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Published: December 10th 2010
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Chicham - Spiti Valley
Seen from the approach from Kibber. In September this year (2010), Mark Takefman (my biker mate) and I visited what I now call the Great Himalayan Bike Odyssey, riding our Royal Enfield Bullets from Delhi to Leh and back via Spiti Valley.
In our second week we were staying in Kibber, a village parked high on the northern side of Spiti Valley, which claimed to be the highest habituated village in: where? The world? Asia? I can’t remember exactly (Mark?), but it was perched up high! And the little and cute looking village of Chicham seen in the distance simply beckoned us for a visit - on foot because we had just had a very long ride the day before from Keylong over some very rough roads (and needed to rest our butts as well as stretch the old bodies – sorry, Mark tells me only MY body is old – in his dreams!).
“Yes, Chicham is that way. You will come to a suspension bridge”. So said the tour guide staying in our guest house.
“Cool”, I thought. I remember crossing some amazing suspension bridges on my Nepalese trek many years ago. Flimsy affairs held by locally woven ropes, across high gorges and
The cage
AKA "suspension bridge" - yeah right! rivers, and often with a plank or two missing. I can do that – a bit of excitement! Hey!
As we approached the deep gorge, the ‘bridge’ came into view. Holy shit! We both stopped dead in our tracks above the slight descent to the edge. “You call this a ‘suspension’ bridge ji?” I asked Mark. No bloody way! It was a metal cage the size of an apple crate strung up by two rollers resting on a cable that stretched the 150 meters to the other side.
We looked at each other and smiled almost simultaneously, and discussed how one must ‘take risks’ in life – ‘being in it to win it’ and so on. But somehow we both just needed a moment or two, or three, to ‘compose’ ourselves before getting into that crate and pushing off!
Thankfully some locals arrived, as it made sense to get some basic tips on how to manage the pull ropes. We asked them how many could fit in that cage, thinking it might be just one at a time, maximum two. While the answer was three, the reality as more locals arrived, was six! I was squashed firmly
into one corner of the cage under a sea of people, with at least three locals hanging on as if on a Sunday picnic. They pushed off with gravity taking us all down to the lower side. I could not see a bloody thing, perhaps a blessing under the circumstances! So I simply imagined the gorge far below! We were of course feeling pretty neat once they got out at the other side! Chuffed really.
After visiting the village (which was pretty amazing – old Tibetan structures) and having chai in a local home-stay guesthouse, we walked back for the return journey. This time just the two of us with no locals to assist, and a rise to get to the other side!
Twenty minutes later, after a struggle of hand over hand, we finally got to the other end. We realized that the sensible deal would have been to wait for locals to arrive at this side to pull us across, something we discovered to be the expectation when three local women shouted for just such assistance from back across on that other side. We decided it was probably a good thing to comply with their request.
How many in a cage
The load before ours - only 4! what were they thinking - so much spare room!! And it was – because they then arranged a free jeep ride back to town in appreciation.
Around these parts you would think twice about making enemies with anyone! Otherwise you’d be on your own in that crate, hand over hand! A nice example of how people help each other out of necessity in small and remote places. Pity was that they are now building a proper vehicular bridge across the gorge. That’s progress and you can hardly deny that luxury to the good people of Chicham!
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Rosie Kusuma
non-member comment
definitely too far...
My stomach is churning and my heart rate rising and the sense of panic bubbling up just reading this and looking at the photos! There are some adventures that aren't necessary - or maybe wise - or at least for me not in the best interests of my mental health. Amazing nonetheless...