<\/p>\n

If I were to look back upon some of the places I’ve traveled to recently — Colombia, Argentina, Vietnam, Cambodia, Mozambique — as recently as even a decade ago, people would’ve thought I was crazy to travel to some of those countries. So is the prospect that travel to Afghanistan really that far-fetched of an idea? Don’t forget, Afghanistan — as part of the so-called “Hippie Trail”<\/a> of the ’60s and ’70s — was once well on the “beaten track.”<\/p>\n

Outside Magazine recently decided to check out what travel was like these days<\/a> in the war-torn country. For a mere $3,700 it seems intrepid travelers can sign up with Hinterland Travel — a U.K.-based travel company — for a whirlwind tour of some of the country’s best ruins, spectacular Central Asian vistas, and, oh yeah, probably a few encounters with members of both the Taliban and the United States military forces.<\/p>\n

And who can you expect on this trip with you? Oh, the usual hodgepodge of British, Danish, and American tourists, and as the author encountered, maybe even a Indian septuagenarian.<\/p>\n

The oldest person in our group was a tiny, 75-year-old Indian woman named Bithi Das, who walked with a cane and exuded Yoda-like tranquillity. She was going to Libya and Uzbekistan after this, and seemed to have a philosophical take about risk.<\/p>\n

“I will die,” she told me at one point. “We all will die. It’s OK.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If I were to look back upon some of the places I’ve traveled to recently — Colombia, Argentina, Vietnam, Cambodia, Mozambique — as recently as even a decade ago, people would’ve thought I was crazy to travel to some of those countries. So is the prospect that travel to Afghanistan really that far-fetched of an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9479,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2569,1,2562],"tags":[1463,1640],"yoast_head":"\n