Driving to Leh

  Keylong and Leh, India
Saturday, July 14, 2007

The road to Leh was long, beginning early in the morning and ending at almost midnight. Our driver had slept for one hour the night before, after tackling the same trip going the other way. Nevertheless, he looked alert and clear for the entire trip (we were hoping as much).

Very few settlements existed along the way because of the harsh conditions of the Transhimalayas, the rainshadow lands behind the Himalayas also known as the Tibetan Plateau. Instead, temporary tents for tourists periodically line the road. Some tents had signs advertising "luxury resort." Where is the swimming pool?

The Indian Army, perhaps scared from its 1962 defeat by China and repeated Pakistani aggression, was present throughout the trip, in the form of small bases and truck convoys. One truck partially fell through a small bridge, leading to a two hour delay.

But we continued on, despite the delay, over newly-paved asphalt. The sealed roads were smooth and fast, while they lasted. Much of the road was still unpaved, however; many areas were too unstable to justify paving, it seemed, as they would be destroyed by landslides, frost, ice, and falling scree. Below the road were hundreds of empty drums of tar, rusting in the once-pristine streams.

Shades of brown dominated the starkly beautiful landscape with nary a tree in sight. Sparse grass, shrubs, and herbs covered the brown in places and greenery lined streambeds and rivers. Once we saw a Himalayan Marmot: only once. Several times, the road scaled switchbacks to passes around 17,000 feet tall: Baralacha La, Lachalang La and Taklang La. Canyons descended into the depths while mountains of snow pushed upwards into the blue sky.

Before leaving for Leh, we stayed in green Keylong for a day, surrounded by large peaks and visiting the Keylong Drukpa Kagyu Monastery across the valley. We spun prayer wheels as we rounded the monastery temple clockwise. A friendly monk then arrived, perhaps notified by the noise of the spinning prayer wheels. He showed us the temple and told us that His Holiness Gyalwang Drukpa was here a few days ago and would be in Leh for the 800 year celebrations of the Drukpa lineage.

The last part of the trip to Leh was in the dark, as we crossed the Taklang La (about 17,500 feet) watching headlights on the switchbacks far below as Venus set behind the Karakoram Range. In the Indus River Valley, appraoching midnight, we passed hundreds of headlight-lit banners proclaiming the 800+ year Drukpa Celebration, with the driver running on spirtual Buddhist fumes of the Kalachakra, I suppose. Finally, we arrived near midnight and the Druk Guest House called our name, literally.