Exploring Karachi

After seeing the north of Pakistan, the five of us decided to head south. We hopped on the next train to Karachi and started our journey. We had a blast during the train ride; we played chess, cards, ate and drank many different things from our stops along the way. The views from the train changed so drastically as we moved on. At first it was all rivers and greenery along the way and then we entered the last 5 hours of so of our journey, the whole terrain changed. Everything became dry, hot and sandy. It looked like a view you would expect to see on mars. It seemed we were heading towards a desert and not a breezy city with an ocean. There was not a living soul to be seen for miles, not even plants. It was a very weird experience. The only sign of human life we saw were a few wind-turbines in the distance.

The journey was long and tiring, but we made it to Karachi from Islamabad after 25 hours. We cleared our bills with the waiters and got off the train. It was January but the city was quite hot at noon, more than we had expected.

Our transport was waiting to take us to our residence so we dumped our luggage in the van and got on. It was then that we encountered the infamous traffic of Karachi. It was mad and exhausting. It took us almost two hours to get to our apartment, even though it was not that far. We were sleepy and exhausted when we got there, so we decided to take a little nap. Our residence for the next few days was an 11^th floor apartment in Karsaz, with a killer view.

It was our first day so we were not inclined towards heading out. A friend of ours from Karachi got us food from Burns road, which was delicious. We were starving and dug in. Our sweet tooth however was satisfied by heading out to the nearby Kaybees for their amazing ice cream. The ice cream was served in a bowl of biscuit, which you could eat afterwards.

The next day we were recharged to explore around this massive city. Our first stop was Dolmen mall for some shopping and exploring around. When we got there, we were told that it was family day and guys were not allowed inside. After a long and constant persuasion, the guards finally let us “tourists” in. The mall was very modern. Much better than the malls in Islamabad.

 We looked around, tried the haunted house, had some food and were on our way to sea view. It was breezy and cool. We stayed there for a while and left for the port where a huge boat was waiting for us to take us deep sea fishing.

We were taken on a boat outside the city. We had come a long way from that the Karachi skyline looked like needles in the distance.

It was quite beautiful. We got to see some submarines as well. Unfortunately though, we failed to catch any fish because of the strong waves.

It was almost sunset when we reached back at the dock. We were starving and decided to go to boat basin. There was a long queue of waiters standing outside restaurants to get us to come in. Our friend from Karachi was with us so he took us to one of his favorites.

After feeding our hunger, we were all craving some chocolate shake. Our friend suggested that we visit port grand because it has many places that offer chocolate shakes, and that it looks mesmerizing at night. Port Grand was beautiful and posh. It was the kind of place that rich people visit. There was even a ticket to get inside. You could listen to live music playing in different corners, people walking along the sea and having dinner. We all got chocolate shakes from one of the local shops and enjoyed the waves of the sea in the distance that shone because of the moonlight.

The next morning we skipped breakfast and decided to treat ourselves at lunch from Burns road. So there we were to try all its specialties. We started with the famous dum-kebab, and moved on to dhaga kababs, which were simply out of this world.

We were stuffed but then we came across the fact that Karachi Eat Festival was going on. We went straight to the festival to try everything, and everything we tried was better tasting than the previous one. There were stalls of countless eateries. I wish we could have tried them all but we only had so much time, money and capacities.

By then, Kaybees had become our go-to place for getting our sugar-fix. Therefore, we headed there for some more ice cream.

At night, we went to Saddar for some watch shopping. Our friend also took us to Khadda market for some shopping. Unsrprisingly we were all-hungry again and went to the nearest restaurant, which was KBC. As I was entering the restaurant, I saw a waited bringing a massive zinger burger for someone. I had decided in the moment what I was going to get.

After having dinner, we roamed around the streets of Karachi till late after mid-night. The next morning we woke up late. We were told to get ready because we were going to spend the day at Manora beach. Our driver dropped us off at the port again. We got on a navy boat to head towards Manora Island. It took us almost an hour to get there. We went to our rooms and got changed for the beach.

Manora was hands-down the best beach I have been to in Pakistan. It was clean and there were no people except for us. We spent 4 hours just swimming and making sandcastles. The water was so clean that you could see crabs walking 6 feet deep. It was beautiful.

The ocean had taken all our energy and we resorted towards food to get it back. We were served biryani on the Island and we savored every spoon.

The sun was close to setting when we got back on the boat to head to Karachi. I had been wanting to see the sun set on the ocean, and that wish was fulfilled that day.

The following day was our last in Karachi. We were not in the mood to travel much so we went to Arena Karachi and the maritime museum, which were nearby. It hardly took us 5 minutes to get there.

There was also a shooting range there. We fired some guns and went skeet shooting.

After that, I tried ice skating for the first time in my life. Needless to say, all I did was slip and fall. It was still a lot of fun.

At night, we headed to Do Darya Karachi for an amazing ocean-side dinner. We had barbecue at the Kinara restaurant and some amazing green tea after that. The ambience of the restaurant was gorgeous. It was right on the ocean and you could see sea gulls just sitting on the water, floating on the waves. It was beautiful.

It was our last day in Karachi so we spent the night exploring the city. We visited defense, the do darya area and all other places worth seeing. The next morning, we headed straight to the airport because our flight back to Islamabad was scheduled for noon.