Mountain Mama

For ease i shall be referring to our 6 day jeep safari as a "trek" but for the avoidance of confusion i would like to clarify there was very little walking!

On the map i've added you can follow the route that we took:

20th - starting from Manali at some unearthly hour and heading north up to the Rohtang Pass, then east at Grampoo and into the Chandra River Valley underneath the Khuzum Pass, through Loasr more often spelt Losar and sometimes Loser and on to Kaza for the first three nights

21st - day trip from Kaza north to Kye Monastery and Kibber

22nd - day trip from Kaza to Hikkim and Langza which unfortunately aren't on the map but are to the south-west of Kaza

23rd - leave Kaza and travel towards Tabo through the Pin Valley (home of the snow leopard!) taking in Kungri and Dhankar Monasteries along the way and staying over night at Tabo

24th - visit Tabo Monastery and then travel back along the Pin Valley (home of the snow leopard!!) through Kaza and staying overnight at Loser

25th - travel back to Manali via the Khuzum Pass and then a road too small to be on the map that takes you to the blue dot north of the Khuzum Pass which is in fact Chandertal Lake!

well that was the plan anyway but this was without factoring in altitude sickness which suprise suprise i suffered worst from!!

the first day was fine and we headed up to the Rohtang Pass a very strange place where huge groups of Indian tourists travel to for sledging and skiing fun, unfortunately however there is not what i would call "actual snow" here, there is simply brown ice or possibly frozen mud! Nevertheless everyone is dolled up in ski suits and fur coats and stubbornly dragging their sledges to the top of the slope!

the scenery through the valley was amazing and there's no way my pictures can do it justice unfortuneately

we stopped along the way to take pictures - mostly of the Indian road signs, they have a whole host of signs to encourage safety on the roads including:

"if you are married, divorce speed"

"safety on the road, safe tea at home"

"darling i want you but not so fast"

"be mild on my curves"

hugely entertaining!

oh oh and we passed the worlds biggest glacier called Bara Shigri which translates as Big Glacier!

unfortuneately as the afternoon went on the altitude started to affect us all and it was harder to breathe, by the time we got to Kaza i was feeling really sick and i then spent the next day and a half being sick!

altitide sickness is a new one for me and to begin with i couldnt even sit up without being sick but after two days at the guest house in Kaza i finally managed to aclimatise, but i also missed all of the 21st and 22nd's activites!

on the 23rd i was ready to get back in the jeep but i managed to milk feeling ill just enough to get the front seat for the day!

We drove along the PinValley the apparent home of the snow leopard although i feel either the snow leopard is a very lax host or he was in fact out

the first stop was Kungri to see Choling Monastery, it was very unassuming from the outside but the interior was very ornate and very small! It was built in 1330 and is home to hundreds of Bhuddists teachings written up to 1000 years ago, they are kept wrapped in coloured cloth and sandwiched between two pieces of wood and they line the walls of the Monastery

for some reason we then thought it would be a good idea to go down to the river for a paddle but as the water was barely above freezing we settled for washing our hands and seeing who was brave enough to cross the indiana jones style bridge!

then on to Dhankar which was a much more spectacular site, it was originally a fort which explains why it's perched precariously on top of fast eroding rocks!

we ended the day in the village of Tabo, a small peaceful village whose helipad we had to drive through to get to our guesthouse! there we sat and had dinner under the shade of an old parachute and surrounded by mountians

in the morning we went to the Tabo Monastery which was built in 996 and has paintings dating back to that time - they are very well preserved and no photography is allowed, ben and jamie took sneaky pictures which i told them off for.  It is a very important monastery to Bhuddists and it was built by The Great Translator who traslated many Bhuddist teachings from Tibetan to other languages and it is also the place the Dali Lama intends to retire to.

after that we drove to back to Loser where we were spending the night in a guesthouse run by a very friendly family

it was however the worst room we have stayed in so far, Kaza wasn't great because the room was freezing, tabo was lovely but the bed was just a piece of wood and neither of them had showers, just hot water and a bucket

but Loser wins "worst room ever" because:

1. the room was made of mud and the floor was very uneven (imagine how disconcerting that would be after a few drinks)

2. the ceiling was made of woven braches and twigs and in some attempt at keeping it waterproof there was a piece of tarpaulin covering the inside - with a hole cut out for the light bulb, as the tarp hung down everytime one of us reached up for any reason we would "disturb" whatever had collected on the tarp - ben had to get rid of three spiders but they were raisins with legs so i remained calm

3. the lack of shower was expected but there was also no hot water and no sink!

4. the toilet had no handle to flush, so you had lift the lid and reach in to manually activate the flush after you had first filled it up with water!!! ours was better than tim and traci's however as when there's was flushed it just sprayed the water out a pipe at the back!

5. there was a small assorted ugly-bug graveyard just in front of the toilet

this aside we had a very fun evening teaching Ramesh shithead and getting him to teach us Indian card games which turned out to be sevens and chase the ace! and we saw the football and heard that australia were still in the world cup - so of course we had to celebrate with Tim and Traci!

then Jamie decided we should try Spitian Beer as the guys at the guesthouse brewed there own

it arrived in an old mineral water bottle and looked like dirty water with soil settled at the bottom, he shock it up so it looked like cloudy dirty water and poured it into winnie the pooh themed shot glasses

i drank mine but i think it would have been better sprinkled on chips!

the next morning everyone but me and traci woke up with a bastard behind the eyes and we set off to the lake

we had planned to spend a few hours there and do some fishing but after we had arrived and ben thrown out a line and not caught anything in five minutes everyone decided they wanted to leave!

this was bad enough but what made it worse was that to get to this lake we had taken a four hour detour on the worst roads of the entire journey, none of the roads had been great but the roads to the lake were terrifying, the drops were stomach churning, there were too many vertical hairpin corners, waterfalls were attempting to erode what road there was and at one point we went too close to the edge and Ramesh had to get out and build up stones under the wheel to get us out!

anyway we are now back safe and sound - and we were in time to watch the england match and just managed not to fall asleep!

it's all a bit hectic back in manali as it had just been the six of us for a week in the peaceful serene mountians and whilst we've been gone i guess schools out for summer and the students have descended!

still we're looking forward to a week of doing nothing but playing cards and eating hello to the queen before we head to McLeod Ganj for the Dali Lama's birthday on the 6th july

xx