The Karakoram Highway is the highest road in the world with a paved surface. The route connects the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi with the Chinese city of Kashgar and is more than 1,300 km long, only 400 km of the highway are located in China. The Karakoram Highway owes its name to the mountain chain it crosses – the Karakoram is the second highest mountain range in the world after the Himalayas. This unusual highway is one of the major tourist attractions of Pakistan. It was opened in the 1980s and runs through inaccessible high mountain areas, glaciers covering higher parts of the Karakoram, some of its sections run along terraces carved in rocky slopes.
