The morning was just as beautiful. I took out my camera and started clicking as soon as it was bright enough. You won't find this plant anywhere in the plains. And these are the leaves:
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| 26th to 30th June, 2005 : Trip to Keylong and beyond | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 29th June The morning was just as beautiful. I took out my camera and started clicking as soon as it was bright enough. You won't find this plant anywhere in the plains. And these are the leaves: |
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| From the hotel: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| A bath and a breakfast later, I was ready to leave. I decided to ride up the route to Ladakh for a while and turn back and make it to Manali for the night. Jispa was the next town on the route, 23 Kms from Keylong. It was 11 AM. There were some army barracks on the way and a petrol pump that had only diesel and I guess that was not for public use. Jispa had another HPPWD rest house and a large hotel. The roads were pretty bad for long stretches and a real test of patience for any biker. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Next up was a descend to Darcha where there was a bridge across the river Chandra. There were some shops and dhabas here. I crossed the bridge and went up further for about 10 Kms when I saw a huge waterfall flowing down the slope and right across the road. I was not sure if it was safe to cross and decided to wait for a while for some vehicle to cross it first and give me an idea of how deep the water was on the road. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| A while later a truck passed through and I found that I can cross it if I kept to the center of the road and avoided the tread lines of four wheel vehicles. I decided to try my luck, lost balance and had to put my left foot down on the chilling water to balance myself. I got through with chilling water in my shoes. I decided to proceed a bit further and then drain the water off my shoes. But just one Km ahead there was another massive stream flowing across the road. This was much tougher than the previous one, and I decided to wait and have a good look. The flow was so strong that it carried large chunks of rocks right across the road. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Soon a Tata Safari came along and had a tough time getting through. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| This was when I decided to turn back. I rode back and stopped at a small dhaba at Darcha, drained out water from my shoe and had some refreshments. On my way back, I took this road up to Kangsar and May villages. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| There were surfaced roads only up till Kangsar. Thereon till May, where the road ends, the roads were unsurfaced. Half way to Kangsar, I had a look down and saw the winding mountain road that that I was riding on. All the way till Kangsar, there were potato farms on the hill slopes. Kangsar was about 10 Kms off the Leh road, a few Kms after Jispa, if you are going towards Leh. May is further 2 Kms from Kangsar. May takes you up close to the snowy mountain peaks. A 2 Kms trek from where the motorable road ends, there's a monastery. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 28th June, Page2 | Home | 29th June, Page2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||