This post is based on our experience crossing the Torkham border from Afghanistan to Pakistan in December 2023.
So, if you ever wondered how to cross the Torkham border from Afghanistan to Pakistan by road, then read on.
I’ve also written a story about what it was like to travel in Afghanistan.
Before you go
Make sure that you have a valid Pakistan visa and bring a printout of it with you.
The e-visa processing time is totally random. In our case this time it took three months, possibly because in the itinerary they asked for we mentioned southern Punjab and Sindh. Not sure, but given the giant fuss they made when we actually showed up in southern Punjab and Sindh, I get the feeling that it might be a better idea to just stick with listing the more popular northern areas on the itinerary when applying for the visa. We’ve heard in many cases of it just taking a few days or a couple of weeks.
The last time we applied for this visa, in 2019, we supplied a random hotel booking which is all they asked for. Then they came back suddenly and wanted a letter of invitation so we had to buy that as well. Applying from your home country is recommended, since they will sometimes call you in for an interview at your home embassy. I guess if you were already on the road at that point you’d have to try and arrange the interview elsewhere, which apparently is best avoided if possible.
So: give yourself time to get the visa, and when you do get it, print it.
Bring your yellow vaccination card with you. On both sides of this border, dubious medical (?) personnel will try to force feed you an oral polio vaccine. The Afghan side let Oyv through without it when he argued a bit and produced his yellow card showing that he is already properly vaccinated. I (Sar) was in a tent with women who couldn’t read my yellow card and insisted on the vaccine. On Pakistan’s side we were together and we both showed our cards and I also showed the new ‘yellow slip’ from my recent vaccination fifteen minutes prior. We argued long and hard but they weren’t having any of it and absolutely insisted on it. We have a friend who crossed the border a different day, and he argued apparently for a very long time and avoided it so maybe it depends on who you meet. Either way, it’s a (invasive and ridiculous) formality and both of us spit it out almost immediately, probably within sight of the officers, and nobody said anything.
There are plenty of moneychangers on the Afghan side of the border. There a just a few on the Pakistani side. We didn’t see ATMs on Pakistan’s side.
In the Autumn of 2023 Pakistan was deporting a lot of undocumented Afghans. For that reason the border was very busy and chaotic, sometimes shutting without notice for days. This situation had tapered off when we crossed, but I’d ask in Jalalabad or Kabul about the border before setting off.
The border is open during regular daytime hours. As with any other border-crossing day, just get an early start.
The route
You can get from Kabul (Afghanistan) all the way to Islamabad (Pakistan) in one very long day. We stayed overnight in Jalalabad the day before, and then set off early the next morning from there. I’d recommend that rather than coming all the way from Kabul in a day.
From Jalalabad it’s a share-taxi to Torkham village. From there you walk a short distance to the gates and process all formalities on both sides.
Once you’re through, you can in theory take a share-taxi from Torkham border to Peshawar. However, in December 2023, the police were not allowing foreigners to use the public transport or stay in Peshawar. They sent us in a private taxi with a police guard.
In Peshawar we had to take the bus directly to Islamabad. It’s not like the police followed us onto the bus to make sure we left town: but hotels weren’t accepting foreigners at the time either. I guess if you were determined to stay there you could get around this by couch surfing, but we’ve been to Peshawar before anyway, so we just took the bus out.
Jalalabad to Torkham (Afghanistan)
In Jalalabad, take an autorickshaw to the Torkham share-taxi stand for about fifty afghani. Cars are lined up and filling regularly and we didn’t wait long. From there, it was about an hour to the border and it cost two hundred afghani for a seat. The ride to the border is scenic, past lots of pretty orange groves.
If you are coming the same day from Kabul then get a very early start. Take a taxi to Tangi Kalay bus station which is twenty-three kilometers outside Kabul. There you’ll find cars going to Jalalabad. It takes about three hours to Jalalabad (plus waiting time for the car to fill). Also a very scenic drive through the mountains. Then change cars in Jalalabad and carry on.
In Torkham you can change your leftover afghanis to rupees near where the taxis drop-off. We also changed dollars to rupees on the Pakistani side.
Crossing the border
From the shared taxi stand in Torkham it’s a short walk till you enter a fenced-off passageway. We’d read that groups of kids could be extremely aggressive, swarming and even stealing things from your backpack. We didn’t encounter any.
The first formality we met was the polio vaccination. Women go into a separate tented area for this. You should be able to dodge the vaccine on the Afghan side if you have a valid polio vaccine and show your yellow card.
Then we went to immigration and got our passports stamped and photos taken. There was almost no queue. We’d been advised by locals that if there was a queue, we should just jump it and carry right on. It’s ok because as foreign tourists we’re easy to process and there’s no point queuing up with refugees etc. The entire time, whenever there were local people ahead of us on either side, they ushered us past.
We finished with the Afghan side quickly and before we moved on somebody informed the Pakistani authorities, who sent an officer to meet us. He sat us down and took down all our details, photos, checked the visas and so on, before allowing us to continue. Then he escorted us all the way through the border, which was fairly hectic. There’s a bit of sitting and waiting here and there while they talk amongst themselves.
Then they scanned our luggage and after a bit more walking in the maze, we encountered the next polio vaccine.
Lastly, we handed over our passports at the immigration window and got them stamped. At this point the first officer came back and took us outside, informing us that we wouldn’t be able to carry on alone from the border. He escorted us into a shipping container/office and into the clutches of a taxi driver and the police guard that accompanied us to Peshawar.
It took us around one and a half hours to get through the border, with most of that spent on Pakistan’s formalities.
It’s a good one. Welcome to Pakistan!
Torkham (Pakistan) to Peshawar and Islamabad
In December 2023 a police officer in the car for the ride to Peshawar was mandatory (this could change any time and then you can just take a share-taxi). The guard is free. The taxi took some rigorous negotiation and the driver has you. He wanted six thousand rupees to Peshawar and we ended up paying four thousand.
It’s a nice drive through the famous Khyber pass – enjoy it! Our driver was very sullen at first but cheered up enough as time went by to take a bunch of selfies and video of us on our sunny afternoon drive with the armed guard. It took around two hours to Peshawar.
Since we weren’t staying in Peshawar we got the taxi driver to drop us at Faisal Movers bus terminal in Gulbahar. Daewoo also works. Busses to Islamabad take around three hours and are very comfortable.
Read More
For more about travelling in these two countries and things to see and do while you’re at it, check out my stories about Afghanistan and Pakistan.
I’ve also written a story about what it was like to travel in Afghanistan.
