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Matter of life and death....
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The thing about most of the trips Ausaf and I did together was that they were all last minute plans. They were never planned or pre decided. Even the slightest catalyst, be it an old memory or just the craving to be in the midst of nature and meet people so different from the ones we interact with daily, was sufficient to have us pack our bags and leave for Delhi's Inter State Bus terminal.
The trip to Lahaul and Spiti however, was something Ausaf had been planning to do ever since his AIIMS days. That was the only place in Himachal Pradesh he was yet to explore. I guess the drive to do this trip was more to do with the scorching Delhi summer and also that we'd just finished our semester exams and needed something to do.
We tried to rope in Sucharit, but he already had plans. Our plan was to leave for Manali en route to Lahaul, followed by Spiti. One of our top priorities was to trek at least to one of the glacier lakes found commonly in the Himalayas.
Our journey to Manali wasn't particularly a pleasant one. Our bus - a private one, broke down a couple of times before making it to Himachal Pradesh's most popular hill station. We ate quickly at this Chinese restaurant I can't remember the name of, but had this beautiful girl at the cash register who Ausaf couldn't take his eyes off. I didn't blame him.
We enjoyed our meal before setting off to Keylong - the headquarters of Lahaul district. Calling the journey a memorable one would be an understatement. We literally saw the vegetation transform every hour, from alpine to grassland and then to a point where there was nothing but ice, and back to grassland before entering into the cold desert. We reached Keylong soon after sunset. We soon learnt there wasn't much to see or do near Keylong and we headed for Spiti early next day.
On our way to Spiti our bus driver decided to break for lunch at this village called Kokhsar.
The village looked like it was taken straight out of a novel set in the English country side. There was a meadow full of sheep, along the river and the most beautiful waterfall on the other side. We quickly realized that spending the night at Kokhsar would give us the opportunity to explore Rohtang pass.
We asked the bus driver to drop us off at Rohtang pass. We got off at a point where we were the only human beings around. We could spot scads of tourists a few kilometers away. But we walked in the opposite direction.
After an hour of trekking in the mountains, the weather deteriorated and we hitch hiked our way back to Kokhsar. After hiking in and around the village and eating momos for lunch and dinner we hit the sack early hoping we could catch the first bus to Spiti the next day, from Gramphoo - 3 km from Kokhsar.
The next morning we managed to find a Tata sumo driver who was supposed to fetch a bunch of foreign tourists from Baatal.
He offered to drop us off at Baatal and said we could catch a bus from Baatal to Spiti. The drive from Gramphoo to Baatal was very very bumpy, mainly because of the condition of the roads which were at their worst because of the rains and melting ice. The view however was breathtaking and very soo we arrived at Baatal just in time for lunch.
Baatal is the kind of place one will either love or detest immensely. Only because this village has a couple of shacks and no trees, just ice, rocks and a noisy river and mountains. "This is the kind of place you often dream of in your nightmares" my colleague told me after he returned from Baatal, a place he'd visited on my recommendation.
The bus to Spiti arrived at Baatal within an hour after we'd reached the place. We reached Kaza later the same day.
Our host at Kaza was most hospitable. The next morning we set off to Key monastery
, the place where Paap - a hindi movie starring John Abraham and Udita Goswami, was shot. And this was something the people of Spiti were particularly proud of. We also drove to Kibber, the world's highest motorable village.
After returning to Kaza that night we decided the only thing left for us to do was to trek to the glacier lake - Chandrataal. We slept early hoping to catch the 5 am bus to Kunzum top. Our plan was to descend to Chandrataal from Kunzum top, which we were told would take us a couple of hours. We would then spend a decent amount of time at the lake before setting off to Baatal about 14 km from the lake and it would take us roughly 5 hours to cover the distance. As luck would have it the bus to Spiti from the previous night hadn't yet arrived and by the time it did it was 9 am. We were four hours ahead of schedule and we hadn't moved an inch outside Kaza. A hotel owner in Kaza seemed to think we would be able to make it in spite of the delayed start. He said that we would probably just have to spend lesser time at the lake. We were willing to compromise on that. And with that we were on our way to Kunzum top. We reached Kunzum top by 11 am. We assumed that it would take us a couple of hours to descend to the lake as mentioned earlier by the hotel owner in Kaza. Well. We reached the lake alright, but at 5:30 pm, 6 hours after we had started off. The sight was worth the distance.
We walked all around the lake and we could even view the glacier, a short distance away from the lake.
The trek was however; by no means a cake walk and we were wasted by the time we got to the lake. Realizing that there was no way we would be able to make it to Baatal before sunset we explored the idea of spending the night by the lakeside. We trashed the idea almost immediately recognizing the fact that we were short of bedding and leave along camping equipment, we would not have a roof over our heads in the event of snowfall or rain. We decided to walk back to Baatal, without the slightest inkling of what we were really in for.
We began our walk back to Baatal by 6 pm. Darkness descended on the mountains within a few minutes and we soon found ourselves walking on the mountain in pitch darkness. To make matters worse, it had started to rain and snow and we had to wade through a couple of icy cold water falls. Our clothes had soon become second skin on us. After a point I began hallucinating. I don't know if it was the empty stomach or the altitute or the cold (or all combined), but it happened a few times. I could see a house at a distance and persuaded Ausaf to walk in the direction of the house, only to get a thrashing from him. After a point I could walk no longer and it seemed like we were walking endlessly and possibly in the wrong direction. I tried convincing Ausaf to go take shelter under a rock but he pointed out that the soil there was damp from all the rain and we might only get crushed under the rock and even if we didn't we would probably find ourselves in a blanket of snow by morning. He also said that if we kept walking in the direction of the river we would reach a village eventually, be it a few minutes or maybe even a few hours. He even dragged me along for a short distance. A few hours later I spotted a temple. Assuming it to be a hallucination I decided to keep mum. Ausaf spotted the bridge next to the temple I'd seen and I knew we had reached Baatal.
We knocked on the door of the only house in the village. The couple living there let us in and after some hesitation even gave us one quilt to share. We slept on the floor under the quilt and I passed out almost immediately. The next morning when we woke up and went outside to board the bus to Manali, we were greeted by mountains that were covered in snow. The couple told us that the mountains were bare until last night and the white coating this morning was due to overnight snowfall.
Ausaf was quick to point out that we would've probably been rotting in hell if he'd have taken my suggestion and spent the night under the rock!!!!!
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