Manali
Trip Start
May 31, 2008
1
9
33
Trip End
Jul 31, 2009
Manali,
India
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Personally I was happy to simply explore on foot for most of yesterday and today with my companion Dr. Daniel from Dewsbury. The monsoon seems to be established with a pattern of rain here in the morning and fine afternoons with patches of blue sky. Accordingly, after the rain abated yesterday morning, Dan and I made our way through the tall pine trees of the nearby nature reserve, cutting out most of commercial New Manali and crossing the river to follow the path to find some hot springs.
We failed in our quest to find said springs but bumped into some Israelis (usual story - just finished National Service, travelling and doing the pot smoking / hippy thing before heading to Uni) who told us they were heading to a waterfall near a temple which we thought sounded good as an alternative to the springs so decided to tag along.
The scenery here is breath taking and the first glimpse of snow capped mountains surrounded by patches of cloud is quite thrilling having been stuck in the perpetual haze of Shimla for nearly a month. The waterfall itself was quite stunning, starting from the top of a mountain hundreds of feet above us, descending from out of the clouds with quite large volume of water.
Following lunch we headed back and discussed our onwards plans to join a group looking for people to accompany them in their jeep over the Rohtang Pass (one of the highest mountain passes in the world) to Ladakh. Ladakh is part of Jammu & Kashmir but unlike the rest of the region has seen little violence largely due to being bound mountains which divide the Indus Valley from Tibet, Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh.
Its isolation has preserved one of the last Tantric Buddhist populations on earth. This seemed like the best option for travelling in the region at this time of year because in addition to the unique civilization who inhabits Ladakh, the monsoon has not yet reached so far north yet making this the best location for trekking in the Himalayas. It is also perhaps the best time of year for such a venture as Ladakh is usually only accessible by aeroplane, with roads only open from July to September.
Today these plans were firmed up after Dan and I met Hayden and Leigh (from Canada and South Korea respectively) who were organizing the trip. We met another couple from Birmingham and another from Iceland who will be joining us also and had coffee and played pool until the rain abated, after which a few of us walked up one of the mountains looking for a Gorge and remote village which we failed to find, but had fun trying.
We depart on our two day drive North at 05:30 tomorrow morning and will camp at the mid-point to break the journey up. The plan from Leh is to spend a few days acclimatizing in this pristine medieval town before doing a trek for 3 days or so and then relaxing before flying back to Delhi a week on Monday. The flight out is supposed to be spectacular and hopefully somewhat less hair-raising than the ride we face tomorrow and Monday. Carpe Diem as they say...
Comments
Ancient Futures
Being the owner of this splendid book 'learning from Ladakh, by Helena Norberg-Hodge, I will now revisit it, and hope to share some thoughts with you Rob. Knowing that Vernon gave me this book, will no doubt alert you to there being some seriously important lessons to be learned from Ladakh. The book was written in the early nineties, so it will be interesting to know how the last fifteen years have impacted on a community with such ancient culture. The author spent six months of every year for sixteen years, setting up a project 'to warn the Ladakhis of the long-term 'side effects' of conventional development and to present practical alternatives, from the demonstration of solar heating systems to educational programmes for schoolchildren'. Ancient Futures reveals a knowledge of certain complex principles of Buddhist doctrine that permitted the author to understand this ancient social order that much better - the humanism of old ways that worked, emotionally as well as economically, now threatened with the fatal loss by ways that don't.......the author says we have much to learn from Ladhakhi culture, and we will ignore these teachings at our peril. So, Rob, over to you....
Hello, how are you? or
'Jule, karu skyodat-le?' which is, apparently, the universal Ladakhi greeting! So, you can easily remember 'Jule', can't you?
How cool is that!
XJule!
PS SUN at Glastonbury- you missed a corker, it seems!
Go Blobbo
Nice one Blobbo ......must feel good to get out into the fresh air ......i remember manali well .....i stuck around there for 2 weeks while the Footie was on ......became my home for a while......i learnt some israeli .....and stayed in a shed for about 50p a night.
Just back from holiday myself....look forward to catching up proper soon .....or at least writing you a proper mail .....but for now ....WORK and REALITY beckons..........you lucky man!
Hugs and Massages NICK