Ratti Gali, Katora, Saif-ul-Muluk — the glacier-fed lakes that reward the hardest walking days in the north.
Alpine lakes are the reward at the end of the hard days. You climb for hours through scree and meadow, the air gets thinner, your legs complain — and then the ground drops away and there is a sheet of glacial water sitting under a wall of ice.
Ratti Gali, Katora, Saif-ul-Muluk, Kundol, Ansoo — every one of them is fed directly by glacier melt, which is exactly why the colour is so unreal and the water so cold.
Some are reachable by jeep. Others take a proper trek. We are honest with you about which is which before you book, so nobody arrives expecting a car park and finds a four-hour climb.
Bring good shoes. Bring a camera. The lake will do the rest.
