ladakh-2

Jaigurudev!

day -2

Woke up to a beautiful sunny morning, after a quick breakfast we were on our way to the srinagar city.. passed the dal lake when it was probably in its most picturesque light .. took some pgraphs .. mostly just stood there and gazed .. and knew what those poets had been going on and on about for the past few centuries .. it really cannot be described ..








We pulled ourselves away because a long day lay ahead .. the road ahead was the view we see in postcards .. lush green, spring creeping in shyly from every branch , behind rocks in sprays of fern ...and the river sindh kept us company all the way to sonemarg which we reached by around noon.

Sonemarg is where the kashmir district ends and ladakh begins ..the himalayas begin to display their true might .. my first impression of them was of weathered warriors.. guarding the nation for centuries .. relentless in their commitment ..

As we reached the transit camp , the OIC there told us that there had been a landslide on the leh highway and the road would be closed for 2 hrs .. he invited us for lunch and took us to this local place where people come to ski ( or pretend ) ..now it was so amazing how temp drops by almost 7 degrees between places which are hardly 700 metres away as the crow flies.. the camp being on the leeward side of the mountain was balmy and very comfortable but this ski place was sooper cold ..




When we got the thumbs up from the BRO (Border Roads Organization) we started with a prayer in our hearts as first half of the route from sonemarg to leh is supposed to be a very treacherous road .. and in spring when the snow is melting this patch is wrought with snowslides that sometimes bring in tonnes of snow onto the road .. as we traversed the first range and gained height .. the roads became more gravelly hence more prone to skidding .. i, for lack of foresight ended up sitting on the side that faces the downslope and one look out had me saying a 108 om namah shivayas .. there was a steep unmitigated drop.. papa pointed out that we could see the campsite for the amarnath yatra, baltal down below .. but i wasnt in any mood for sight -seeing ; my concern being staying alive till the end of the day ..

now i looked around to check if anyone else was as freaking frightened as i was .. nandini (my lil sis) was loving it ..she was craning her neck out and pointing to a 100 things .. papa was telling her bout some trivia about the place and didnt even seem to notice anything scary .. and then i looked at mamma and i knew i had company .. she was sitting there all bundled up in her shawl with her eyes shut and quite hastily chanting the hanuman chalisa under her breath .. It seems really funny now :) but i still remember how absolute that fear had been for me .. because it wasnt a place where my logic could step in and say " look come on , what are the odds of dying here ? " coz the answer would probably be "very high" ..i remember making a mental list of things i d definitely do if i got out of here alive.. i didnt take a single picture in those four hours ..

and well guess what , we did get out of there alive :) this whole really scary stretch is called the Zoji-la pass and my mum calls it the godzilla pass though ( for obvious reasons). The rest of the route to Drass where we were styaing for the night was very calm and solitary .. very few vehicles on the road ..

Now this day was very important for me for two reasons -

1) This whole 'frightened that i was going to die that day' thing was very amusing later..

2) I discovered that there are so many unsung heroes in these terrians .. the BRO people who were clearing the landslides and snowslides so that the highway would be functional were doing so risking their lives every single day..

When you come down the mountains and are on your way to drass you notice army posts every few kms..The jawans who man them sit there the whole day .. always alert and watchful .. in a radius of miles there is no inhabitation..not even birds ..the silence in these stretches is so loud you have to cover your ears ..

You cant help but be oveerwhelmed with patriotism ..with a feeling of belongingness to our country ..a pride..

When my dad was tucking us in our very warm comfortable beds that night , i said a prayer to guruji .. in gratitude for the sheer abundance that he has blessed us with .. and said a prayer for all these real life heroes who silently work everyday in these harsh conditions ..

jai hind

love
tanu