Today we're just hanging out since the whole town of Leh - and probably most of Ladakh - is on strike due to the situation in Jammu and Kashmir. Apparently Ladakhi students studying in Jammu have been locked in their houses without food for over 5 days, so the residents of Ladakh have closed down everything (except hotels, tour operators who have treks scheduled for today, and this one Internet cafe) to support their students and to try to draw attention to the students' plight. We met one student who escaped from there yesterday and is very thankful to be here. The road between Srinagar (in Kashmir) and Leh is closed right now, so even if the students are released from their houses I'm not sure how they'd ever get home. Hopefully the situation is alleviated soon.
Lucky for us, Cindy and I were able to book a 2-day tour of the Nubra Valley and a 13-day trek through the Zangskar Mountains, the Stok, and Kharnak Ranges, (all considered the Himalayas) this morning. Our tour operator, Tsering, even told us that if we couldn't find food we could call him and he'd cook for us. That's what you call 5-star service! : )
Tomorrow, to get to the Nubra Valley, we have to go over Khardung la Pass, which is the world's highest motorable pass at 5359 meters (18,380 feet.). It's a good thing we've spent so much time here in Leh acclimatizing since the first few days we were completely out of breath walking up a slight incline and probably would've had problems with altitude sickness going over the pass any earlier than we are. Once in the valley, I'm hoping to ride a camel (long-haired, 2 humps) through some sand dunes since who knows when I'll get a chance to do that again. Afterwards, we'll visit some monasteries and will spend the night. Most of the trip will be a slow jeep ride so we can take photos and enjoy the scenery. The second day we'll visit a few more monasteries on the way back to Leh.
On August 12, we'll take off for Lamayuru, the start of our 13-day trek that will take us from Lamayuru to Chilling in 6 days. On that portion of the hike, we'll cross over 4 passes, at 3750 m, 4950 m, 4800 m, and 4700 m. The landscape is dry and rugged, and we'll pass through an area that's called the "moonscape." When we arrive at Chilling, we'll travel southward into the Markha Valley, where the scenery will change, and we should have a good chance to see some wildlife. I think we go over 2 more passes between Chilling and Markha, where we're planning to pay the village to use their generator so we can charge our camera batteries. : )
From Markha we'll travel even farther south to Lungmoche. I can't remember how many more passes we're supposed to go over, but I know there are at least 2 on the way, at 5050 m and 4950 m. We'll have to cross a few rivers, so we're hoping that if it rains any more than it has been lately it won't be too much, and we'll be able to wade across instead of being hip-or waist-high in the freezing cold water. We'll see, though!
This will be my first big trek where we have to use horses to pack our food and bags, and I'm really looking forward to it. I was originally told I'd be able to fly fish while I was here, but it doesn't look like that's a possibility. I haven't found any tour operators who even have the equipment to rent, let alone any who will tie my flies on for me. : )
After our long trek, Cindy and I are planning to come back to Leh for a few days to rest, and then will head south by bus to Manali. From there, we'll work our way south to Delhi, where we plan to arrive about 5 days before our (newly changed) flight out. We'll head to Agra for 2 days to see the Taj Mahal at sunrise and sunset, then will go back to Delhi for a day or two before we leave for Zagreb, Croatia, on September 9. We changed our flight so we could stay in India for longer, and are cutting out Greece, which is really sad but we're trying to make the most of our time and money and decided after talking to other travelers that Croatia's islands are just as beautiful as Greece's. I hope they're right! : )
That's all for now. I'll post a long post when we get back into Leh after all of our adventures. I'm hoping the shops will open up soon so I can buy some more warm clothes! Coming from the heat and humidity in SE Asia to the desert of Ladakh, with warm days and cold nights is really taking its toll on me!
Oh - and if any of you want to really know where we are, here's the link from Wikipedia. Ladakh: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladakh
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