On an Enfield through Himachal Pradesh


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April 17th 2010
Published: April 20th 2010
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Total Distance: 0 miles / 0 kmMouse: 0,0


ShimlaShimlaShimla

could be Cambridge, but with monkeys
After Nepal I really got hooked on riding in the mountains with my Enfield. Rishikesh was ok as a temporary break, and Shimla was funny for a day, but soon I would be higher up again. From Shimla I rode down Highway 22, the one that brings you to Rampur and from there on the Hindusthani - Tibetan Highway. That's a road built on the old trade route between India and Tibet. Tibet is off limits, but I wanted to see how near I could get.

I slept the first day in Sarahan, a quite Himalayan village known for it's temple. The original temple was built in the 4th century, to honour Kali. Kali is a ferocious looking multi power godess that craves for fresh meat. Until the beginning of the 19th century, human sacrifice was still a common practice here. Until the British came to tell them that it was not nice what they did to those poor victims and that offering chickens and goats also does the trick. But the people are really nice. Kinnauri people are Aryans and miss the mongoloid traces of their Tibetan neighbours, although they speak a similar language. All the men are big,
ShimlaShimlaShimla

the struggle against time
have big hands and big heads with big noses. The women have bony tanned beautiful faces with light eyes and a veil wrapped around their heads and they look very much like Spanish gypsies as I remember them from the movies. The apple trees are blooming and the white flowers are competing with the white of the snowy hilltops. The sky is filled with the noise of buzzing insects and singing birds and yes, I got lyrical. Magnificent views too.

From Sarahan I left to get to Rekong Peo. Rekong Peo is where I would find the administration to deliver my permit. You need an Inner Line Permit to travel beyond the Kinnaur Valley to the Spiti valley. But I heard already they don't give permits to lonely travelers. For security reasons you have to travel in 'a group of at least 2 people'. And after the Spiti valley, there is Manali waiting. Problem is that to get to Manali, I have to get over the Rothang Pass (lit.:"pass of death"). Every one tells me it's still closed, covered in snow. So I am facing a few challenges, but I want to give it a try anyway.

Before arriving in Rekong Peo, on a terrible stretch of road, suddenly my back slips away. Flat tyre. Damn, I knew it was bound to happen, but not here. Trucks are flying by through the dirt, covering me in dustclouds. I try out my tools for the first time and find out that I can't remove my wheel. I had studied the whole thing before leaving, but there's a big world between theory and the crude reality. A roadworker comes to help me, but the thing doesn't budge. The road guy offers to look after my backpacks, so I can bring the bike to the tyre repair man or 'tyre wallah', as they are called here. Leaving my stuff with him, realising that they are worth more than a year salary for the poor guy is a risk, but I have no choice. I start the engine and start walking along my bike, in 1st gear. I stumble over stones, push it back uphill, trucks keep on coming at me. And then I see a pickup truck arriving. I flag the guys down and they offer to help. With 8 men, we can lift the Enfield in the back of the truck and find a wallah a few km further. I learn how you remove the wheel of an Enfield. It involves a hammer or a big stone and a screwdriver. I was to delicate before.The tube is completely ripped by a rusty nail, but I carry a spare and 15 minutes later, I am riding again. The road-worker is still watching over my gear when I arrive and he doesn't accept any payment. Did I mention already people are helpful and friendly here?

Rekong Peo is like a wild west town, where people from the mountains come to buy a new spade, or some pots and pans and a new pair of shoes. Not lovely, but you find about everything one needs to survive a winter in the Himalaya. I decide to drive on a bit and to sleep higher up in Kalpa, a sweet little village where most tourists stay. If there are any. The next morning, I start up my procedure to get a permit. Administrator n1 confirms that he can not give it to 1 person. I have to wait until another tourist shows up. I decide to give him a though time and stay in
vulture scanning mevulture scanning mevulture scanning me

road between Shimpla and Rampur
his office and start reading. He throws me out in a friendly but very decisive manner. I should come back at 2 pm. In the meanwhile I drive the mountain up and down to scan the streets for tourists. At 2 pm I go back. Alone. Administrator n2 tells me to sit down and starts preparing the paperwork. But then hears that I am alone and goes for a tea. After a while he comes back and says I should try it with big chief functioner, the 'Assistent Commissioner to the Deputy Commisioner' or AC/DC as I call him. I get an audience with the AC/DC, a dude with more attitude than empathy, seated in a big office from where he snaps orders at his staff. I give him my most helpless preach, but he doesn't change his opinion. Then I get a bit more persistent and tell him I am very disappointed in him. He feels sorry about that and offers me a tea and we're friends again. He takes my phone number and will call me as soon as a tourist shows up. We are talking about a 2 euro permit here. It all looks ridiculous, but there are two checkpoints on the road and without it, you don't get through. It would be for safety reasons they say. If one person gets in trouble, at least a second one can go for help. I arrive back in Kalpa and see I have no coverage there on my mobile. I drive back down the 10 km for the 3rd time that day. Still no tourists, so I have to stay a second day. I drive back to Kalpa and suddenly I see a westerner walk in the little town. It's Romain, a young guy from Paris. He wanted to pass the Spiti Valley without permit, but got stopped at the checkpoint and is here to get the paperwork done. We decide to go and see the AC/DC together. We are a gang of two now. I drive back to Rekong Peo for the 4th time that day. 'So you found your guy' is the first thing the AC/DC tells me, with a sarcastic smile. No tea this time and no permit either. Administrator 1 already left the office. The next morning we are back and after a visit to administrator 1 and administrator 2 we are put in
first flat tyrefirst flat tyrefirst flat tyre

40 km before Rekong Peo
a queue for administrator 3 with the command 'stay in line'. We have no other plans so we stay in line. When it's our turn we need to have our pictures taken. The webcam is pointed on my navel and cannot be moved. I bend as far as possible through my knees and almost kneel down in front of the desk. It's so ridiculous that the both of us start laughing. Half an hour later we are both standing in the daylight, with our permits. Mine is showing a picture of a happy laughing guy. We don't have to travel together, but we decide to give it a try. Romain doesn't carry a lot of luggage, but two up on a 350 cc motorbike could be too heavy for the Himalaya. If it doesn't work, we agree that I leave him near a bus stop. While he takes care of some business, I go scanning the whole town fo a helmet for him. It must be the one thing they don't sell here. Nobody uses them anyway. But then I hear about a guy who has somewhere a cricket helmet and I go for it. Unfortunately, it was a false rumour. I already saw him sitting like a Jack Nicholson with his American Football helmet on the back of Peter Fonda's Harley in "Easy Rider". So no helmet.

We drive out Rekong Peo, the feeling is different, the bike feels a bit out of balance, but I get used and everything goes fine. After 10 km however, the wheel starts sliding left and right. Another flat tyre??! This time I can remove the thing myself. Romain stays behind, while I find a ride with my wheel. Another pickup brings me to another wallah, and I can jump right on time on the bus heading back the right direction. One hour later we are riding again. We hope to make up for the lost kilometers, but a bit further we are stopped by a broken bridge. It's a hanging bridge over a wild mountain river and 200 cars and busses, filled with people and cattle, are waiting on either side. A team of workers is trying to fix the thing with a screwdriver and a lot of imagination. The workers have the bad fortune that some trucks are stuffed with soldiers. They are very good at drinking a tea while giving orders to the poor guys. They decide to pay no attention and work on. We sit down next to the waiting people and take it as it comes. I ask a group of men how long it will take to fix. "One hour says one". I look at the mess on the bridge and don't believe a word of it. "Three hours" says another one. It's like a "pronostic". A guy shows up selling popcorn. We enjoy the spectacle. After 3 hours the thing is supposedly fixed and the biggest holes are stuffed. They order to let the motorbikes pass first. I feel like a test case. If the motorbikes don't make it, it means it's not strong enough for trucks. But again we are on the road and before soon we are proudly showing our permits at the checkpoint. I promised never to drive at night, but now we have no choice. Until Pooh, there is no bed for us. We drive in the dark along rivers and high cliffs, on dirt tracks and through those same rivers. I am completely wet and dirty from the splash water combined with the dust. We arrive over 8 pm in the small village and hang out a while with the local people before heading to our bed. Next day we wake up early and find ourselves soon in a most magnificent environment. Every kilometer we climb, we come into a new landscape. I follow the altitude on my watch. We get to 3400 m around Nako, pass a landslide, pass a truck flipped over on the ridge of a cliff, hanging half in the void. We have something to eat in Thabo. I could try to describe the beauty of the enviroment, but hope that the pictures will speak for themselves. There is hardly traffic, the valleys are just opening up and most locals haven't seen tourists in a long time. We are very welcome everywhere we arrive. Many ask us if we are Israeli. Apparantly Enfield and Israeli is a thight combination. They lighten up when they hear we are not. I don't want to hurt anyones feelings and I have met many nice Israeli's, but in general their reputation is questionable.

The skies are immense, the mountain range is so gigantic it makes you feel infinitely small and the sound of the bullet echoes from valley to valley. There are many stretches where I have to drive in first gear. But the bike never lets us down. We decide to move on a while further up North and install us in Kaza, in the house of the local doctor and his wife. The next morning they prepare us a breakfast made of the home grown products. We get freshly baked breads, eggs, kardomom tea and Tsampa, a porridge made of the local cereal and yak butter. We leave for the Kye gompa, perched high on top on a hill in the Spiti valley. The 120 budhist students and the few monks are playing a cricket game when we arrive. In their monk robes. One of thems is appointed to show Romain and me around. We enter in one temple. Nice, impressive, dark, cold, mysterious. We are somehow impressed by the quiteness and the remoteness of the place, built 800 years ago. We put back our boots on but the monks tries to explain us in very limited english that there is another temple. We take our boots back off and follow him. He brings us to the bedroom of the Dalai Lama. Nice, although his last visit dates from 1972. We put our boots on again. He brings us to the door of another temple. We take the boots off. Get in, look around, and keep the boots in our hands. He offers us a tea. Visit is over, so we put the boots on. Upon leaving, he proposes to see the temple downstairs. Our devotion is somewhat less ardent then before, but we don't want to offend anyone and still feel curious. We take our boots off again. He brings us into the summer temple. Romain looks around, checks the different rooms and says: 'OK, I'll take it'.

We continue further and come to the end of the road in Kyber, driving along melting snowfields. The air is fresh, but the sun, not bothered by an ozon layer or polution clouds, burns our faces. A few km beyond Kyber, the road is blocked by snow and it's impossible to reach Manali from here. This means we have to ride all the way back. Not a punishment, the views are so immense I can't wait to see them again. Besides, now it's downhill. We fly back to Thabo, but before that, climb up the 10 km to Dhankar, a high village built against the cliffside and overlooking the whole valley. The houses are small, with tiny windows, and all have a few yaks in the backyard. It starts snowing. We head back and arrive somehow undercooled in Thabo.

The next day we drive from Thabo to Rekong Peo and back to Kalpa, where we arrive in a pouring rain. We stay another night there. I take advantage to take care of some issues with the brakes of the bike. They make a metallic noise when I brake hard and I don't trust us. More mountains are waiting. Rekong Peo has a pretty good bullet mechanic, also called Lucky. After noon we decide to continue a while together. I want to get to Manali through the Kullu valley, Romain has to get back to Delhi to get a train to Kolkota, where he has to meet his friends again. There might be a job waiting for him there.

We arrive in Rampur, but the place looks too shabby to stay there at night and we drive 1 hour back to get to Sarahan. We drive again a while in the night, but make it all
bridge is brokenbridge is brokenbridge is broken

but the army has it all under control
right. Next morning we take it at ease. Romain visits the temple, I visit some people I met the first time I was here. We drive on and find the entrance to the Kullu Valley. Romain could contact his people and he still has a few weeks to spare. We drive through a magnificent valley, but then the road gets steeper and steeper. And worse. At moments we are driving through sand, rocks, branches and holes. All this in first gear, wrestling our way through the forest. Always higher up. At moments the road looks like a wall rising up in front of us. It's crazy doing this on an Enfield, but at 3223 m altitude we make it to the Jalori Pass. There is still snow when we drive by and rododendrons are giving a touch of color to the green that surrounds us. The sun starts getting down, but we are far from there yet. The way downhill is as steep and as bad as the other side. Never drove on something like this before. We stop every few kilometers to let the brakes cool down. It's already over 6 pm when we get to the main road to Kullu and Manali. People set us on the right track and we are driving in the dark again. I have long forgotten my promise never to drive at night in India. We get to the entrance of a tunnel a few kilometers large. Inside it's pitchdark and dusty. My headlights are piercing the dustcloud and the drum of the bullet is deafening. I throw it in fifth gear and we fly through the tunnel. Waaaw!!! And then I see a silhouette in front of me. I brake to give it a better look and it turns out to be a tractor moving at 10 km/h ahead of me, without lights. Only in India. I pass it and decide wisely to drive a bit slowlier. A bit further we find a dead cow in the middle of the road, blown up to rediculous proportions. Tunnels are dangerous places for cows. We drive further in the night and stop in a small place before Kullu to pick up money and ask the road. Romain jumps off the bike and in half a minute, a crazy guy tries to take his place on the back of the bike. I have to tear him of with force and he becomes agressive, a behaviour you don't see often in Indians. At least not in public. In the meanwhile, another nutcase has begun to wash my bike, with the sleeves of his suit! We arrived 30 seconds ago and I have two lunatics around me. Romain helps to fend them of and we drive another hour in the dark.

He knows a nice place in the mountains. It's called Mateura, a km above Jaari. We get in Jaari at 8 pm and Romain thinks the road leading to the guesthouse can be driven. Turns out the road is used only by goats and is like a steep wall. I nearly drop dead and decide to leave everything halfway the mountain. I'm beat. We walk the rest and find a marvelous place there. Ideal to spend my birthday.

But after a day I've had it there and decide to move on to Manali. I want to move from there to Daramshala. Romain, who got very entousiastic with driving by motorbike, wants to finish his travel in India in beauty. What can be more beautiful than doing it on an Enfield? He considers the idea and I propose to give him a lift to Kasol, a place where the Israeli's gather and exchange their motorbikes. We check a few there, but then I remember that I have the address of a very recommended dealer and mechanic in Manali. I give him a call and the friendly guy at the other side of the phone, Anu, tells me he has a Machismo of 2002 for sale. After some negotiation, he's willing to separate from it for 25.000 Rs, 400 euros. Magic deal, and we wonder what could be wrong with this. Normaly this should cost no less that 35.000 Rs. We pack all his stuff on my bike and are riding together to check it out. Upon arrival, we notice that the bike looks a bit beaten up, the black tank lost it's original shape a while ago and several cables hang a bit loose around it. Anu guarantees however that the heart is fine and indeed, the engine gives a nice sound. Romain goes for a ride to try it out and I go for a ride with it too. It's a different style than mine. The gears are on the wrong side, just like the brake, but I like the feel of it. We decide to come back the day after. I bring mine in for a maintenance and we hang out in Manali for the rest of the day. Since Romain has no experience with driving in India, Anu proposes him to take the bike for a ride of a few hours early in the morning. We wake up the day after at 5.40 am and 20 minutes later, we are both of us on the road. Two Enfields make more noise than one and it's great cruising over the new mountainroads without traffic. The riding goes fine and I see that it's Romain's bike already. We bring it back and have a few remarks. Anu proposes to change and arrange everything. The only thing is that beaten tank. It gives the bike a Mad Max look, but if he wants to sell the bike later, a nicer one would make it easier. Anu proposes to take of the silver tank of his former personal bike, a nice gesture. Really a cool guy this Anu. And then they place that Machismo tank on the frame of the Bullet and the methamorfosis is total. Suddenly it becomes a twin of mine! And since the silencer is halfway cut off, it makes a deeper thunder than a custom Enfield. A real mean machine. Romain paid for it and together we are cruising the streets of Manali now. We didn't get further than that yet, because it didn't stop raining. But yesterday afternoon the sun appeared again and we set off around 11.30. The road to Kullu was fantastic, with big curves and a nice overview. Ideal for a first trip with the new bike. In Kullu we noticed however that oil drips from the airfilter of Romain's Enfield. It looks like oil goes from the overflow straight in the airfilter. Long before arriving in Daramsalaa the engine loses all power. We find a mechanic somewhere in the countryside who cleans filters and tubes, and the bike drives like new again. In Palampur, driving already a while in the night again, we get surprised by a thunderstorm. Strong winds blow in our face and hail tries to knock us off. We stop at the first guesthouse we see, a flee infested joint out of the imagination of David Lynch. This morning, after a short breakfast in
gompa of Thabogompa of Thabogompa of Thabo

Spiti Valley
Palampur, we drove to Daramsalaa. Just before arriving however, the bike of Romain refuses to go on. Oil drips from everywhere. I have a telephonenumber of Raj Motorbikes, a recommended mechanic in Daramsalaa and he drives all the way down to help us out. He can get the bike started again and this evening, we can pick it up. I on the other hand should start looking for someone to buy my bike, but I just called the place where I bought it (Yoga Motors, Delhi) and they are willing to give me a reasonable price for it. So maybe I keep it a bit longer. The lady of Yoga motors is Sikh and she told me that before driving back to Delhi, I should first check out the Golden Temple of Amritsar, pilgrim centre and spiritual highlight of the Sikhs. I think she gave me a good idea. Whatever idea that makes me keep my Bullet a bit longer is a good idea.


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15th May 2010
Jajurana, the statebird of Himachal Pradsh

information about jajurana
i want information about the bird jajurana
23rd May 2010

Hey, Blij dat je meelas. Ik ben ondertussen terug, zelfs terug in Belgie. Het zou leuk zijn elkaar nog eens te zien. Ik bel jullie de komende dagen eens. Tot binnenkort!
23rd May 2010

Hey, Jaju Rana means actually 'king of Birds' and is given to several kinds of pheasants, endemic in the Himachal Pradesh region, like the monal, the khalij, the koklas and the great western tragopan. The latter one is the statebird of Himachal Pradesh. They are endangered, but you can see them in a pheasant breeding initiative in Sarahan, hence the fence on the picture. More info: http://www.yatra.com/holiday-packages/destinations/in/sarahan/attractions/pheasant+breeding+center

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