Brotherly bonhomie in Ladakh

 Two brothers can make a very useful, helpful and convenient travelling pair. There are limits drawn which avoid things from taking an ugly shape. In addition, the assurance that they will be going to the same house again provides an openness and vast space for both the good and bad to unfold naturally. There are no protocols to follow, no rules of friendship to abide by to keep things going. You are at your natural self. You don’t have an image to keep that fits in the mold of friendship. No wonder, travelling becomes very enjoyable in such a scenario. To cash all the above benefits, me and my brother usually go out on trips a few times every year. He is younger to me and the Indian tradition of seniority and respect falling in the kitty of the elder brother makes it advantageous for me. This time we are bound for Ladakh.

We can say that earth is completely owned by the humans by now. The rest, everything from the animals, birds, reptiles, insects, trees, plants, stones and even plain dust seem to be the mere means to the question of how far the humans can stretch, elongate and further their desires. We have been plainly greedy; not ingenious in the least.

We are too crowded in mind, body and soul. When it becomes unbearable, and if we can afford it in terms of time and money, we set out to the hills to feel less loaded and burdened among open hill forests. Earth is covered with human-made concrete megaliths in the plains. However, the stamp of mankind shows a gradual dilution from the congested lanes of old Delhi to the hill forests. The hill forests in turn give the baton to alpine meadows and grasses. The alpine grasses then change to barren waste and cold desert adorned with snow-covered peaks.

Ladakh is a beautiful empty vessel where one can dive into the vast wilderness stretched from horizon to horizon. The bus from Delhi to Leh is making a big buzz on the social media. It starts from Delhi at noontime, reaches Keylong in the wee hours and after a few hours halt proceeds to Leh, plying on the toughest and highest motorable passes to reach Leh by nine at night if everything stays normal in terms of weather and roads.

There are enough challenging and exciting jolts on the road journey from Keylong to Leh, so we avoid this first phase of the journey by the HRTC bus from Delhi and board a luxury Volvo bus to reach Keylong. From there onwards one doesn’t have an option apart from the HRTC Delhi-Leh bus.

The plains are burning in the June heat as we board the Volvo bus to Manali. There is T20 cricket final between India and South Africa played in the Caribbean islands. A group of youngsters is watching live streaming of the match on some OTT platform. There are expert comments, gesticulations, guffaws of agony, ecstasy, hoos and haas. We Indians have lots of cricketing sense at least. All this overshadows Sidhu’s hyperbolic, rhetorical commentary in the stadium. The youngsters are engaged in such a dissecting analysis of each ball, each run, each moment that it feels like one is watching the match live. It was a very exciting match. The entire bus full of tension. When India won the match, one chap shouted at the top of his voice, ‘Bharat Mata ki jai!’ We had to rally behind his chorus in our varying capacities to shout.

We reach Manali in early morning and immediately walk to catch a bus to Keylong. Once you come out of the Atal tunnel (9 km long) cutting across the guts of a mammoth wall of mountain, thus avoiding the difficult Rohtang pass, you arrive in a new geological structure of mountains. The trees slowly vanish as you move along the torrential stream of Chenab river. Alpine meadows and wild flowers try to cover the hard, bare craggy base of the mountains. Rosa webbiana (Himalayan wild rose) is a beautiful sight by the road. It’s a lovely wild flower that blooms in the grassy meadows on craggy slopes. Yellow oriental hawk weed adorns the alpine grass trying to cover the stony nudity. From Keylong to Leh, mother nature slowly opens to stony nudity, innocence, purity and emptiness.

We reach Keylong at noon after the nightlong journey and decide to stay at the quaint peaceful town for a day and then catch the early morning bus that arrives from Delhi.

Little scenic Keylong is situated in the valley of Bhaga river that roars past to meet Chenab river down the stream. Beautiful snowy peaks overlook the small town. Two of these are quite popular: Lady of Keylong peak (6016 m) and the Saptarishi peaks. There are many myths and legends linked to these peaks.

Lady of Keylong peak was earlier called ‘Churail’ by the locals. The Europeans gave it a nicer name and now it’s a popular trekking point in the area. It is the bare face of a cliff that looks like a hill woman holding a scythe and a baby tied to her back against the background of pristine white ice sheet of the glacier around it. I’m glad that now she is called the Lady of Keylong, not Churail. She inspires many trekkers to take the challenge to go and look at her from close quarters.

The Saptarishi peaks at Keylong are a series of seven beautiful peaks on the top of a high ridge. The name Saptarishi connotes seven sages (Marichi, Atri, Angira, Pulaha, Kratu, Pulastya and Vasishtha) in Hindu cosmology.

The small budget hotel, Khandorling Guest House, gives a heartening view of pastures on the lower slopes and glaciers in the upper reaches. I can see a little monastery on the opposite hill. Fluffs of snow-white clouds hang languidly in the pristine blue sky. The wind plays with the prayer flags. The Buddhists believe that as the flags move in the wind, they spread the message of love and peace for the entire world. Bhaga river is audible with its rigorous sound in the valley below. From the terrace I can have the entire view of the lazily sprawled out bus station. I inhale big breaths of unruffled peace.

There are a few eateries. Lama dhaba is run by an old gracious Tibetan Buddhist lady. I mention HH Dalai Lama and tell her that I have been lucky to meet him and hold his hand and put it to my forehead. Immediately her eyes get filled with tears of reverence. I tell her that His hand feels boneless on touch, almost like a newborn’s soft contact, the touch of divinity. She listens to it like she is listening to hymns in a monastery. He is their God King. Her father came to India with Him and later settled in Nepal. Making the ends meet is very tough, she says. The monthly rent for the shop is 8,000 rupees per month.

Her neighboring outlets are named Kathmandu dhaba and Sherpa dhaba. Mostly women run these tiny food establishments. These little hotels and restaurants offer tea, coffee, omelets, maggi, noodles, cold drinks, cigarettes, namkeen, chips, rotis, rajma chawal. The family stays in a part of the same block. The eating points are mostly run by the Nepalese and the Tibetans. The hotels are owned by the locals. Most of them go to Manali during the snowbound months of winter and return in summer. The menfolk work as casual laborers, but mostly the women pull the domestic economic cart.

As I have mentioned, there is just one bus from Keylong to Leh, the Delhi-Leh Himachal roadways bus that has an early morning halt here before moving onto the final destination in the land of mountain passes. Most of it is full with tourists from Delhi itself. At Keylong the bus depot changes and a smaller bus takes over for the further journey on treacherous roads cutting across high Himalayas. At Keylong about two dozen tourists have to fight for three-four odd seats available at this point. If the seats aren’t available, many still decide to board the bus and travel standing in the aisle. We talk to the driver who has driven the bus from Leh. He is a decent chap and proves a nice Himachali host to we plainsmen. We compliment him on his good nature. Then we share our problem with him. He gives his word that he will try his level best to get us seats the next day. Pay some sincere compliments to someone and he or she will always reciprocate. We have a chance to get seats in the early morning bus next day. Till then Keylong has enough peace to cordially shower upon us.

We go to the old Buddhist woman’s small eatery for dinner and not feeling hungry ask for maggi. She makes a face. ‘Maggi for dinner! That’s not healthy,’ she says. If you talk nicely and give respect to people, you create a human touch. She is concerned about the quality of our food. So Mrs. Lama convinces us to eat a proper dinner and lovingly makes rotis and sabzi like a mother. If food is served with joy, it feels very fulfilling. The appetite returns and we eat to our full without even realizing it.

After the nice dinner as we lie down to sleep, Bhaga river’s gurgling murmurs sing a lullaby to get us into the folds of a restful sleep. Early next morning, the driver we talked to yesterday remembers us and gets us seats among the rush of many claimants for the few odd seats. The bus moves with an excited load of the plainsmen looking forward to enjoy the road trip across the highest motorable mountain passes, glacial lakes, deep valleys and scores of snowy dazzlement. There are mesmerizing landscapes of Jispa and Sarchu leading to Nakka La.

The most adventurous and tough stretch is called Gata loops at 16,800 feet. There are creepy, spooky stories about the treacherous series of these hairpin bends going one after the other. Gata loops stretch for about 10 km, involving 21 hairpin bends leading to Nakka La. A myth says that the dangerously loopy stretch is haunted by a spirit. They say a man in shawl appears suddenly asking for cigarettes or water thus scaring the drivers. So the people pay a respectful tribute to the spirit to pass safely to the other side by offering bottles of mineral water and cigarette packets. You have this big pile of offerings to the spirit on the nineteenth bend. There is a small stone structure built here and it contains a human skull in it.

The story of the spirit of Gata loops is based on an event happening a few decades back. Those were the days when there was no Atal Tunnel to provide year-around passage for traffic to this side of Rohtang La pass. The narrow, rugged road had to take Rohtang La pass, which was snowbound for many months in a year. A truck driver and his helper started from Manali almost on the date when the road was being closed for the winter months. So probably they were the only vehicle on the road from Manali to Leh. The snow was already making it difficult at many stretches. Their truck gave in at Gata loops. There was no help and no mobile phones to contact anyone during those days. In order to seek help, the driver walked back, leaving the helper with the truck. He reached a human habitation about 40-50 km down the road. But before he could start back on the journey with men and material for help, there were more landslides and snowfall preventing them from moving ahead. The poor helper died after two or three days. So the people say his spirit sometimes appears by the side of a vehicle asking for beedis or water.  

The bus ride is adventurous at many levels: leading to lovely rich barrenness with its sandy hills, splendid golden plains, yaks, sheep, goats and some rare nomadic tent that one may come across. The fabulous, aloof, unadorned, beautiful face of mother nature. Travelling on the rugged road you feel like a child running into the open arms of freely playing childhood. As the bus struggled on the top of mountains, slowly chugging ahead, some passengers faced breathing problems born of mountain sickness. But thankfully all the plainsmen reached to the other side with reasonable safety.

As the bus moves to Leh, at full speed through the plains leading to the capital, one feels freedom and openness in the sandy plains spread on both sides of the road. It feels like there are no boundaries. One feels like flying. It seems like an earthly version of cosmic freedom. These are Moore plains, a plateau spread out in brown majesty along the last phase of the Manali-Leh highway. In Tibetan it means a plain where the wild ass doesn’t find water. It covers an amazing 40 km stretch between Pang and Leh. Nomadic population has shrunk dramatically. But still you can spot some nomadic settlement with their tents, sheep, goats and yaks in enclosures. The yaks are becoming fewer and fewer. Almost all individual nomadic families have a pick-up truck parked by their tent-side. I could spot just one yak during the journey. Ladakh without the yaks doesn’t sound fitting. But the camps by the smooth road, even with their pick-up trucks, still carry enough touristy charisma for the visitors. To provide some more lease to my hopes of the survival of the wildlife, I was lucky to see some herds of wild ass and bhralls on the craggy slopes by the road.

The average elevation of the Moore plains is about 4800 m. Some portions along Lungpa river create stunning sand and rock formations. After the challenges of the previous mountain pass (Tanglang pass), the bikers love this stretch as they speed at a high speed towards Leh. If you are lucky you can see a little sand tornado travelling across the road or along the sides. It’s arid, rocky, scenic. The road is smooth here and it feels like your back is getting a massage after the jolts of unpaved, uneven roads over the mountain passes.

Leh feels congested and very hot. The effects of tourists and climate change obviously. A ribbon of ancient culture tightly squeezed by the commercial forces trying to encash the old; to mint new gold. Bare, craggy hills surrounding the small houses sprawled with a strange mixture of the old and the new, but still somehow feeling on the ancient side. The Indus river gives a small chance to plant life in the valley. Poplars and willows stand out like green brushstrokes on the brown, barren canvas. The ornate, artistic Buddhist architecture is like a soft whisper, a prayer, an artistic muse. The sound and sights of Buddhist rituals, mystique of murals, monastic gateways, intriguing carvings, rich forte of ritualistic practices in monasteries, souvenir shops, prayer wheels, prayer flags—all fluttering for life among barren stones.

Enter a monastery and you are enveloped in a world infused with an intermixing of spirituality and artistry. You feel like stones have as vibrant a heart as the lush green trees. Prayer flags fluttering in the evening breeze and the message of love and peace floating up, rising in the air and kiss the golden yellow on the tops of brown hills. Small white lime-washed houses having multi-paneled glass windows look at you with unhurried demeanor. Clouds hung lazily in the azure blue. Touristy hustle and bustle in the bazaars. Leh is the base camp for the wanderlust tourists seeking the higher meaning of life among the unparalleled landscapes of Ladakh. There is no destination, you move and make a fresh path; a lively destination, the journey itself.

Before you take more arduous journeys across the length and breadth of this amazing landmass, it’s advisable to stay at Leh and enjoy the local places for at least a couple of days. We do the same and visit the nearby places in Leh.

The shanti stupa is a white-domed, two-level stupa on a hilltop. Built by a Japanese, Bhikshu Gyomyo Nakamura, in 1991, it holds the Buddha’s relics, serving as the foundations of the spiritual heritage of Buddhism, at its base which were enshrined by HH Dalai Lama. The place is adorned with panoramic surroundings. Ladakhi Buddhists offered voluntary labor and the Japanese Buddhists provided money and technical knowhow to build this monument of peace. Like most of the Buddhist monuments, it’s built to promote world peace and harmony. Beautiful golden Buddha image stands as a spiritual patron. Around the dome you have relief pictures of auspicious symbols, dharmachakra (turning the wheel of dharma), Buddha’s birth and death events, Buddha defeating the devils and many meditating Buddha mudras.

Leh palace is a lovely legacy set in mud, stone and poplar and willow wood. The palace overlooks Leh from the top of the Namgyal hill. It was built by Sengge Namgyal around 1600 AD. It has nine floors. The upper floors housed the royal family and the lower floors served for the soldiers apart from providing space for stables and stores. There are beautiful Tibetan thanka paintings and colorful murals made of crushed gems and stones. The murals depict sacred Buddhist themes, symbols and mythical deities. One has to have patience to get a real sense of the marvelously intricate details of these paintings. The palace is a splendid piece of heritage constructed on the lines of Potala Palace. It was deserted after Dogra commander Zorawar Singh captured Ladakh. The royal family was shifted to Shyok palace. It’s a nice specimen of the medieval Tibetan architecture involving massive mud-stone walls, wooden balconies, mural paintings, poplar rafters and wooden flooring.

Gurdwara Shri Pathar Sahib is situated about 25 km from Leh. When Guru Nanak Dev ji Maharaj were returning after visiting Tibet around 1515, they rested here for some time and meditated. Indian soldiers do langar seva and eat food with the tourists. The visitors have to cover their head under a yellow scarf bearing the akal takht symbol. All become one here. It’s a message of unity. Tourists from across India and soldiers from different states, regions, castes and classes all sit together on the ground and eat like innocent children. It seems it’s managed by the army itself because they take care of all the affairs here. Eating prasad here is a very fulfilling experience.

The other place that we visited is Sangam, the confluence of Indus and Zanskar rivers. The Zanskar river carries lots of coquettish energy like shakti and the Indus river allows her to have her flirtatious ways and show-off by almost stopping its own flow like Shiva, the stable self. The Indus allowing Zanskar to go rippling across its more stable waters. In fact the Indus waters seem to take a back step to enable the feminine force of Zanskar to surge ahead. Meanwhile massive stony mountains look down at the majestic scene with amusement. Standing at the confluence one can clearly see the green water of the Indus to the left and the brown waters of the Zanskar to the right.

There are buses plying to remote parts of Ladakh from Leh. But one has to be careful about their timing because most of these aren’t daily services and operate just two or three days a week. Nowhere else I found the time table painted on a wall at a bus station more useful than here. One can save a lot of money by taking these buses. Bikes are for the young blood. Personal SUVs are for the super-rich. Rented taxis are for the rich. And for the middle class budget travelers the public transport is the safest bet. Moreover, travelling with local Ladakhi people is an added incentive for free if you take a bus. Public transport is a very practical and economic way of exposing one to the local culture. You get a deeper feel of the ground realities.

We take a bus to the Nubra valley. It’s a private bus run by an interesting chap named Dorjee. He operates it under a license issued by the government authority. The bus runs twice weekly between Leh and Nubra valley, reaching till a place about 20 km further from Hunder. The jangling, smoke-exhaling vehicle leaves at eight in the morning and reaches the destination in the evening. The return journey is on the next day. A short, strong, agile, athletic man, Dorjee is a multi-tasker serving as the owner, driver, helper, conductor, fuel man, porter, everything.

An amazing man as we watch him closely during the journey. He is very helpful. He even stops his bus by a little hamlet on the way to inform the passengers who are inside their houses, feeling assured that he won’t miss them. I’m sure that he would even wake up some still sleeping person who has asked him to remind that the bus has arrived.

Many local people boarded the bus in Leh for short journeys within the city and easily got down without caring to pay. He doesn’t mind such minor issues. He is particularly popular among the lady workers busy in the road-keeping operations on the path. They wave cheerfully at him as they see his rattling, old bus laden with people inside and the roof piled high with luggage and other wares, a bed and sofa set this time that have been firmly tied by his own expert hands.

The road to Nubra valley passes through Khardungla pass about 40 km from Leh. It’s the highest motorable road in the world. The construction workers from Bihar, baked by the high altitude sun, are busy almost all along the way. A woman is working with her child tied to her back. They look eagerly at the upcoming bus. They have set up temporary tents along the road, so there is hardly any facility here. To give you a clue to how things are managed in this tough, remote terrain, one worker is cutting another’s hair.

It’s a busy, noisy, dusty serpentine line across the barren mountains, beaten by a merciless sun and stung by rough winds: the earthmovers and cutters shrieking with effort to gnaw at the stony innards of the lofty mountains; the workers plodding, hacking into the stony sides to leave an imprint of the indomitable spirit of the mankind to reach all points on the earth. But the mountains look too powerful in their barrenness to be daunted by the mankind and their machinery.   

Khardungla is the gateway to Nubra and Shyok valleys. After Khardungla pass the road descends to a scenic view. The barren rocks get a slight tinge of green alpine grasses. Nubra river originates from Siachin glacier. (The government plans to start Siachin base camp tourist adventure.) It gurgles like an oasis in the mountainous cold desert. Stunted poplars, willows, bushes and shrubs surround Khardungla village, which is a big hamlet from Ladakhi standards.

As the bus stops for refreshment breaks near little hamlets having a shop or two, I see that even the birds are relaxed like the local people. As I sip tea looking lost in the relaxing wilderness, a black and white Ladakh magpie sits on the branch of a low willow tree by the road, just near the eating point swarmed with the passengers. Unbothered about human intervention, it just sat there for almost ten minutes. It’s a lovely sight to see a wild bird sitting so near to you.  

Nubra river joins Shyok river, which later on merges with the Indus. As we move on after the break, it becomes even more challenging passage along the mighty and majestic Shyok river. It first follows southeasterly direction through Pangong range; then takes a northwestern turn, almost going parallel to the previous path in reverse direction. In Tibetan its name means ‘gravel spreader’ which is amply testified by vast stretches of sandy gravel on its broad, intimidating floodplains glistening white like snow under scorching midday sun on the right of the road. It’s also mentioned as the river of death due to the havoc caused by it on the silk route trading caravans in ancient times.

We get down at Hunder in the evening. It’s famous for the majestic sand dunes running in a broad valley flanked by lofty walls of completely barren dark-brown rocky heights. Here the tourists enjoy rides on double-humped camels walking in a row in the Shyok valley, imitating the famous silk route caravans of the ancient times.

At Hunder we stayed at an ex-soldier’s guest house. He had scaled Mount Everest during his army days and now carried the same indomitable spirit in setting up a lovely guest house. The first floor is beautifully done and ready for check-ins. The upper story is still under construction. The mess with classy wooden furniture is as impressive as the officers’ mess at an army cantonment. His family assists the cook in making food. The food is delicious. The bedding is clean. It’s a nice room. It’s like a little oasis among the sand dunes.

The evening breeze is freshened by the swaying branches of poplars, willows, bushes and shrubs. The camels, after a tiring day of ferrying the tourists across the sand dunes, rush to the bushes after their duty is over as the night falls. A lovely clean-watered stream flows through the sparse high-altitude scrub forest nearby.

I have done my research on Ladakh flowers, plants, shrubs and trees. So I’m able to read the traces of life written on stones in the shape of little wild flowers. From May to September, up to an elevation of 3800 m in valleys like Nubra beautiful little flowers welcome you. Purple colored acomite is pretty common. Little yellow blooms of a alpine herb named phulumentok are the indomitable signs of life among craggy rocks. Then there are flowering shrubs like khardung (yellow), Himalaya may apple (white or pink), chagna (bright mauve) and a few more.

As I walk along the dwarf scrub growths along the little stream passing near the sand dunes of Hunder, I can spot common juniper (shukpa), a shrub with crowned needle-like leaves. How can I forget that fragrant smell that I inhaled in a monastery back at Leh? Shukpa has fragrant leaves and bark, which are used by the Buddhists as incense. There are clumps of sea buckthorn as well. It’s a dwarf thorny shrub with a woody stem. It’s a storehouse of vitamins and medicinal properties. I have ordered online a few packets of Ladakh sea buckthorn tea a few times. It’s a strangely elating feeling to stand next to this remote tree in a distant part of India.

On the moist slopes you have tiktas, a grass like shrub. On dry rocks and stony slopes there are kabra shrubs. All these shrubs are highly medicinal in nature. In the traditional Tibetan system of medicine, these rare hardy plants, flowers and shrubs are used in profusion with great effect. Something that grows in such adverse climatic conditions must be having a very high potential and vitality for life. No wonder they make highly effective medicines.

I met a German woman near Turtuk. She is on a quest to be away from the hassles of professional life back home. There are so many foreigners who have lost their path in the maze of Himalayan spirituality. I feel she is an easy catch to be lost in the exotic Eastern chaos. So I load her with lots of unsolicited advice. I tell her to keep the goal limited, in sight: just aiming to recharge her sagging batteries, go back home and start a new job with new vigor. She was uncomfortable to this truth to begin with. But later she digested the essence of my point.

The Himalaya is a great seducer. It pulls with irresistible charm. It’s a great charging port of high frequency energy, no doubt about it. But it’s suitable to be there as travelers now and then. Charge your battery, explore yourself and make the most of your potential at a place where you need to be for your own self and your loved ones. I know I have to run away from my old self. But I also know that I have to stop as well. And Ladakh is an endless path. You can tire yourself out, but it won’t come to an end. You think you have covered hundreds of miles, but that’s nothing on the scale of this limitless playground.  

We return to Leh when Dorjee the great comes back for his second weekly trip to Hunder. In the intervening time it was an amazing experience there.

We then plan to go to the Pangong lake. The bus on that route is scheduled for the day after tomorrow. The day in between offers a great opportunity to enjoy HH Dalai Lama birthday celebrations at Choglamsar about 8 km from Leh city center. It’s a Tibetan Buddhist settlement and no wonder it gives a faint smell of how Lhasa must be. There are artisans here who are keeping alive the age-old tradition of handcrafted souvenirs and painted wooden furniture. The place is a heartbeat of Ladakhi and Tibetan traditions.

The great man’s birthday celebrations offer a top end, full day festivity for the Buddhists. Family and friends form groups and set up tents in a sprawling ground. You can see people enjoying food and tea on the low tables adorned with Tibetan wood painting involving ornate carvings and spiritual iconography. Everyone is dressed in traditional dresses. They play lovely Tibetan and Ladakhi songs and perform mesmerizing group dancing. The dancers move elegantly in concentric circles. It’s a slow movement with poise and grace, gently tapping feet and peacefully waving of limbs. Almost slow poetic movements. Throughout the day they have been enjoying food and tea in their tents with their near and dear ones. An entire day full of being dressed in the best traditional costumes, eating, chatting, dancing and praying. A lovely funfair full of colorful symbolism of spirituality.

Then in the evening there is a lottery ticket result announcement. A woman wins and she can’t believe she has won the top prize. She is very shy when she goes to receive the prize. The people shout, laugh and applaud. At a nearby monastery, the boy lamas have toy guns and bows and arrows to play in celebration of the grand occasion. HH Dalai Lama turns 89 this day. Long live the great man because He is almost a lifeline for Tibetan Buddhism.

The Jammu and Kashmir transport bus starts for Pangong lake at four in the morning. Another exciting journey starts. The road ascends to Chang La. It’s a lovely weather with slight precipitation on the lower reaches. There are sparse coverings of blue lettuce and peppergrass bushes on the side slopes. White dragonhead enjoy their high altitude seat on the stony slopes. Then the high mountain pass welcomes us with its fluffy spray: snowfall.

Snowfall is a big wonder for the people from the plains. The vehicles halt and the tourists start dancing in the snowfall. And once you start descending from the high mountain pass, beautiful valleys open up with their alpine grasses and wild flowers.

The Ladakhi ecosystem is very relaxed. A tiny chit of black puppy is relaxing in the middle of the road near Durbuk in Tangtse valley. A huge military truck has to halt and honk horn so that the lazy guy clears the road. It doesn’t. A smiling havaldar with big handlebar moustache gets down, picks up the prince and puts him at a safe distance. Only then the army truck starts on its journey.

The Leh-Pangong road has all the charms to satisfy all of your wanderlust desires. Occasional wild roses smile at you from among the rocks. Tiny yellow dandelions and sea buckthorn (Leh barley) give you an idea that even stones have a heart and they show it through these seasonal blooms. A few stunted willows, poplars, violet-colored Himalayan crane’s bill and pink fireweed watch you with curiosity from the side of streams. Purple and white colored spotted heart orchid beautifies the open meadows, moist places and open slopes. There is tiny Himalayan winterfat, a sparse pale grassy shrub by the little streambeds near Durbuk. The stony wastelands also show a softer side as they welcome you with cow’s lungwort (desi tobacco). Stunted juniper (shukpa) is the state tree. Its fragrant leaves and bark provide beautiful moments of perfumed bonhomie at social gatherings and religious ceremonies.

The land of passes has a few offerings in terms of tress: poplars, willows, apricots, walnuts. High altitude meadows with summer blooms of edelweiss and wild roses. The rest is simply imposing barren stone walls, snow-capped peaks, glaciers shining under the sun. And the mankind’s eternal quest to reach higher and higher; making roads, repair works, a never-ending job in this tough environment. One can’t help marveling at the small, robust Ladakhi women working at the construction sites.

And there we stand on the banks of the multi-colored marvel, a little puddle in the navel of the mighty Himalayas: Pangong lake. It’s a work of fluid art by the eternally musing artist. The lake is an open canvas. The surrounding hills are the frame. The brush is made of the sun, the clouds and the sky. The shifting angle of the sun is the hand moving the brush. The swabs of white, grey and dark clouds and the pristine blue lurking through them create a wonderful art of lovely colors on the canvas of the lake waters. Colors mix, flow, merge along the waves. Sit on the bank and you see the colors moving—blue, green, moss green, indigo, grey, purple. A beautiful watery canvas where multiple colors play with the sun, wind, clouds, sky.

We check in at a homestay by the road overlooking the wavy, colorful, heaving bosom of the lake. Just a little row of homestays and the rest comprising mother earth’s sunlit yard high in the mountains. It’s run by three women: grandmother, daughter-in-law and granddaughter. It’s very reasonably priced, just 1500 rupees/night including food. They have a nice little mess hall with carpeted floor, low tables, cushions, chests and little prayer wheels by the seats. You can feel the strong effect of the monastic culture even in the mess room here. Sacred symbols and auspicious motifs have almost as dense existence at homes as they do at monasteries. While we eat, the old woman rolls the prayer wheel and says prayers. ‘This is for you guys. She is praying for you so that the food you take is good for you,’ her granddaughter tells us while serving the food. That’s Buddhism for you, the religion of compassion.

They handle the tourists of all types and inclinations with lots of grace and elegance. After a two-night stay, at the time of leaving I thank them for the nice hospitality. The pretty, young Ladakhi girl softly and shyly says, ‘Please come again!’ And I say, ‘Yes, we will.’ One ought to keep one’s promises.  

It is an otherworldly experience by the lake. Just to be with the lake is a meditative experience. I simply open myself to the icy cold wind and the noisily swashing lake waters. The lake almost a big blue, heaving, rippling temple having a goddess of universal well-being somewhere in its depths. And the moment you accept this fact in totality, a thing or phenomenon will touch you with its essence of divinity. The untamed harmony and solitude percolate deep into my cells. It is a feeling belonging to a new dimension. After a long spell of meditation on the lake shore, with half closed eyes I see my torso as a flaming ball of indigo. A great experience.

I enjoyed lovely walks along the shore. Studied the rare sprouts of vegetation among the alkaline stony barrenness on the stretch between the road and the lake shore for a few kilometers towards the line of actual control (LAC). I could spot a kind of knotweed and cream-colored sprouts, a kind of purslane. If you are an open-hearted wanderlust person, just be there to witness the show, mother nature will surely won’t disappoint you. I spot a Himalayan hare among the stones. There is a little colony of brown agile birds that nests in holes dug under small stones. The ground nest is actually a passage under a stone with both ends open. I can see one odd big Himalayan raven and a pair of in-love gulls that leisurely flow over the water. It’s very windy most of the time and the waves strike the banks like a mini sea. It’s an amazing tapestry of water stretched among high mountains.

The waves crash, the colors change, the wind buffets. The long line of sand and gravel along the shore offers a broad avenue to walk in solitude and find your real footing away from the hustle and bustle of life in the congested plains. During these walks I sit down and meditate now and then. The moment I close my eyes, I can feel that it’s a very high energy place. The level of self-peek is totally different.

The lake has its colorful canvas and music that varies through the day. Sometimes I go knee deep in the water, taking a symbolic bath by sprinkling some ice cold drops over my head, bow and pray and taste the salty water as prasad.

Some of the tourists who have travelled in the bus with us are staying at the same homestay, the others at the neighboring lodges. One is a very tall Spanish-looking guy from Pune. But good for him that he was balanced by a lack of macho spirit. That makes one more realistic in life. A macho body with macho spirit creates chances of crash landing in pits. There is this girl, a researcher from the JNU, who is travelling solo but has the restlessness and readiness to change her solo status to a partnered travel. The girl is ordinary looking but very high in flirting spirits. She waits for the guys to approach. But they have the alluring Pangong to attend to, so nobody dances around her. The moments here are very precious.

At night most of the tourists are having drinks outside the homestay looking into the wind coming from the lake. She is tipsy and almost falls in the laps of the men around. My brother doesn’t drink. A sober guy. I’m a light drinker on very-very special occasions. He proposes a walk in the night on the road circuiting by the side of the lake. All the guys, fifteen to twenty in number, get ready for a walk. The lake is silent. The milky way perfectly clear. The stars so clear and near that you feel like raising your hand and pluck them. But the short, fat, bespectacled man doesn’t get up. He is busy with his beer bottle. Slightly cross-eyed, I had observed during the day. ‘You guys are from Haryana. Now you are saying that it’s just a stroll on the road. Further on you will say let’s jump into the lake and try to cross over to the other side. I won’t go,’ he declares.

The rest of us start. It’s pitch dark. There is no running electricity here, just some diesel-set generated power available for a few hours. The nights are pitch dark. Beautiful. We have walked just a couple of hundred meters and it feels like we are in the remotest uninhabited part of the world. No sound, no sight. Just the sky and the stars. My brother then tells them that there is no risk here; no reptiles slithering around. Just this snow leopard sometimes makes it exciting. He is very mischievous at such moments. The word ‘snow leopard’ drops like a bomb. As we move on and must have walked for another hundred meters or so, we find the group severely depleted in number. Now it’s just me, my brother and the two Bangladeshi tourists. The rest have dropped off the walk stealthily, beating any snow leopard in the art, and gone back to the safety of their rooms.

Iftikar is from Bangladesh. He is travelling with his friend. He is in mid fifties. The man is enjoying the trip like a bird set free from the cage. His wife suffered from a rare ailment for almost a quarter century. As her partner he was right there bearing his share of pain and suffering with loving kindness. He gave her the best possible treatment. Then she died. After overcoming the critical phase of mourning the loss, now he is flying freely in Ladakh. I can feel he is a very nice human being who deserves this open joy after a tough personal phase. Joyful, all smiles, making friends, creating group bonhomie, clicking pictures, insisting on sitting on the front seat in the bus—that’s Iftikar. On the way up, he had danced with childish joy in the snowfall on the Baralacha pass. Now, in the sympathizing pools of darkness by the lake, it’s a gentle talk with the stranger who feels so familiar with his grief and pursuit of happiness after the storm has passed.

We come back to our place after one and a half hours later. All the tourists have gone into their rooms. Only Jishnu is morosely sitting outside on a chair. He had met the Spanish-looking Pune guy on the bus and to save money they had taken a shared room. The Pune guy hasn’t returned. Jishnu is very tight on budget and is scared that his room partner will stay with the girl and won’t pay half the money he owes for the room charges.

He is a small Keralite; a charmingly dark boy with a flawless white-teethed smile. Well the girl has probably succeeded in changing the solo status of her journey. Girls have an advantage in this manner. In a way, the Pune guy has dumped Jishnu. We have words of consolation with him. He feels that we are friendly guys and breaks his shyness to talk in his broken English and still more devastated Hindi. He stays at his friend’s place at Kasol and does some graphic designing for him in return. Presently, he seems to be running around Ladakh like a clueless tiny mouse; understandable because he is around only 25 years in age. On our return to Leh, to help him on his shoe-strung budget, we offer him to stay in our room on a mattress at the rate of 250 rupees/night because this is what he usually pays in a dormitory for a bunk. It makes him very happy.

Back in Leh, Jishnu introduces us to a small eatery in one corner of the bus station compound at the end of a small row of shops. An old Ladakhi lady operates the little tin-shed tea shop. She treats him like her own child. Her tea is fabulous—a big glass, full. The graceful woman looks very happy to serve us Tibetan bread, omelet, noodles or maggi. Her daughter works as a bank clerk in Amritsar. The husband drives a bus on contract for the army. Very soon we also join the league of her sons like Jishnu.

She is our aunty now and we become her regular customers. Aunty is graced with a natural, loving smile. She serves us tea like a mother. There is an affectionate touch; not a strictly professional approach to the task. The charges for her servings are cheaper than anywhere else we have seen in Leh.

Jishnu is a quite boy, hardly speaks Hindi. She doesn’t understand English. But both of them have developed a mother-son bond with the language of silence. Her glass of tea contains almost double of what others serve in tiny paper cups. Smile and kindness are showered for free. She has visited Delhi and stayed with her daughter in Amritsar for some time. As a tourist, just like any other native of the land, most of whom are saturated with silence and emptiness, she loves crowds and the hustle-bustle of shoulder-rubbing humanity. She also likes lush green trees in the lesser Himalayas and in the plains below. I think they are saturated with the barren emptiness here, which attracts us so forcefully because we are burdened with the crowded strife and chaos at our places in the plains. So it’s natural that the crowds of plains seem very interesting to them; and we enjoy the Ladakhi peace and silence.

We enjoy the summertime charms of Leh by visiting more places nearby like Thiksey monastery and Shey palace. We have enough time to feel relaxed, loiter around and experience the deeper layers of Ladakhi culture. So there is no time constraint forcing us to rent a car and go rushing like people usually do while on a short trip. We take a small city bus to Choglamsar and from there the locals tell us that we can get shared vans or jeeps to the monastery and the palace.

We have been waiting for an hour but there is no shared van or jeep today. Finally, a kind gentleman gives us a free lift in his junked van with a luxurious welcome. There are no autos in Leh. Had there been autos, it would have been more congested. But the taxis charge too much for budget travelers. A taxi to and fro from the palace and the monastery charges more than a day’s boarding and food costs in Leh.

The gentleman, who has given us a ride, is rich in heart and sits like a king in his junked Maruti van. One sliding door is jammed. One seat at the back is removed and in its place you have jacks, tools and a spare tyre lying on the dusty carpetless floor. We clamber in. The seat is dusty as if sandbags have been ferried on it. A local woman also sneaks in.

The driver is evidently a very kind man. He has to attend a very urgent task at a construction site about one kilometer from Shey palace, so feeling a bit sorry he drops us at this point. When we offer him fare, he says a very firm no and smilingly gives us instructions about the path to the palace from the place where he has dropped us.

Shey palace stands on a hill overlooking the road. It bears toned down ancient Ladakhi luxury embellished with Tibetan architecture. The roofs are made of poplar and willow wood. Starting from one corner of the palace, a craggy ridge reaches to the pointed peak of the neighboring hill. From the sunlit terraces of the palace, one can see the ruins of stonework done in gravel and mud on this peak. The ruined tower somehow still holding its head high. It’s an interesting rock-climbing experience to clamber up over the stony ridge to reach the top of the hill bearing the decaying, time-ruined stonework. Long strings of prayer flags are drawn along the way. Most probably it was a religious site used by the royals during their heydays. The cautious climb becomes a pilgrimage. Once you reach the top and enter the roofless tower chamber, you get a feeling of achieving a milestone in your journey.

Coming out of the palace, we take a shortcut along the tiny agricultural fields and poplar and willow groves along the Indus river to reach Thiksey monastery situated on the top of another hill. The place is about 20 km from Leh. It’s a tiny replica of Potala palace. There is a separate block, an attached nunnery, for the female renunciates in the 12-storey complex adorned with Buddhist art, little stupas, impressive statues, thankas and mural paintings. The colorful murals painted with meditative muse; gently painted, weaving majestic tales of symbolism recounting the Buddhist aspect of truth. Done in natural pigments, these much-detailed works open a teasing world of elaborate Buddhist rituals, beliefs and practices. A world of yellow, red, green, blue and gold. A vast ceremonial offering to the ultimate by the human spirit.

The highlight is the 15-meter high statue of Maitreya made of clay and copper. It’s gold-painted to give it a shiny perfection. In little shrines and alcoves one can see a mesmerizing complexity of murals depicting Tibetan calendars, the wheel of life, thousand armed Avalokitesvara, female deities and many other religious symbols. There is a separate temple for an important female deity, Tara. The temple also contains dozens of tiny, alcove-sized shrines for various smaller female deities.

There is an ascending order of floors, the top floors for the high pontiff and the abbots. You feel like rising to a higher dimension as you take the impressive flight of steps from the terraced fronts taking you to the upper floors having marvelous rooms and shrines painted in white, red and ochre. It is clearly visible that it was built as a fort monastery. Standing on the terraced ramparts one can have a beautiful view of the Indus valley below with its semi-sparse green brushstroke among the barren brown of hills.

Ladakh has a unique charm. It’s made for purposeless wandering in the open-ended stony charms of mother existence. There is unparalleled solitude and peace. The barren stones more peaceful than lush green forests. Forests are the manifestations of the creative potential in the stony womb. So maybe being in the barren stony embrace of nature makes you feel closer to the source, the emptiness. The source of creation. The stones present a huge truth in their naked, imposing avatar. It’s a lovely experience to share this barren serenity and solitude. The people are so warm and gentle, a unique product of this exceptional landscape.

 I’m peeling layers after layers of my worldly self in this welcoming wilderness. Ladakh is a travel, a journey, an endless destination for exploring. It’s a living entity. As I discover more about it, I discover myself as a sweet byproduct.  

Since Leh is our base camp for forays into Ladakhi hinterland, we have built a little circle of acquaintances around the place where we stay. The hotel is located a couple of minutes walk from the bus station. That gives us the choice to loiter around the bus station, enquiring about the buses plying on various routes, whenever we have time. We also go there after our dinner for a digestive stroll. The bus from Delhi arrives around nine at night. And it’s a nice sight to see the excited passengers disembarking to feast on these lovely landscapes. We have also made friendly acquaintances with five or six HRTC drivers and conductors who run the buses on this tough route on a rotational basis.

The Muslim guard keeps a vigil inside the compound at night. He has a thin Buddhist friend. Once he pulls the long, low iron-gate on its tiny bearing wheels, it’s his kingdom inside the bus station. The guard is lame and keeps a long stick to support his polio-afflicted leg. His Buddhist friend is a wiry man in soiled yellow robes. He is a convert from a poor, low-caste Hindu family. Life is easy for both of them after ten at night once the hustle and bustle stops. They get drunk to a nice degree. During the busy tourist season they make some extra money as well. Tourists ask them to reserve their tickets on the Delhi-Leh and other routes to the tourist destinations in Ladakh. The frequency of buses is very less and there is always a fight for tickets. Since they stay at the station compound itself, they can get a few seats reserved and charge a commission on the tickets. A little enterprise which can be pardoned given the fact that it gives them some scope to get a little high at the end of the day.

There is a Rajasthani family, headed by a big-turbaned mustached old man, selling aphrodisiacs. The old man arrives with his family during the summers. At night, we usually find them sprawled on the open floor of the empty high-roofed, open-sided waiting shed. His young daughter-in-law has an infant. She has more privacy. She and her husband need privacy even more, given the product they deal in and must be experimenting on themselves as well. So they have a tiny sleeping tent for the young couple.

The old man has smartly memorized the bus timings to various destinations. If you happen to be lost in semi-darkness looking for the ways and means of increasing your chances of getting a bus tomorrow, he will hark your attention and tell you the timings and the smarter ways of getting an advance ticket. These are very valuable inputs. Of course he would always expect you to reciprocate by buying his vitality-enhancing herbal medicines to make yourself a superhero in the bed.

In these two weeks, we are able to get friendly with a nice group of bus drivers and conductors. These are old-style sturdy buses, lumbering like tanks on high mountain passes. How do they manage to scream and rattle ahead on the world’s highest motorable passes? It’s wonderful. The drivers are meditative, alert, smoking lots of cigarettes on the way. They know that they have dozens of lives under their care. The slightest mistake and all are gone.

The driver and his conductor have a day off after their arrival from Keylong. Here they drink, eat and take full rest, mustering up strength for the arduous return journey. Early in the morning, they sit in the bus and take advance bookings for the upcoming journey. Sometimes they are mischievous and tell a white tourist that the bus is full, even while there are vacant seats in the bus. They say it’s for a reason. In the case of foreigners, it’s their duty to get down at a few check-posts and escort the foreigners, holding their passport in their hands, to be verified by the security personnel. They find it an unnecessary hassle which takes much time.