A stay in Pakistan's remote Ishkoman Valley, where humans still consult fairies

I took a 650km motorcycle ride to this traveller's hostel, where activities include lazing with sheep, enjoying Pakistani hospitality and visiting shamans who can learn your fate.

I scramble up a scree-covered slope, trying to keep pace with a flock of woolly white sheep, each wobbly step triggering a mini landslide below us. Unfazed, the sheep charge on, navigating the precarious cliffside as if by memory and leading me like seasoned guides to an overlook.

They halt abruptly and begin to graze. I catch my breath and look out across Northern Pakistan's Ishkoman Valley, framed by snow-capped peaks and cut through by pale glacial stream. Pale pink cherry blossom trees line the narrow switchbacks, descending to Coyote Den Ishkoman Hostel – my pastoral mountain retreat for this week, where I'm trekking high peaks and conferring with a female shaman who is said to speak with fairies.

Taking the long, scenic route

To reach the high-altitude Ishkoman Valley in Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan region, I had planned a 650km (403 mile) journey from Islamabad, trading the capital's traffic and smog for open skies.

Bordering Afghanistan's Wakhan Corridor, Ishkoman is one of Pakistan's least-visited mountain regions. Travellers seeking quick access usually take a short (if notoriously unreliable) flight into Gilgit, followed by a four-to-five hour taxi ride. The overland bus journey can take more than 20 hours. But for savouring Pakistan's wildly diverse scenery, there's nothing like hitting the open road.

I rented a 150cc phool patti motorcycle covered in technicoloured truck-art designs for the three-day mountain journey, navigating out of Islamabad's grid-like streets before speeding north on the Karakoram Highway. The Karakoram – the world's highest paved international roadway – follows the trail of the ancient Silk Road, soaring over the turquoise Indus River far below. From Besham City to Chilas and onward to the northern gateway of Gilgit, exposed cliffside highways revealed snow-capped jagged peaks behind each hairpin bend, including the dominating 8,126m (26,660ft) face of Nanga Parbat.

After the brimming bazaars of Gahkuch, the road narrowed to a single ribbon of tarmac, following the undulating terrain into the remote reaches of Ishkoman Valley. For three days, I had stopped only to take photos, sleep at roadside guesthouses and share steaming cups of chai with uniformed officers at police checkpoints. Finally in Chatorkhand, I walked wearily through the wooden gates of Coyote Den.

Since arriving, I've spent countless hours wandering the grounds, sheep in tow, and picking persimmons with Sana Marwat and Alex Reynolds, co-owners of the sprawling property – conceived as a budget-friendly "traveller's hostel" for wanderers and bikers. 

"Ishkoman is famous for its masonry," says Reynolds. "The wood used in our construction was all sourced from local pine and poplar trees, and the stones taken from nearby waterways." The result is a collection of stone cottages dispersed throughout a rose-filled garden. Panes of stained glass cap the windows,........

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