Tuesday morning dawned cold and misty - quick look round the Tabo monastery which was built over a 1000 years ago from mud and had the most amazing paintings inside before following the river down the valley to the Dhankar Gompa. This was at a height of 3890m and 8.5 k's up a twisty winding road - we passed a couple of travellers heading up the hill with rucksacks on their backs - it must take something to do that as it was quite a steep climb and the weather not the greatest. Dhankar was perched on a hill and was constructed from mud but is crumbling - once more more beautiful murals inside but the best room where they held the pooja's I wasn't allowed in as no women allowed. The monks once more didn't live actually in the monastery but in a very nice building across the way. Next stop was Kaza which is the biggest town in the Spiti valley - a really cold wind was blowing through the town and no one seemed to be in at the two rather nice guesthouses so we ended up at the guesthouse at the Little Ittly (their spelling) restaurant on the strenth that they served pizza. I rather foolishly ordered the pasta - which predictably wasn't like pasta back home and wasn't much warmer than the restaurant we were sat in. Bit of a chill out afternoon spent buying socks and catching up on the internet before heading over to the hotel beginning with the letter Z for dinner and cards.
Wednesday - not quite as cold as yesterday but what I'd been waiting for since Shimla a chance to be photographed next to the highest petrol pump in the world - way hey!!! - then a walk which I found really hard up the hill behind the town - I was by now finding it quite hard to breathe at times when walking - sat down I was fine and thankfully had none of the other signs of acute mountain sickness. Nazir and Rana picked us up in the jeep at the bottom of the hill accompanied by the bloke from the guesthouse who was trying to get Hans and Jaap to cough up for a toilet roll that he had replaced as he dropped theirs down the toilet - a bit of a heated argument then ensued till it was pointed out that we could have made a fuss about his crap Italian food so he should count himself lucky we hadn't refused to pay for that. Finally we set off to visit the Ki monastery which was only a short drive down the valley - it was really picturesque and set upon a hill and is the largest monastery in the Spiti valley. One of the lama's showed us round and gave us some Tibetan tea - he and Nazir had a rather in depth conversation about yak's which did seem to go on a bit - apparently the lama was saying that he only ate male yak as there were no females - which was a bit strange as I thought Buddhist were vegetarians not counting there being no female yak's. Then it was on to the highest village in the world (lot's of highest today) with a motorable road and electricity - which could be disputed - Kibber is at about 13900 feet and had a real remote feel to it with donkeys milling round, white houses, and laundry being done on the village green. Unfortunately a group of French women who we had been seeing since Kalpa had bagged all the best rooms so I ended up with a rather cute room with debris that fell from the ceiling and a shared bathroom.
As it was so cold we had bought some whisky in Kaza - for purely medicinal purposes - ended up driving to just under 16000 feet to have the highest party in the world - it was trying to snow, Rana put on some loud Punjabi music and we got a rather bemused looks from two women bikers who rode past. If you looked one way you could imagine you were on the moors in Yorks/Lancs but looking the other way just huge mountains that you could no other place than the Himalayas.
Thursday we were up incredibly early with no time for breakfast but it was a gorgeous day with clear blue sky as we wound our way down to the valley bottom. The road was really great till we reached the village of Losar where we stopped for breakfast of parantas and chai - from then on the road was an endless stream of stones and bumps for about the next 80 or 90k. I started to drift as we wound our way up the Kumzun pass which is about 15000 feet - felt quite ill when I went to the natural toilet in some ways it was worse than the festival ones I've been to. Once over the pass we were in the Lahaul valley in which the Chandra river flows through - which I had last seen in Ramban in Kashmir where it is known as the Chenab - there were not many villages along the way so we took dinner in a tent along the way - always amazes me what people can cook up with limited facilities. Then back to more climbing up winding roads to the Rohtang Pass (3978m) - the road did get a lot better when we reached Gramphoo but it was here that we started to encounter lots of mad tanker drivers on their way to Leh before the road shut for the winter. The top of the pass was shrouded in mist but that hadn't stopped hoards of Indian day trippers from making their way up there from Manali - lots of pony rides and shabby tea shops were strung along the road. Then it was a 42 k climb down the other side before we hit rush hour sheep and goat style on the way into Manali - I was convinced we would have lamb chop all over the road. All day I had been dreaming of fluffy towels and a hot bath in a nice hotel - well I got a bath tub but no plug which got me a bit ratty especially when the guy went up the market and came back with one the wrong size which I had predicted he would. But that was nothing to the palaver that Hans and Jaap had over a pizza - they had been dreaming of Dominos pizza all day - but no Dominos in Manali - so two small ones from the local pizza restaurant turned up which they sent back which then returned cold half an hour later - four more were ordered which took three hours to arrive - the guy from the hotel then brought a spoon and a fork for them to eat with - the spoons were sent back and a knife requested - two more forks then turned up which were sent back before finally a bread knife arrived - kinda gave up after that and settled down to drink some beer and play cards.
Pretty chilled out the next day - Hans and Jaap were catching the 5.30 bus to Delhi so we all went for a meal in the afternoon at a really nice restaurant before waving them off at the bus station. Rana then drove me and Nazir up to Hadimba temple which was set in some woods - strangely there were a few women stood around with huge fluffy Angora rabbits - couldn't really figure oput what they were doing. The temple itself had huge rocks in it on which I found out later goats and buffaloes were sacrificed on - not too nice and I don't think I would have gone in if I had known beforehand. I did like Manali as for one thing it was fairly flat to walk around the centre and the riverside was really nice.
Right nearly up to date now - the last week after a back breaking 10 hour ride in the bus cab back to Shimla - 14 of us in there at one point - has been pretty busy. Did a 34k walk from Shimla to Tattapani with a French journalist called Arnoux(sp) and went swimming and white water rafting which was ace - was a bit nervous as I am usually the candidate most likely to fall in but the waves weren't too scary. It was also nice to see Omesh and his family again and they did remember me from my last visit - Amritty the dog was looking really well and came out on a walk with us - couldn't quite get the story about what happened to her last puppy - but I do know she was being well cared for and had been to the vets so she couldn't have any more puppies.
Bit of a rush this as I have had a bit of a do finding an internet connection this morn - as I am off to catch a bus in about an hour - I'm off to Aru in Kashmir and this time hopefully I'll be able to trek out to the Lidderwat glacier. It's not going to easy to find the internet so I'm not sure when I'll be able to post next but I'll do my best.
See you soon.
Clare
