Terrain: Bad roads with full for dusts
Last night it was quite cold and more over because of the altitude, I could hardly able to sleep. Although it was getting late to start, all of us took extra time to get out of the tent. By the time we were set with our bikes, Bram and Jinji were almost about to start. Jindji definitely heading towards Leh, but Bram decided to spend one more day exploring some of the hidden parts of Tso Kar lake in the mountains. It was a warm see off to both Jinji and Bram from our side. While having breakfast, I heard a word, which I kept on hearing since last two three days and today I came to know the meaning of that. ‘Julley’ is as versatile as cheers in English, as this means ‘good bye’, ‘thank you’, ‘hello’.
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| With Bram |
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| Tent Place at Tso Kar |
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| Tent Place at Tso Kar |
With the disappointing Tso Kar Lake certainly the 7 KM ride to catch Debring was painful. It was not the end; the pain became intense, when saw bad, dry and dusty road ahead. The road was getting worse as we road on. The friction and gradient challenged quite hard to our muscle driven machines. At some time it was a never ending journey, when we reached near to a water stream and decided to settle down our stomach. Bright weather with pinching sun made out lunch quite difficult. With a good sunny weather, we started to complete the last 10 KM to conquer the Tanglang La Summit.
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| Landscapes of Tso Kar |
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| Debring |
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| Road to Tanglang La |
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| Santhosh Resting |
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| Santhosh |
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| On the way to Tanglang La |
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| Some Land Slides |
We kept on straining our muscles for the hope of a good road to climb till summit. On the way we met the historic traveller ‘the double door’, who was on his way back from Leh. We road more than 5 KM and there was no sense of good road. I was heading the stretch and suddenly it started drizzling. I looked up on the sky and decided to move on as it was a chunk of cloud. Within 15 minutes, it was hail stones with rain. I believed in my instincts and past experience to continue ahead. We reached the start of good road and could able to see the Tanglang La peak. Big relief and also a big reason to worry. By the time we put on our rain gears, it started snowing. All the three together and we were already wet. It did not take much time to get frizzed. Santhosh and myself were eager to climb and take shelter in the temple at the peak, where Vijesh was totally disagree with our decision. Still I insisted to climb till the valley to see, if we could get any shelter. By the time we reached the valley, it was white everywhere around. The mountains and roads were all got covered with a thick blanket of show. Finally we did not find anything there and we also were loosing sense in our fingers. That was where we decided to back up and head down at least to save our life. Thanks to Vijesh, who made us agree on the same. We never thought show fall would be so deadly sometime.
The roads were completely covered by snow and it was hard to figure out the pot holes. Vijesh headed on the front and did not care about anything on the road. My self and Santhosh just followed his tire marks. I was not able to control my body out of extreme cold and also was low in energy. While Vijesh and Santhosh moved very fast, I took my own time to come down. On the way Santhosh tried to take shelter from truck drivers, but failed because it was all full. The stream on the way back was quite full with rain water and I managed myself to crash in that.
Thanks to BRO people who gave us shelter and even arranged a stove for us. It was that humanity, which saved us that time. We took quite a long time to be normal. BRO people also served us food, which helped us retain our body temperature.
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| Tanglang La from BRO camp |
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| At BRO Camp |
It was that time, where we had to take a decision to continue or call back the expedition. We had lost one day before at Jispa and We lost one again. It was not practically possible to meet the dates, if we continued the journey. And again we covered all the highest peaks already. Spending sometime at Leh would have been great, but looking at the timelines we decided to return from there. With a bad luck with the expedition, we got a good truck who agreed to drop us at Manali. Fare has been fixed at 8000 INR and we boarded our bikes on to the truck. Till Debring, we were at back holding the bike and at Tso Kar, we tied the bike properly. We were at back to confirm the arrangement till Pang and then came to driver cabin. That day we traveled quite late night till Sarchu. Took a Dhaba arrangement for 200 INR each to sleep. Next morning we started from Sarchu and reached Mannali in the evening. The real scariness about the roads, we realized while coming back by truck. We never realized the road condition while riding the same route. The end of the expedition was quite exiting travelling in a truck for more than a day.
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| Our truck driver |
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| Baralacha from truck |
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| Inside truck |
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| Inside truck |
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| Our bikes in truck |
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| Playing cards in truck |
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| At Manali Drop |
We stayed till 1st August, 2015 at Manali and explored various places and it’s culture. Back journey from Manali in bus and flight along with the packed bikes was certainly the most painful part of the entire trip. Because of the spicejet fault, my front derailed also got damaged.
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| At the hotel after reaching |
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| Breakfast with a friend |
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| Manu Temple |
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| Old Manali |
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| Bike Packing |
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| At Delhi Airport |
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| Fun time with Ashok |
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| At Bangalore Airport |
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