Thursday, October 18, 2007

A Journey To The Heaven (Part II)

Part I - Manali To Leh

Part II - Day 6,7
September 7: Leh-Khardun La-Diskit (Nubra Valley)
September 8: Diskit-Hunder-Diskit-Khardung La-Leh
Approx distance covered 300Km

Day Six
The climb to Khardung La starts just outside the city of Leh. Khardung la top (K-Top) is 40 Km away from Leh. In the morning, we heard that it has started snowing up there. As expected, few kilometres after, we were greeted with first snowfall of the ride.


Riding with snow all around was a wonderful experience. I wanted to take a video while riding through snowfall. For that, I held the camera in my left hand without wearing any glove. I could only go ahead few meters and my left hand fingers almost went numb. I had to stop shooting. After that, I could dare to take the camera out till we reached the top!
Joy was clearly seen on everybody's face as we lined up our bikes near the red coloured board indicating height of 18380 feet. We congratulated each others for reaching the topmost point of our journey. There was a small canteen run by military folks where we celebrated with rounds of black tea. Then sun came out to give us a pleasant surprise. Whole area was sparkling. Eventually, thick fog which was standing in between us and the valley also vanished. I can tell you that the view simply left me spellbound. This was the happiest moment of today's ride. Six of the riders including me, Yogesh, Nilesh, Dharma (Nilesh’s pillion), Bhuwan, DJ, Sparsh headed towards Nubra Valley while rest returned to Leh. On the descent down it was so cold that I had to stop in between and literally grab the engine to produce warmth in my hands inspite the fact that I was wearing an extra pair of woolen gloves! At that time I could believe what one of the soldiers told me - In winter it forms a layer as thick as 20 feet above the road surface!
Road till Nubra valley is in good condition. We enjoyed riding as we hardly came across any other vehicle on the way. Thanks to the beautiful terrain we took lots of photo breaks in between. It almost went dark by the time we reached Diskit. For dinner, we tried Momos - a Tibetan food item. I did not like them so much. I satisfied myself with Nubra style Dal-Roti-Rice & went to sleep. It rained that night in Nubra.

Day Seven
In early morning it was still pouring. I got little disappointed. Thankfully, rain God listened to me & rain stopped after some time. In an hour sun also came out shining in the almost clear sky. Happily I went out for a walk while others were just out from there bed.
Diskit is a beautiful small village of Nubra Valley. Because of its tranquillity, it feels so peaceful that you wish you could stay there forever. It became my instant favourite. I clicked few snaps, visited the prayer wheel place. Every village in Ladakh has at least one such prayer wheel where people say their prayers by rotating it clockwise.
We rode along desert of Hunder. Out of nowhere, there is a proper dessert with sand dunes at Hunder which is also the home of double-humped Bactrian Camels. We could not spot any as we didn’t enter the dessert.











There is a military check post at Hunder after which visitors are not allowed go further. Only locals can go. This road goes toward Siachen Glacier. Somehow the security guards didn’t stop us and we could ride further down for almost 50-60 Kms. There we saw couple of military camps. One of them was the base camp of Siachen Bombers & another one was an air force base. It was a thrilling experience to pass by those places. With so many army vehicles, buildings around in such remote terrain, it looked like a scene straight from a war movie!
 We were asked to go back from the next military check post. They told us that Pakistan border is just 30 kms away from there! We returned to Diskit. Had our breakfast cum lunch there. Next stop was Leh.
As weather was not supportive, Khardunlg la climb from Nubra side felt even tougher. While descending down from K-top, on the way towards Leh, I could see mountains tinted in a rich golden colour of the setting sun. It was a treat to eyes. Knowing that tomorrow is not a rest day, I lazily covered last 30 Kms. Tomorrow we would be taking on The Mighty Chang La which separates Leh from Pangong Tso - The largest salt water lake in Asia.

Part III - Leh-Pangong Tso-Leh

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