Attractions of Afghanistan

Ghazni

The modern town of Ghazni is just a pale shadow of its former glory. The city is only 150km (93mi) southwest of Kabul on the road to Kandahar, but poor roads mean the trip still takes most of the day. Ghazni today is known mainly for its fine bazaar, featuring goods from Afghanistan and surrounding countries.

The carefully restored tomb of Abdul Razzak and the museum within are of interest. There are also some very fine minarets, the excavations of the Palace of Masud and, most surprisingly, a recently discovered Buddhist stupa that has survived from long before the Arab invasion of the 7th century.

Attractions of Afghanistan

Herat

Herat was once a small, laze-about place that everyone seemed to like, an easy-going oasis after a lot of hassle and dry desert. In the 15th century, it became the lively Timurid centre of art, blending Persian, Central Asian and Afghan cultures to create one of Central Asia’s cultural highlights.

The Friday Mosque (Masjid-i-Jami), is Herat’s number one attraction and among the finest Islamic buildings in the world. It has some exquisite Timurid tilework to complement its graceful architecture. The covered bazaar in Charar Su is a complex of all sorts of shops and artisans’ workshops.

Attractions of Afghanistan

Kandahar

Kandahar is situated in the far south of the country, about midway between Kabul and Herat. It’s the second-largest city in Afghanistan and lies at an important crossroads, where the main thoroughfare from Kabul branches northwest to Herat and southeast to Quetta in Pakistan.

Kandahar lies very much in the Pashtun heartland and gained modern significance as the power base of the Taliban militia. Kandahar’s great treasure, a cloak that once belonged to the Prophet, is safely locked away from infidel eyes in the Mosque of the Sacred Cloak, known locally as Da Kherqa Sharif Ziarat. (more…)

Attractions of Afghanistan

Nuristan

Northeast of Kabul, Nuristan (Land of Light) is mountainous, remote, little-visited, of great ethnological interest and memorably described in Eric Newby’s hilarious book A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush.

Shahr-i-Zohak (The Red City) enshrines the remains of an ancient citadel which guarded Bamiyan, and is about 17km (11mi) before Bamiyan itself and 180km (112mi) northwest of Kabul. This was once the centre of the Ghorid kingdom.

Attractions of Afghanistan

Kabul

Once Afghanistan’s cosmopolitan centre and a stop on the old hippy trail to India, Kabul was ruined in the civil war. The Soviets left the city reasonably intact in 1989, but since then it has been virtually destroyed by bombardments, street battles, and many lost lives.

The Kabul Museum, which used to have one of the finest collections of antiquities in Asia, has had nearly three-quarters of its finest collections looted. It’s still possible to see the remaining artifacts - those without any significant monetary value - but museum hours are erratic. (more…)