It never rains in Ladakh.........

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When I first decided to come to Ladakh, it was only to avoid the rain. Monsoon is hitting Asia pretty hard now, and believe me, it's grim :O/ If it wasn't for the rain, I'd have headed down to South East Asia and never discovered this place......what a shame that would've been.
When the time came, I was ready to leave Nepal.......in fact I couldn't wait! I hadn't really given any thought to the 12 hour stopover I had in Dehli on route. On the plane, the prospect of 12 hours in Dehli airport hit home. I had a good book, but wasn't sure if this would be enough to distract from the grim surroundings I was pretty sure lay in wait for me. How wrong could I have been. Dehli airport has a transit lounge, complete with sofas, satellite teli and water machine! It was bordering on luxury!! You're not supposed to stay there longer than half hour.....it's supposed to be the waiting room for the bus to take you to the departure terminal. There were 2 or 3 other people I noticed 'hiding out' in there too....probably just as relieved as me. I met a young guy from a french university about to start an exchange programme for a year with a university in Jaipur, Rajasthan. He made me laugh........reminded me of when I first came to India. He must have got his insect repellant out at least 3 times in as many hours. When we went to get some food from what was in fact an amazingly clean looking bakery in the airport, he came back empty handed....said he didn't want to get food poisoning and what did I recommend he could eat which would be 'safe'! Its amazing how you get over the inevitable paranoia which hits when you first arrive here.....when you meet someone who's just got here, it all come's flooding back.....makes you chuckle. Any how, thanks to the lounge, the cricket and the company, the 12 hour wait was over pretty quickly and Ladakh was only an hours flight away. They say the road leading to Ladakh is a must do......and I will be doing it on the way back. The flight is also a must do. It's amazing. I've never looked out of a plane window in flight and seen mountains higher than the plane. It's beautiful, stunning ...... and a bit freaky! What a welcome to Ladakh. It's very similar scenery here to what I imagine Tibet to be. Desert mountains, snowy peaks and lush green valleys where the populations cultivate the land. Amazing, stunning contrasts which make every place you go breathtaking.
The airport is small so you don't wait long for your luggage and then it was off to find the town. I was pretty knackered by this point. The night with no sleep was kicking in and I was getting pretty desperate to find a hotel. For once, you weren't bombarded with hotel representatives offering you a free lift if you went to their place.......what a bummer!! When you need them, they're never there! In the end I paid for a taxi and took the first hotel I came to. It wasn't great and seemed over priced to me, but then it was high season. Still at the time, the bed was priceless! A few hours later, ventured out and had a wander around. Found a really nice guest house which I ended up moving to the next night. My room there was amazing, had a view out over the fields to the mountains in the distance one way, and a view up to Shanti Stupa ( a gompa up on the side of the mountain at the top end of Leh) out the other way. Very nice.
The next couple of days I just took it easy, getting to know the place. I took a trip out on the local bus to Thiksay village, where there's a really old monastary on top of a hill. It's amazing to look at, and the views form up there were stunning. These monks know a good spot when they see one!
I decided to try out some yoga while I was here and checked out a couple of places advertising. One place does a lot of Buddhism courses which I was pretty interested in doing at some point, the other one did Vipassana meditation courses as well as yoga. Vipassana meditation is a really intense 10 day meditation thing, where you can't talk or have any kind of communication with anyone. From what I understand it's supposed to focus on becoming equanimous.....(not sure how that's spelt!) ie losing your cravings or dislikes for things. Apparently the buddhists believe this is the way to enlightenment!! I'm going to give it a go while I'm here :O) Anyhow, back to the yoga. Tried one class. Now yoga, even when I tried it in England, never felt as good as a trip down the gym or a run along the sea front. Since I tried it in India, it has been better (probably coz the gym or a run is now out the equation). This class though was the epitamy of what I originally thought yoga was.......slow, boring......I may as well have laid down on my bed in the guest house for an hour and saved my 150rups. I tried 2 classes, thinking the second, earlier class would be better......wrong. It was probably slower than ever. I think we did 2 assanas and the rest of the time we spent laying or sitting 'relaxing'. All very nice and not really worth getting up for!
After the 2nd class I had brekky with a guy, Claudio, who'd also been at the class. I was glad to find that someone else had the same opinion of the hour and half 'relaxation' we'd just experienced. Neither of us have been back since! Instead, Claudio re-introduced me to the wonderful world of biking! I haven't ridden a motorbike for a while now.......since I sold the duc. That must be at least 18 months ago. On top of that, I always said I'd never ride in India. I have to point out though, that these roads aren't like they are further south. I'd still never ride down near Dehli or anywhere south of there as the people on the roads here are complete nutters. Up here though, there's very little traffic and the mountain roads are amazing. It took a while to persuade me though.....starting that morning over brekky.....the turning point!! A trip to Pangong lake was mentioned. Pangong lake is amazing....its around 4000m high, and over 100kms long....stretching from India to Tibet. The mineral / salt content gives it this stunning blue azure colour when the sun's out. One of the people in my guest house had been talking about it so when Claudio mentioned they were going, I really wanted to go along. They were going on bikes though.......mmmmm. The accident I'd had on the Duc had knocked the confidence out of me......not that it was bad at all, just makes you realise how vunerable you are. That combined with my preconceptions of 'all' Indian roads made it a pretty nerve racking concept. Still, Pangong sounded fab and I really wanted to go. So after brekky, I headed out to see if I could hire a bike. Over here, there are basically 2 choices of bike to hire. The Enfield......the travellers bike....introduced by the british army, a single cylinder, hard wearing, go anywhere, thumper of a bike, with sound effects to match. (You pay good money in England to get your bike to sound like this!) On the plus side, riding an enfield is on the list of must do's for travelling in India. On the down side, it's a heavy bike, and a daunting prostpect at the time for me. I tried a couple and really struggled to get them into gear......even first! The gear boxes were incredibly stiff. Another thing with bikes over here is that the pedals are back to front and upside down...... so your gears are on the right, one up and three down. Once you're over stamping on the break every time you want to change up, or changing up to fourth on a blind mountain bend, it's not so bad, but it's a bit hairy while you get used to it. So back to the enfield. The two hire ones I tried I didn't get on with. They felt completely alien compared to what I'd been riding back home. My other choice was to go for a Pulsar. A 150cc street bike. On the plus side, it's a lot more similar to my bike back home....and the gears are on the same side! It was better than the enfield, but I was still pretty nervous. A guy in one of the hire shops had said he wouldn't let me hire a bike to go to Pangong as the road was so bad. I have no experience of bad roads and hadn't ridden in a yr and a half. You wouldn't believe how relieved I was when Claudio agreed to let me go on the back of his instead......ok, so I'd chickened out.....but hey, I'd probably get to the lake in one peice. There were 4 of us going to the lake in the end. Claudio and I on one bike and Tuni and Nadesh, a french couple, on another bike. What I hadn't even considered when asking to go 2 up with Claudio, was the steep ascents round the mountains. He has a 350 enfield which struggled up some of the steeper roads. You have to go over the world's 3rd highest motorable pass on the way to Pangong and the road up to it is pretty steep. If it was smooth road it'd be one thing, but negotiating the rocks n boulders n trying to keep the bike going all at once is pretty tricky......especially 2 up. In places, 2 up wasn't an option! Vasilya needed a bit of encouragement in places........ but hey, I had the all round biking / trekking experience! The road to Pangong was pretty bad in places.....it was one obstacle after the other.....sand, rivers, rocks. You probably wouldn't call parts of it a road. The pictures would give you a better idea. We took some goodies between us all.....the good thing about going 2up on two bikes. (Unfortunately, I can't load them just yet coz we're on satellite connection up here and it'd probably take all wk.) We had problems with the bike on route too, which kicked in just after Claudio's 'legs up n go' approach to the river crossing :O) Probably the best approach, but Vasilya (Cloud's bike) didn't take too kindly and threatened to die every time the rev's dropped after that. Luckily it wasn't too long before we got to Tangtse village where we'd planned to stop for the night. We'd been told there was a river across the road between tangtse and the lake and if you passed there too late in the day, the water levels were too high to cross. Hence getting there in the morning with the bikes was a good idea. Vasilya died just as we got to the main road in Tangtse. A good sign that this was def the place to stop for the night. When Tuni and Nadesh pulled up they told us we'd better head back and make peace with the guy on the police checkpost at the start of town......we'd sailed passed him waving and blowing his whistle at us as we'd sailed on by. We were too intent on keeping Vasilya going til we got to the village. We walked back up there expecting the worst, but luckily he was over it by the time we got back and didn't give us too much greif. It's really just a case of showing your permit which you have to have to travel to most of the valleys around Leh. It's not difficult to get, just an extra thing you need to think about before you go. Any travel agent's happy to do it for you for a fee!
The next day Vasilya wasn't happy at all. That's probably an understatement.......good early morning exercise up n down the road outside the guest house trying to start her. The battery was dead completely. Turned out the connection had come loose and after fixing it, she was off. The last bit of road to the lake was amazing too....brand new tarmac. Really strange how you can go from off road dirt track to brand new tarmac in the middle of nowhere! Not sure if there's any reason to it, or if they just tarmac bits n pieces as they choose. who knows. All I know is it was a welcome relief to hit a nice bit of road. The river level was fairly low when we got there and Cloud made it through no problem......made a better job than some of the jeeps going through! Vasilya was running well. The only thing holding her back was the sand over the road in one bit. That was a bit hairy.......was taking a video at the time and it's a good one to look back on. We got to the lake around midday I think. The sun was shining and it was as beautiful as I'd imagined. I think we must have 100 photos between us.....don't worry I won't bore you with them all! We stayed in a homestay in the end. There was one guest house that wanted 2000 rups for a tent......oh yeay, including your food!!. Instead we went for a room in a local house with four mattresses including food for 150 rups. It was nice too. They had 3 kids, loads of goats, a tiny sheep (who Nadesh managed to tame!), and a dog. Cosy, but nice!
The next morning was a different day. Snowing!! Who said it never rained in Ladakh????? Since I've been here, it rained at least 3 times in Leh and we get over to Pangong and it snows!!!! 'Very unusual' we're told!! Now, call me an optamist, but I didn't have wet weather gear with me. We decided to sit tight and see what happened with the weather and spent the morning eating chapatis, butter n salt, and playing cards. You couldn't even see the lake....what a difference a day makes. Eventually, the weather cleared slightly and we decided to take the window and try and get back to Tangtse at least. There was a festival in Hemis that wkend which we really wanted to get back for. It was Saturday that day, but we figured even if we didn't make it ack that day, if we were in Tangtse we'd get back earlier on the sunday and hopefully catch some of it. We got back to Tangtse in time for lunch and the weather was looking good. It changes so quickly in the mountains. Clouds gather quickly, but then they seem to disperse just as quickly....moving from one valley to another I guess. We were feeling pretty confident and decided to make a run for it. It was the hardest journey I've ever experienced on a bike. The sunshine didn't last and soon we were wet through. Going over the pass was tough. It's almost 5000m. Not a place you want to be in a blizzard, soaking wet with too few clothes on. The roads were dodgy too. Snow and ice everywhere. I was pushing every 5 minutes but we were desperate to make it all the way to the top. Having made the river one way, we didn't want to have to go back over it to Tangtse to try again tomorrow. Tunis bike handled the hills much better. It's a 500cc and has that bit extra power. When we eventually got to the pass there was no sign of them. In a way I don't blame them for not hanging around for us......the weather was closing in and there was a pretty good chance you'd get stuck at the top or in the valley. I just hoped they'd made it over safely. There was no sign of them or the bike though so it was pretty likely they had.
When we got over the pass, we didn't even stop for the free tea! ....every one going over gets a free cup of tea on the pass...... we wanted to get out the snow as quick as possible and heading down was probably the quickest was to do it. The roads at the top going down were incredibly bad though. The tyre tracks in the snow which we'd tried to follow going up the other side were pretty non existent and we nearly lost Vasilya on one corner. We seriously debated going back up, but we didn't know how long the snow would last and if we went back, when we'd get out. We decided to press on. Cloud was so cold he wanted me to ride the bike. At least I had wind protection on the back, on the front you're well open to the elements. In wet gloves, his fingers were pretty close to frostbite. I've laughed at him having to make that decision since.......suffer more of the cold or let Sharon loose on Vasilya! I hope he apologised to Vasilya! As it was, I only rode her for a few minutes. I wasn't confident in the first place, let alone on someone elses baby in those conditions! You couldn't see a thing and the roads were covered in ice and snow. About an hour's ride down, we came to the army check post where we'd showed our permits on the way up. I have a huge amount of respect for the indian army now. We weren't too sure what reaction we'd get when we said we needed somewhere to warm up. I certainly didn't expect what we got. We were invited into their tea making shack, given tea biscuits and 2 kerosene stoves to try and dry out / warm up. They were so nice, you wouldn't believe. I cannot put into words what a godsend that stop was. We even managed to dry the gloves out so Cloud's fingers didn't drop off! Slightly recharged, we set off again. The guys on the checkpost had said that one bike with 2 people had gone through earlier, which was almost certainly Tuni and Nadesh. That was a relief too.....at least they were ok as well. We just needed to make it through the rain now as far back as we could towards Leh. On the bright side, this rain was probably all over Ladakh, so we probably weren't missing too much at the Hemis festival! We made it back to Tikhsay......where I'd visited the monastary. It's not too far from Leh, probably only half hour's drive, but that's how cold and desperate we were to warm up. We stayed there instead of getting back to Leh. The guest house wasn't great.....the food was worse.....but it was warmer than we'd been all day! The relief just to be there was fab! Having warmed up, I showed Cloud how to play chess (he he!!) and then we crashed.......well n truly.
Next morning we headed back to Leh. The Hemis festival was on again, having been a bit of a washout the day before apparently, and we wanted to get there. Having found a guest house, washed changed n had breakfast we set off for Hemis.....about an hours ride back the same way we'd come from the lake. The festival was ok. I'm glad I went to see it. It only rained on and off and it was interesting to see. It was held in Hemis monastary and I think it was mainly the monks dressing up and doing the dances. The costumes are pretty cool, but a lot of the dancing is very slow and monotonous. Tibettan music isn't the most tuneful either. I was glad to have gone, but glad it was over too.....if you know what I mean :O) The kids dancing at the end were probably the best bit.....at least they had some energy! Unfortunately it was raining pretty heavy by this time and a lot of the people had started to leave.....shame, they missed the best bit. We left in the rain, so decided to get a tea and see if it stopped before going back to Leh on the bike. Sure enough the weather passed and we headed down to get Vasilya. She didn't want to start. ......not at all. Eventually she stood her protest by catching fire in the carpark. It's amazing how quick you get off a bike when it's on fire. I wish I had it on video! We decided to freewheel down the hill and see if we could get to the village at the bottom. Maybe they'd be a mechanic there. We got almost to the bottom, but when Pepe drove the last bit, he couldn't find a mechanic, so we had to try and repair it. We managed to get a bit of wire off a passing camper truck and after 3 attempts replaced the wire that'd shorted and caught fire, and made it back to Leh. Yeay!! Vasilya's had a whole new electric system since then and is now running like a dream......no more fires, no more pushing!!
Having been on one adventure the next one was calling. Having been on the back of the bike, I had more confidence and wanted to have my own next time. The next trip was to Nubra Valley. There were a few bikes going.....6 in all, 7 people. I hired 'Bob'. 'Bob' because she looked like a Bob n sounded like a Bob.....Bob bob bob bob bob......say it loud n quick and that's how an enfield sounds! So, her name was 'Bob'. Bob did amazingly well going to Nubra. You have to cross the world's highest motorable pass to get there.....18000ft. It was really hard going, negotiating the obstacles, in effect driving off road, and going steep up hill round tight bends. Once I'd remembered the art of clutch control it was much better......I wasn't left trying to kickstart her while sliding backwards on corners at any rate :O) It was hard though. I didn't make it above 2nd virtually all the way up. Loads of respect for Cloud doing a similar road 2 up to Pangong. The road is really windy......a typical mountain road. On the way up we passed where a truck had gone off the edge. Both occupants dead. The grim reality of going too fast on these kinds of roads and a good reminder to take it very easy. As the road went on, it got worse and worse, more and more boulders, so the option of going fast was null n void anyhow. When we got to the top of the pass it was fab. I was so chuffed with myself. We even made the most of the tea this time! We probably stopped for an hour or so on the top. We'd had a late start from Leh too.....people faffing around at the last minute......not me for a change either!! :O) By the time we headed down into Nubra Valley it mustve been 2 or 3ish at least.
Going down was harder than going up. The breaks on Bob weren't amazing. The front was pretty non existent, the back was there but only just. I have to be honest, it was pretty scary in places. About half an hour down I decided to stop and take photos of Cloud n Dory going past. I'd set off before them and they were the only ones who hadn't passed me going down. I waited for what must've been a good hour and no sign. At first I thought maybe they'd passed me and I hadn't noticed.......on the way up I didn't see 2 of the bikes pass me, but I was the last one to the top! Must've been concentrating on the road so hard n not noticed them. Anyhow, a bus full of people stopped and the drived came over and chatted to me. Nice guy, wanted to make sure I was ok. I said I was waiting for 2 friends on 2 bikes to come down. He said he'd seen 2 guys on bikes sitting on the side of the road about half way back to the top. So I carried on waiting. The bus went all the way to the bottom and came back up and still I was waiting. In the meantime a white car had come by and the ladies in it had said there were two men just 'sat on the side of the road resting' up the top. I said I was getting worried about them and was thinking about going back up and they'd said 'don't worry, they're not hurt, they're not doing anything to the bikes, they're just sitting resting' ' no need to worry'. I was worried though. I couldn't understand what could've happened to both the bikes that one of them wouldn't come down n let us know what happened at least. Maybe they were just resting. I wanted to go back up. Had I have been more confident on the road, maybe I would, but I was starting to feel pretty alone and it was getting late. I didn't want to head back up and find they'd gone back to Leh with problems with the bike, coz then it would've been really late and I'd have been alone trying to get to somewhere with a guesthouse....be it back to Leh or back down to Nubra. Rightly or wrongly I decided to head down and see if the others were waiting further down. When the bus passed on the way back up I stopped it and said if the 2 guys are still there, could he let them know I was going to carry on down. At least then they'd know I was continuing. The worst thing about the situation was not knowing what the hell was going on. I carried on down and the others were waiting about another half hour down. It was half five by then. They didn't want to wait and when I suggested going back up, they weren't up for that either. They wanted to get to Diskit and they wanted to head off so they'd make it before dark. They said none of them were mechanics so they wouldn't be able to help anyhow. So I either stopped by myself, headed up by myself, or carried on with other people. Call me a coward, but having other people around seemed like the best option. With no word coming down about what had happened to them, I had no idea if they were coming or not. I knew they were ok, ie not hurt, from the messages coming down. I was too scared to head back up alone, so I carried on with the others. If I'd known how far it was to Diskit (the village where we'd said we were going to stay) I'd probably have headed back up. It was 60kms at least. Leh would've been closer and I'd have known what'd happened to Cloud n Dory. Still, we were on our way and at least the road was better down in the valley. The ride down was amazing for views. The sun was setting at the end of the valley, shining off the river in the bottom, stunning. Shame I wasn't feeling that good about splitting up from the others. If it wasn't for them I wouldn't have been there. I didn't really know the other guys......just from that day. I was the last bike in convoy, way behind at times. I was so tired by this point you wouldn't believe. All I was focussing on was the countdown in kms on the little roadside boulders to Diskit. The last 15ks were hard. When we got to Diskit, Tashi stopped and talked to one of the guest house owners, but then he got back on his bike and carried on. At first I thought we must be heading to the other side of Diskit where maybe it was cheaper.....the first guest house we'd stopped at had looked quite expensive. Soon it became clear that they weren't stopping. Being at the back I couldn't even catch up and ask where we were going. We were supposed to be in Diskit......that's where we said we'd be. If the other's came, that's where they'd look for us. Or at least that's what I'd thought. Maybe I was wrong though n maybe they'd agreed the next village along, by this point I didn't know what was going on and I was so tired I just wanted to know what was going on, for the others to turn up, for some food and for a bed. We eventually stopped in Hunder, a village about 15ks further on. When I asked why we hadn't stopped in Diskit, saying that's where we'd agreed to stop, Tashi said he couldn't afford it. I said I couldn't believe we'd left them and then not stopped where we said we were going to be. Still, it was late now, nearly 9. I had no energy to do anything about it now.
The next morning I'd decided I was going to head back to Diskit. In my mind, I was pretty sure the other guys had problems with the bikes and headed downhill to Leh instead of getting stuck in Nubra Valley, but I was sure they'd come back over today. Cloud had my permit as well, so I was pretty sure he'd come back over. I told the other guys what I was going to do, kinda hoping they'd come too, but they didn't seem too bothered. They liked Hunder and wanted to stay another night. Avy, Dori's friend said he felt bad too, but he didn't know if they'd turn up today and wanted to stay in Hunder another night too. I'd have liked the company, but at the same time I wanted to catch up with Cloud more. We'd come on this adventure together and I felt really bad about losing him. Also, one of the girls Tania had really annoyed me the night before. She'd been telling a guy at the hotel about losing the others and had laughed like it was the funniest thing that had happened to her in ages. I'm more tolerant now than I have been in the past, but I wasn't impressed. OK she didn't know them, but we'd still left 2 people on the side of a mountain and then not even stopped where we'd arranged to meet. There wasn't anything funny about it from where I was.
So, I headed back to Diskit......Once I'd found the keys to the bike........still in the ignition from the night before! I was so tired when I'd arrived there I'd literally got me and the stuff off the bike and staggered into the guest house, leaving the key in the ignition and the petrol on! Anyone want a bike??!!! :O) In Diskit, I stopped at the hotel on the main road where Tashi had spoken to the guy the night before. They were really nice in there. I couldn't afford to stay there, but I ate there and in return they let me leave the bike outside in their layby all day, with a note on it for the guys. As the day wore on, I decided to check into a guest house there. Originally, I'd hoped they'd come early and we could all head back to Hunder and catch up with the others. As the day wore on I started thinking maybe they had to get the bikes sorted first, then head over, so maybe it'd be later they'd arrive. I didn't want to move the bike......at least on the side of the main road they had a chance of seeing it and stopping to see the note. I walked round all the guest houses I could find....its a small village so there were only four of them. No-one had seen them. Apart from that I spent the day in the guest house waiting and sleeping. It probably did me some good as I was still really tired from the night before, but it was a shame to waste the time in Nubra in a guest house. Still, it was the best chance I had of finding them. The guys in the guest house where I'd left the bike had said they'd keep an eye out and let them know I was staying in sunrise guest house if they saw them, and the note on the bike was to the same effect. I was so certain they'd come. By 8 still no sign. I didn't want to leave the bike on the side of the road all night, so when I went round for dinner, the guys there said I could pull it inside to their carpark overnight. - Really nice considering I wasn't staying there. The next morning, it was raining again! No rain in Ladakh, but it looked remarkably like it to me!! Reality of being on my own hit in. It didn't look like they were coming back. I wasn't sure where the others would be by now, but they'd mentioned going to the other side of the valley. I decided to wait and see what the weather did. Just about midday the rain stopped so I decided to head over to the other side of the valley and hoped to bump into them. I didn't want to head over the pass on a rainy day......I had visions of the pass to Pangong! So I checked out and walked back round to the bike and started to load up my stuff. Just as I was doing that, Tania and AJ drove into the carpark. They'd seen me and stopped........fantastic timing! They were heading back over the pass to Leh, not to the other side of the valley, so I said I'd head back with them. The way back was intermittent sun and rain, but not too bad. We got caught up in a huge convoy of army jeeps which made it pretty tough too. They go so slow you're trying to keep the bike from cutting out and the pot holes and boulders come out at you from nowhere because you can't see far enough ahead to anticipate them, but at the same time they're really hard to pass on the narrow mountain roads where there are blind corners every 100ms or so. Still, I made it. The others like to stop every so often for breaks but after a couple of breaks I said I'd carry on. I was so much slower than them anyway that I thought they'd catch me up in no time. Bob struggled back up the top of the pass, but she made it with lots of encouragement! What a girl! The weather on the top of the pass was ok too.....no blizzards this time! I carried on all the way to Leh. About 20kms from home Bob started making a funny noise. At first I thought it was the wheel as it sounded like something going round clunking. I stopped several times but couldn't see anything. At least the others were behind me somewhere so if she didn't make it, I could get a lift the last little bit. She did make it.
As I drove back up through Leh I passed Cloud. He wasn't happy. They had made it to Diskit that night expecting to find us there being that we hadn't waited somewhere along the road. We weren't there. They'd been there the whole of the next day, not seen my bike, and headed back earlier the same day that we had. I thought I'd checked all the guest houses but obviously missed the one they were in. I couldn't believe I'd sat on my own in a guest house in a small village when all the time they must have been just round the corner. They'd spent a lot of the day in the mechanics in Diskit........didn't even think about checking there. Daft really, if they'd had problems with the bikes, that's the obvious place. Still hindsight is a wonderful thing. He was a bit pissed off and suprised that we'd 'left' them. Rightfully so. I don't blame him. You can't justify leaving your mates on the side of the mountain, no matter what you do to try and find them again later. Every time he tells the story of our 'adventure' I want the ground to open up and swallow me. How do you persuade someone you don't know that well, that leaving them was the last thing you wanted to do, but you were just too scared to do anything different. Funny thing is, even going back in time now, I don't know that I'd head back up the mountain on my own. I was nervous enough that day in a group....first time on a bike in ages, on really bad roads, gears not where you expect them to be! I was scared to go up the mountain again on my own not knowing if I'd find them or not. If it'd happened now, I'd have more confidence on the bike and I'd probably go back up without thinking about it, but at the time, I really didn't. It doesn't make me feel good thinking about what happened though.
Luckily, I think we're all over it now and it's not mentioned that much any more. There was a Full Moon Party in the desert the night we got back which we went to. It was the first time I'd had a drink since getting to Ladakh. I think we were both pretty knackered but the party was just what was needed. It went on til the early hours of the morning......or actually the late hours, but we only made it til the early hours. KC restaurant had put on busses to take us out to the desert where it was happening and there were intermittent busses going back to Leh during the night. We got back to Leh just as it got light.
The next day was the last day I had Bob on hire. The noise seemed to have gone.......someone suggested it may have been the chaing being loose n getting hot. Whatever it was, it wasn't a problem any more so we headed off to make the most of the last day on the bikes.........together this time! We headed out towards Alchi, but didn't realise how far it was and hence didn't have enough petrol to get all the way there. It was a nice ride out though.
Giving Bob back was a sad moment. It didn't take much to decide to look out for a bike to buy for the time I'm going to be in Ladakh......I can't afford to hire one any longer, but buying one you should hopefully only lose a couple of thousand ruppees over a couple of months, so about 25 pounds. There's not too many bikes up here for sale right now. Lots of people on bikes, but they all want to keep them as the roads are so nice for driving and its so handy for getting around. We found one which was in lovely condition, but had no original paperwork. You'd probably get away with it with the odd bit of backsheesh here and there when you get stopped, but I didn't want the worry or the hassle, so the search continued. I tried another one, but the gearbox was stiff like the original bikes I'd tried before going to Pangong. Definitely not for me. Then, sitting outside a coffee place with a friend, I mentioned wanting to buy a bike and a friend of theirs that was sitting with us said he knew of an Ozzy guy who was going to sell his bike in a wk or so. Then within a couple of minutes of that, the Ozzy guy, Dan, walked out a gate just next to where we were sat. Amazing timing. We had a chat. Turned out the bike was one I'd walked past the previous day. It had made me chuckle because it had it's name 'possible' written on the front numberplate. (Front numberplates are generally used for names rather than numbers on bikes over here!) I took it for a ride. It was an old bike....78, but the engine was really good, had a lot of power up the hills. Had a couple of things wrong but not much. He wanted 20,000 ruppees, so about 250 pounds, but didn't want to sell for a wk as he wanted to go to Nubra and Pangong where we'd been. He did hint that he may let her go sooner for a price. In the end I got her for 20,000 the next day. I spent yesterday in the mechanics sorting bits and peices out. Yep, the whole day! There are 2 mechanics in town and they're busy from the time they open til the time they close at night.....everyone has a bike up here! You literally have to turn up and wait your turn, watching out for locals turning up and trying to jump the queue. It's a good meeting place though......I must've seen at least half a dozen people I knew from Leh there yesterday! Between the mechanics, the tyre place, the tyre fitting place, the welders, running to the shops next door to get parts / oil etc, it was an all day job. He's running well now. He has new handle bars, new back tyre, gear box sorted, new luggage racks, new lights.....looking good Bob! I've called him Bob 2nd, or 'Possible Bob', or just Bob. I'm not too sure if he's male or female yet. Enfields should really be female......they need lots of TLC! but my bikes have always been male. So Bobs having a sexual identity crisis right now! :O)
Cloud wants to head over to Zanskar valley tomorrow. He wanted to go today, but I managed to persuade him to have a day's rest. Not sure why, but I'm feeling pretty knackered today and wanted to write this and sort a few things out before hitting the road again. Hopefully Bob will go the distance......always a bit nervewracking on your first long ride. Still, there should be a few of us again.....and this time we're staying in a group!
Like I said at the beginning, I'm so glad I came to Leh. The plan to escape the monsoon almost worked ......ok, not completely, but relatively!....... and it's a fab part of the world. I'd recommend it. There's a really nice group of people here too, a lot of them in the same guest house, along with a resident cow, who has beautiful big brown eyes, but's incredibly noisy :O) It was a good choice to come here. Let the fun continue.................. :O)

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