The Hills Are Alive

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20 hours.

10 people.

1 4x4 jeep.

20 mph.

3 passes over 15,000 feet, the highest at 17,500.

add it up, and you'll get two dirty, tired, and happy campers resting their feet in leh, ladakh, an indo-tibetan paradise deep in the himalayas. we're in the province of jammu/kashmir, which is the northernmost state in india, and about as far away from the indian heat and humidity as you can get in late july. the views on the way up were spectacular to the point of exhausting. we took many pictures (including a great shot of dave after about 16 hours of car/altitude sickness, hot!) but as there are only closely-guarded satellite links from leh to the internet at large, we'll have to postpone their distribution until we descend from our mountain retreat. don't hold your breaths. : )

this land is an overwhelming gallery of contrasts. the valleys alternate between dry, dusty, boulder-ridden moonscapes and lush, ridiculously green pockets of clover, cottonwoods, and flower gardens. though the region is incredibly poor, the culture is the richest i've seen yet, with gompas (monasteries) and stupas (monuments of various sizes) as numerous as houses in some places. leh is at about 10,000 feet, and it's said that in the morning or evening you can sit with your feet in the shade and your head in the sun and suffer frostbite and sunstroke at the same time. we haven't tested it yet, but the sun sure does feel closer than usual, and the shade does seem a bit wintry. these contrasts, though at times exhausting, give this place a semi-magical feel.

the town is irrigated with crystalline streams running down from the snowcapped peaks north of town, and the streets are clean and beautiful. the food is clean and multi-cultural, and we've obtained lodging in an incredible guesthouse that cooks us homemade ladakhi food each night from the garden beneath our bedroom window. it's almost embarassing what $6 per day will purchase here. a major difference, though, between ladakh and the rest of india is that here the smiles are spontaneous, and the service is obviously more than an economic feature. the tibetan culture is steeped in kindness, and it's astounding how palpable and comforting that attitude feels.

there are numerous travellers here, and i often feel like i'm walking through a town that is a combination of tolkien's hobbiton, gunnison, colorado, and lhasa, tibet. ladye says this place is more tibet than india, and i can easily believe her.

we'll be hovering in this area for some time. i'm attempting to infuse my cells with as much clean blue himalayan air as my skinny frame can hold, and ladye is visiting the many gompas and stupas which give this area it's reverential atmosphere. in addition, we hope to attend a teaching by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who will be making a rare visit to this area in the coming weeks. once our buddhist, tibetan, and himalayan desires are satiated, we'll fly, not drive, back south into the heartland of india for further adventures.

we'll post some photos as soon as bandwidth allows.

until then, love from the himalayas.

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