeling that something bad would happen to either me or my peers including the sherpas on my way back to base camp,” she said last month.
She said this trip would be different, and she would be carrying a photograph of Ko Mi-young, a lifelong rival who fell to her death last year while descending from Nanga Parbat, the world’s ninth-highest peak.
Copyright © 2010 The Press Association.
News Source: Google News
Popularity: 13% [?]
Found this Editorial interesting, so sharing with you:
Nobody really expects airline travel to return to the days of yore, when flying was fun and exciting, almost like a great adventure.
But really, must airline travel continue to get more grueling by the day?
Apparently so, at least if the latest gambit from Miramar-based Spirit Airlines becomes an industry-wide trend.
It was just earlier this month when Spirit irritated just about every traveler by announcing it would charge as much as $45 one way for carry-on baggage that couldn’t fit under a passenger’s seat. At least five other airlines said they had no plans to follow suit, but you have to imagine it’s just a matter of time before others follow.
Read it complete here: A long time ago, airline travel actually was fun
Popularity: 11% [?]
If you are thinking to spend your winter’s vacations with your family at some place, where you could find all those entertainments that makes your vacations memorable. I am sure that you are thinking to go at some hill station or some other place where you could find some soft and slippery snow to make your winter more chilled.
For this you are advised to turn your face towards Big Ski Resort. Located southwestern Montana in Madison Country. This resort provides you the best source of entertainment which makes your winters a pack of leisure.
Big sky opened in December 1973 at main base area of 7510 feet above the sea level on highest mountain in Montana. This resort is known for its best wide open slopes and also for its short lift lines. Big sky resort is one of the famous and the largest lift served in the United States.
Big Sky is usually known for its winter activities, which include ski and snowboard terrain, a terrain park, cross country skiing, zip line and snowshoeing, but now it is also getting fame is its summer activities as well. Horseback riding and hiking the trails are accessible on the mountain, with zip line, golf, and tennis obtainable further down by the Meadow Village, which sits at an elevation of 6,800 feet, between the ski area and US-191.
On the Gallatin River, Fly fishing and whitewater rafting is the most popular activities Huge Sky is a expedient and comfortable base camp for excursions in to nearby Yellowstone National Park.
Big Sky has three mountains to contentment skiers and snowboarders. Lone Mountain is the resort’s signature peak, ascent to 11,166 feet. The Lone Aiguille Tram takes the adventuresome to its acme with European appearance able area below. Big Sky offers 3,812 acres, 4,350 vertical feet-terrains abundant for all levels and abundant bend allowance to get pleasure it. Andesite Mountain has some of the resort’s best notable average canoeing runs, some adequate south-facing abecedarian trails, several able timberline runs and a super pipe and behemothic area park. Flat Iron Mountain is on the eastern accepting of Andesite and offers alike added variety. In the draw amid Andesite and Lone Mountains, you’ll acquisition Big Sky’s appointed inbounds snowshoe trail: Moose Tracks. The Big Sky Resort-Moonlight Basin interconnect is the Biggest Skiing in America, this Lone Aiguille Ticket provides skiers and riders seamless admission to 5,512 ski able acres.
There is one the most famous place in this resort. If you want to go out for some walk and enjoy different meals, drinks and other more excitement things this is the one stop shop.
The Lone Peak Tram is a lift at the Big Sky Resort that begins at the top of the Lone Peak Triple chairlift and unloads at the acme of Lone Mountain at 11,166 anxieties. Opened in the abatement of 1995, the tram is a four-minute ride for 15 passengers, aggressive 1450 vertical anxiety over a ambit of 2828 anxiety, with two cabins traveling in adverse directions. It provides admission to the best difficult area at Big Sky Resort and adjacent Moonlight Basin. Architecture was completed by the high-altitude architecture close Matrix, based in Alaska. Big Sky’s acquaintance on its arctic abuttal is Moonlight Basin, opened in 2003. It originally began as Moonlight Basin Ranch, an absolute acreage development stemming from the 1992 acquirement 25,000 acreage from Plum Creek Timber Company. Both Big Sky and Moonlight Basin accomplish absolutely on clandestine land.
Big sky ski resort is one of the highest ranked resorts in the United States. No one can deny that there is something for everyone. Those who will visit this place will defiantly enjoy their vacations and always remember as a best place to enjoy the winter vacations. Go and try to get some chilled a smooth rides on a slippery or dicey snow.
You can get more details from here Big Sky Resort, Montana
Popularity: 40% [?]
Skiing is the best thing that everyone wants to do on a smooth white snow. Because of the large area slopes are not crowded and the lift lines are not so long. There are just nine lifts which includes six chair lifts, two surface lifts and a one cable car line. There is also a trail facility for the beginners, intermediates, and experts. There are 68 trails for every category, but most of the trails are intended for the intermediate skiers.
For the night riders or who loves to skiing in the midnight light, skiing is permissible to make their night full of entertainment and excitement. In the moon light u can see snow capped mountains, hanging glaciers, and un-ignorable famous Northern Lights. 
According to the Skiing Magazine this resort place 9th position among top twenty-five killer ski-trips.
This awe-inspiring season begins from mid of the November and continues through mid of the April. In this part of Alaska, day time is approximately of sixteen hours. But during the December there are only just seven hours of day light. This is best for the night riders and for those who just want to spend their most time on the slopes.
There is a luxurious hotel named “Alaska Prince Hotel”. This hotel is well furnished, contains very graceful rooms and also a very well dinning. Night entertainment is also available in this hotel like bar. Café, clubs.
Glacier Tube is also an appealing place of Alaska. Those who really fond of tubing this place will definitely provide them lot of enjoyment. In this park every member of family will amuse. There is a separate park for snow boarding named “Alaska Terrain Park”. There are lots of winter activities which you can be enjoyed in and around the resort like helisking, flight seeing, ocean cruising tours, dog sledding, polar bear viewing, ice climbing, back country skiing, mountain climbing and skating.>
At Alaska you can experience your crucial time of your winter vacations. Through out this tour you cannot find time to think about your tensions, your work load, day to day problems. Without visiting Alaska you never know about Alaska and skiing. This resort provides lots of activities to the whole family to enjoy themselves. There are also other locations, sight and different places for the gratification. This resort is the best spot to spend ski vacation with family.
Popularity: 18% [?]
While browsing through my old files, found some old pictures of a trip with friends. That initiate me to rewrite about an old memorable trip to Banjosa Lake in Kashmir.
As I remember our group consists of Fisal, Asim Adeel, Kashif Aziz, Irfan Mughal, Faizaan, Shoaib and Nasarullah.
The pictures here are scanned from old pictures collection, so may not be of the quality that it should be. as the real adventure was worth watching. and add many more good photographs to the collection.
Break-Fast in the way of Murree, crossed Murree and after having a good round of Antakshiri (game of songs) 
with 1 km limit for deciding a song. We first stops at the shore of River Jehlum, which was at very full tide, and too cold. This picture is of the nala near it, which drops in to river Jehlum. Its pleasure to see Jehlum that day.
We all unable to stop us from diving in to the open pool of that Nala, what a cold water, gives a new birth to all of us. One of the best bath since that time [beacuse later in life I had enjoyed bath in many more rivers and lakes, including cold river Nellum in Nellum Valley, will discuss that some other day].
Then after crossing Dheerkoat and visiting NeelaBut, we reach to another great Nala D…., And a tota hoa romantic pul (bridge) gives pleasure to us. Faisal, Nasarullah and Kashif also enjoys the water there by having a half dubki in it and crossing its fast flowing waters to explore a large amazing cave on its other end.
A great discussions from all of the scholars in the trip on the matter of “What is Love”. Nobody wins the discussion, some one seems stupid 
and many have objections (
). A cool “War of the Words”. Everybody have their say, even little Faizan has a very mature view on the topic. We all like it.
During our way to rawlakoat a honey bee gets inspired by Kashif and bites him (probably after listening his views on love), he just got rescued by Faisal, before it gets to…. ;)
Finally after crossing Rawlakoot city, We reach our destination in the evening, “Bangoosa Lake”. A small and peacefull lake, under the trees. A quite romantic place that is. Peoples are poluting it but yet beautifull. We’ll visit it again some day. We had a great evening there, under slow rain 
and bright orange sunlight. a glooming view of Sunset.
Above is the rest house at Bangoosa Lake we finally able to arrange for our night stay. That was a great night, first having some great chats and songs (not to mention the great phada on Farhat Abbass Shah poet), then a good dinner and finally a great rainy and stormy night 
.
Night storm awaken us several time. But the end of night is the most beautifull part then all of that, a bright Morning, I even remember it today and unable to explain the beauty in words, that the first day I realize how beautiful Kashmir really is.
But the sad part is that, then we have to leave Bangoosa, finally we take its another round and a memorable morning walk. And there we go back to Rawlakoot to take our route to Rawalpindi.
Way back to pindi, we found another cool nala. and Faizaan gives the plan to “lets clean the Car”. And we all got on to it, everyone took active part, while Kashif takes a nap. That is the best service for our Unicorn. But thats another story that with in next few kilometers of our trip we manage to make it dirty again.
Way back to home, before reaching the bridge of river Jehlum, Our cars, ‘chimtaa ka kabulaa’ gets fancy but God saves us all. Faisal and Asim go to Kahota to get the mechanic and ‘Kabulaa’ and took 3-4 hours, rest of the guys take rest and wait. But all that is enjoyable. Allah helps us by giving us a good mechanic who fixs it in good manner, and we carry on our way back to Rawalpindi.
We all remember that good day of our Life. “We are not sad that it is over but happy that it happens”
Popularity: 50% [?]
