The first hour took us from Leh to Karu, which was at the base of the mountains. There was a military checkpoint that we had to go through, as our journey to the Lake would take us very close to the border with China. The second and third hours took us to the Chung-La pass, which is 17,586 feet above sea level, and is the third highest mountain pass in the world that can be traveled by car. The road started out smoothly, but the farther up we went, the closer we got to the snow and ice, which melted to form streams across the roads. In fact, as we went farther up the mountain, we weren’t sure if an actual road had been created. Our guide, Karma, ensured us that there was in fact a road that was built by people from the state of Bihar, which is one of the poorest states in India. The road itself was quite narrow, approximately 1.5 times the lane size of the US, but it was a two-way road. In fact, we actually had to pass a few military trucks on the way up, and it almost felt as though we were going to fall off the mountain. After two hours of perilous journey (in which my brother threw up twice, and my mother gained a splitting headache courtesy of the rocks), we reached the pass. As I clambered out of the car, I immediately felt dizzy, due to the lack of oxygen.
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At the top of the mountain, the Indian military had created a sort civilian rest station, complete with a first aid center, a temple, and a complimentary tea station. After the first few minutes passed by, I felt better, but by the time I climbed back into the car, the lack of oxygen reared its head again, this time in the form of headache. Thankfully, as we began our hour journey down the mountain, it subsided. My mother and brother, on the other hand, had to move from the back seat to the front seat, as the bumpiness was becoming unbearable. I would like to say that the road got better the farther down the mountain we went, but that would be a total lie. The road only got worse. There were fist sized rocks scattered over the road and our car seemed to travel over every single one. Finally, we reached the bottom of mountain to another military check point. This time, we had about a 15 minute stretch of flat road through multiple villages, only containing two or three nomadic families who lived in white tents. Surprisingly, almost every village had solar panels and one even had about 15 windmills. The government had provided them for the villagers so that they could reduce the amount of electricity that had to be sent to the village. Going through the villages was nice, not only because it was a flat road, but all around us there were little streams running through lush green grass with yaks walking through them, and above the streams, there were huge, sandy mountains. When we got closer to the lake, we passed through another military checkpoint, and then began our journey to the lake. This road was probably the worst of all. At one point, we were traveling a narrow road between two mountains, with boulders that were leaning precariously on the slope of the mountain. But the sight of the lake made it all worthwhile.
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| Lake Pangong |
Speaking of the lake, there were many, many other tourists who were just sitting with their feet in the water, skipping stones across the surface of the water, and just generally chilling. However, there was this one group of tourists that came to the lake that came in a bus that looked like it could fit about 20 people. All the tourists were old women, maybe 75-80 years. After touching the water, they decided to blast old Hindi songs on the bus’ speakers. While the sight of them dancing was quite cute and it was nice that they were having so much fun, I think it was slightly inconsiderate towards the other tourists there. The Lake was a calm, peaceful place; the blasting of the music kind of ruined the ethereal character of the lake.
We then began our journey back, this time stopping for lunch. We had lunch in a small restaurant; although it looked like it was a tiny place, was using solar power to cook the food and heat the water. A girl who looked about my age was serving the food, and I immediately knew that I wanted to take a picture of her. I wasn’t sure that she spoke English, but it turned out that she was trilingual-she spoke English, Hindi, and Ladakhi. Her name was Tanzi, she was in 10th grade, and she wanted to become a doctor. I took a few pictures of her and showed them to her; she laughed seeing herself on the screen of the camera. It was then that I realized that yes, seeing all these tourist places are fun, but to truly learn the culture of a place, you have to step outside the boundaries of the “tourist places” and talk to the people who live there. It’s one thing talking to our guide Karma, and another talking to a Ladakhi girl who prepared all the food that we had for lunch. I helped her serve some of the food for the people who came after us, and then left.
The ride back was exactly the same as the ride going to the lake: bumpy, and nausea and headache inducing. I normally don’t get too affected by bumpy roads (unlike my brother and mother, I didn’t have too severe a headache and I didn’t throw up), but by the time we reached the last hour of a journey, I wanted to take an Advil and walk the rest of the way to the hotel. Tomorrow we’re going to travel through the highest mountain pass in the world. Bumpy roads and lack of oxygen here I come!
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