There is a place in northern Pakistan where a lush green meadow sits suspended between earth and sky, where pine forests breathe cold mountain air, where a mirror-still pond reflects the ice face of one of the most formidable mountains in the world, and where silence is broken only by the sound of wind moving through cedar trees and the distant thunder of glaciers shifting in the night.

That place is Fairy Meadows.

The meadow was given its enchanting name by German mountaineers who first arrived here in the 1950s as a base for Nanga Parbat expeditions. The original name was Märchenwiese — Fairy Tale Meadows in German — and it stuck, because no other description seemed adequate.

From the meadow, the entire colossal north face of Nanga Parbat fills the southern horizon from edge to edge. It is one of the most overwhelming natural spectacles on earth, and unlike many of the world’s great mountain views, it requires no technical skill, no extreme fitness, and no high-altitude acclimatization to reach.