Christian Lindgren left school at 18 to see the world, and by 27 he had visited 97 countries, paying his way with jobs picked up on the road. His photographs, shared in 2015, range from a painted truck beside Pakistan’s Attabad Lake to the red hillside of Larung Gar and the Registan in Samarkand.

Travel photograph by Christian Lindgren from his journey through 97 countries
Photo: Christian Lindgren.

Christian Lindgren, the Unusual Traveler

Lindgren, a Norwegian photographer with Danish roots, runs the blog Unusual Traveler, where he writes about off-the-beaten-track places and shares photography tips. Travel runs in the family, he says: his parents and grandparents travelled widely.

He bought his first plane ticket with his own savings and funded the rest by teaching, farm work, hostel jobs and helping at a dive centre. “All the money I have spent on my traveling is money that I have earned myself,” he said. His advice is simple: “Everyone should travel, people will learn a lot more about themselves, the world and other cultures.” He recommends going solo for a richer experience.

Attabad Lake and the Karakoram

Decorated truck beside Attabad Lake in northern Pakistan – photograph by Christian Lindgren
Decorated truck beside Attabad Lake, northern Pakistan. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

Attabad Lake is one of the youngest lakes in the Karakoram. On 4 January 2010 a huge landslide at Attabad village in Pakistan’s Hunza Valley killed 20 people and dammed the Hunza River. The water rose behind the debris into a lake about 21 km long and more than 100 m deep, drowning around 19 km of the Karakoram Highway.

The road link with China was restored in September 2015, when a realigned 24 km section with five tunnels, the Pakistan-China Friendship Tunnels, opened along the shore. Pakistan’s elaborately painted trucks are a familiar sight on the highway.

Larung Gar in Sichuan

Dense red buildings on the hillside at Larung Gar – photograph by Christian Lindgren
Larung Gar, Sichuan, China. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
Larung Gar, Sichuan, China – photograph by Christian Lindgren
Larung Gar, China. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

Larung Gar is a vast Tibetan Buddhist academy in the Larung Valley of Sertar County, in Sichuan’s Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. It was founded officially in 1980 by the Nyingma lama Khenpo Jigme Phuntsok, growing out of his earlier mountain retreat. Thousands of red wooden dwellings for monks and nuns cover the slopes. In 2016 the Chinese authorities ordered the population halved to 5,000, and about 1,000 homes were demolished that year.

North Korea, Georgia and Iran

North Korea – photograph by Christian Lindgren (1)
North Korea. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
North Korea – photograph by Christian Lindgren (2)
North Korea. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
North Korea – photograph by Christian Lindgren (3)
North Korea. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
North Korea – photograph by Christian Lindgren (4)
North Korea. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
North Korea – photograph by Christian Lindgren (5)
North Korea. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

Lindgren also travelled to North Korea, a country most visitors can enter only on an organised tour, and his five frames from there are among the rarest in the collection.

Katskhi Pillar, Georgia – photograph by Christian Lindgren
Katskhi Pillar, Georgia. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

In western Georgia he photographed the Katskhi Pillar, a 40-metre limestone column near Chiatura in Imereti, crowned by a small church dedicated to St Maximus the Confessor. The ruins on top date from the 9th–10th centuries. The monk Maxim Qavtaradze settled there in 1995, restored the chapel and lived on the pillar for about 20 years.

Esfahan, Iran – photograph by Christian Lindgren (1)
Esfahan, Iran. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
Esfahan, Iran – photograph by Christian Lindgren (2)
Esfahan, Iran. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

Isfahan in central Iran was the capital of the Safavid shah Abbas the Great, who laid out the city’s great square, Naqsh-e Jahan, between 1598 and 1629. At about 560 m by 160 m, it is framed by the Shah Mosque, the Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque, the Ali Qapu Palace and the gate to the Grand Bazaar. It has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979.

Tajikistan, Tibet and Samarkand

A wedding in Tajikistan – photograph by Christian Lindgren
A wedding in Tajikistan. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

Lindgren crossed Tajikistan by bicycle, and his photograph of a Tajik wedding is one of the more personal pictures in the set.

Mount Everest viewed from the Tibet side – photograph by Christian Lindgren
Mount Everest viewed from the Tibet side. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

From the Tibetan side he photographed Mount Everest, the world’s highest mountain at 8,849 m.

Registan, Samarkand, Uzbekistan – photograph by Christian Lindgren (1)
Registan, Uzbekistan. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
Registan, Samarkand, Uzbekistan – photograph by Christian Lindgren (2)
Registan, Uzbekistan. Photo: Christian Lindgren.
Registan, Samarkand, Uzbekistan – photograph by Christian Lindgren (3)
Registan, Uzbekistan. Photo: Christian Lindgren.

The series ends at the Registan in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, the city’s ceremonial square on the old Silk Road. Three madrasas face it: the Ulugh Beg Madrasa (1417–1420), the Sher-Dor Madrasa (1619–1636) and the Tilya-Kori Madrasa (1646–1660). Samarkand was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001.

Planning your own trip? Our guide to a manageable first trip is a good place to start, and Pascal Mannaerts’s travel portraits offer another photographer’s view of people and places.

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