Haven't Taken a Road Trip to Ladakh? Don't Wait Any Longer!

I always wanted to do a road-trip to Ladakh with friends. But when it finally came to being there for a holiday, I had but a chance to fly up there. So I took it. From New Delhi to Leh in an hour and twenty minutes! Felt like being tossed off a frying pan directly into a refrigerator. I was suddenly 11,000 feet closer to the sun amid severe cold, and mountains alien to the concept of green vegetation.

Barren mountains, that cold expansiveness, a beautiful calm broken only by frigid winds whistling past my ears, and the feeling of being in the middle of nowhere: this picture of Ladakh had me mesmerised ever since I set eyes on a life-size poster of Pangong Tso (a beautiful lake in Ladakh).

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Poster Perfect Pangong

Sunscreens were on and sunglasses were out as I drove to the hotel with a severe headache that troubled me for the rest of the day. Come evening, from Dimox to Disprin, to getting into long conversations with strange fellow travellers, I desperately tried to forget my headache and altitude sickness that just didn’t seem to go anywhere. So I drank lots of water as instructed by Stanny, my tour guide, and slept.

Next morning, we drove towards Sham Valley on the road to Alchi, Likir, Lamayuru, and Kargil. I had never seen so much natural beauty in my life. Wide open valleys without a trace of green, through which ran a jet-black road beautifully maintained by Border Roads Organization. We couldn’t help but enjoy speeding up, the only thing making us reconsider the readings on our speedometer being BRO's wayside messaging – DONATE BLOOD IN HOSPITALS, NOT ON THE ROAD, and my personal favourite - LOVE THY NEIGHBOUR BUT NOT WHILE DRIVING!

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Sangam – Where the Mighty Indus and Zanskar Meet 

By noon, we arrived at Sangam, a beautiful confluence of River Indus and River Zanskar, traversing our way through serene surroundings and stopping at places such as the Magnetic Hill, where we watched our Toyota Qualis move uphill when we left it on neutral; and the Hall of Fame Museum, dedicated to the history and culture of Ladakh and the martyrs of the Kargil War. The Kargil Memorial is located at the back of the museum. I didn’t explore it well for I was busy beholding the views of Ladakh Valley from there. 

Sangam is a great picnic spot as all of us friends discovered on the last day of the trip. The military has parked a small truck at the confluence that acts as a souvenir shop selling cups, T-shirts and other curios. We left Sham valley at around 12:45 pm to visit Gurudwara Pathar Sahib; unexpectedly huge for the area it's located in. Thereafter, we moved on to the Spithup Gonpa, a beautiful monastery just a few kilometres from Leh Market. The views from the top were absolutely stunning. I could clearly see the Ladakh airstrip as well. 

Monasteries, Stupas and Temples

The next day spelt spirituality in more ways than one. We started by a drive to Hemis Monastery (Entry: Rs 50, Entry to Monastery Museum: Rs 40). The contrast in weather conditions in different parts of the valley were striking. As we ascended up the serpentine road to Hemis amid a hailstorm, the weather on the other side was sunny and dandy. From its ramparts to the temples and the museum, this monastery is spellbinding - a must-visit on your trip to Ladakh. From here we were off to Thiksey Monastery. Beautiful stupas, incredible views, and temples - the Temple of Tara, Chamba and Maitreya Buddha - all spoke of a distinct ancient spiritual story. Our next stop was Shey Palace. Now in ruins, there’s nothing much to see in the Palace except the murals depicting many future Buddhas inside the temple (Entry fee: Rs 20).

After an evening snack we were off to Naropa Photang Nunnery to attend evening sermons. We reached early and decided to take a guided tour of Druk Padma School adjacent to it – the same school Amir Khan used as a set for his movie 3 Idiots; the same school that was ravaged by a cloudburst soon after. Amazing as it is, this school is run completely on solar power. After attending and recording every bit of the prayer at Naropa Photang, we drove back to the hotel. Amid all this excitement, I forgot to drink water and the headache was back again.

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High Altitude Passes and Valleys

The fourth day of the trip was here; we were tired but the itinerary today - a drive to Nubra Valley for a 2-day campout via Khardung La Pass - kept us up and alive in excitement. The drive started and as we ascended up to reach a height of 18,380 feet. I was shivering. To top that, it started snowing. I had never seen the skies go so frigid in the month of July anywhere. We all stopped at Khardung La top for photos, a cup of tea at Rinchen Café, and a futile try to climb up the snow-covered stairway to a nearby Hindu temple. It was an unforgettable experience in the making. I wondered if many could see it as we got into our cars and started descending down to Nubra Valley. At first sight, the beautiful white valley of Nubra run riot with tributaries of Shyok had drums of heaven playing in my head. It felt like being taken back home from that hell I have come to know as New Delhi. Down inside the valley things got even prettier as we drove past the river across the valley to get to our camps. I wished I had the kind of kindred spirit I would need to let go on a whim, and seal my decision to never return home.

There is a lot to see and do here - visiting monasteries such as Samthanling and Diskit, taking a dip in the hot springs of Panamik (a small village), enjoying a drive to the Shyok river basin, and last but not the least, enjoying a camel ride on the Bactrian camels of Hunder (another village in Nubra). We divided all these activities over a couple of days and drove back to Leh on the 6^th day of our trip. Guess that courage and the spirit of letting go wasn’t strong enough. 

Finally in Leh, tired and exhausted, with a bad headache (I forgot water again!) after a 160-kilometre drive, I slept without eating much. I read the itinerary set for the next day. It said “Drive to Pangong Lake (280 km round trip)."

We woke up early to take this arduous drive through Chang La, the 3^rd highest mountain pass in the word for an 8-hour (140 kilometres) long trip to Pangong Lake. So cold it was, I stopped at least 8 times in 6 hours to take a leak. It was snowing atop Chang La. We took a short photo-stop, enjoyed playing with the snow and descended down into the valley for a long ride to Pangong Lake. For a while, the ride seemed never-ending as we traipsed the meandering roads from one military checkpoint to another, through one beautiful turn to another. The turquoise waters of Pangong became visible suddenly and we jumped from our seat in excitement. Funny, it was still 15 minutes away.

Looking upward to the sky, we felt cheated by the clouds as the lake cannot change colours without sunlight. Hapless, we strolled around the lake, enjoyed the breeze, tried to catch as many colours as we could and sat down inside a shack for some Maggi and Chai. Suddenly, a girl in my group screamed, “Look at the colours; it's dark blue, and orange, and turquoise, and brown, and opel blue! I looked outside and saw the clouds give way to a hard shining sun. We all ran to the lake as its waters shimmered and changed colours while the sun moved over it; another unforgettable moment in the making. Our trip to Pangong was successful at last. We took a back-breaking journey on broken mountain roads back to Leh but none of us seemed to mind it. All of us friends planned to picnic to Sangam for the next day and retired to our rooms.

The road trip might not have happened but I returned home a satisfied, changed human being. There’s still so much of Ladakh left undiscovered, as my driver Tashi put it in his typical Ladakhi accent - “Sir, Iss jagah ko dekhnen me do meeney (his pronunciation of maheeney) lagenge!”. Until then, I’ll see if I can save time for a road trip, this time around.

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