Jul 15
Ride: Drass to Kargil + Experience: Kargil
NOTE: I lost the memory card from my camera that contained all photographs from Drass to Kargil. All photographs used here are from Yogesh’s phone–camera. Thanks Yogesh!
So you know already we had planned on visiting Ladakh and Kashmir in summer… and we were here, in summer. So what one expects in summer is warm climate, right? We almost got soaked in rain yesterday… which we thought was freak weather. Oh boy, we were so wrong!
Drass had decided to force me into changing my threshold of “freak”. By a factor I had never imagined.
We woke up to snowfall.
I woke up with a “WTF” of epic proportions! It couldn’t possibly snow at this time of the year! We asked if it was normal, the hotel owner was in similar state of confusion. It never snows during these months, he said.
Global Weirding of climate is very real. From a very wide POV, it is “global warming”, however for smaller weather systems, the effects are chaotic… hence my preferred term “global weirding”. Back at home, we had nearly insane monsoons after over a decade in what is now declared a drought prone area. In Kashmir, and especially Drass, everyone we talked to insisted that the snowfall is odd. Indeed, we have screwed with the only planet we have to live. Someday it will be time for payback.
Vehicles arriving from ZojiLa were covered in the cold white powder that magically turned to water the instant you touched it. I wondered it Schrödinger’s cat was made of ice. Nevermind.
There was snow slowly gathering on the ground and snow creeping down from the roof.
Tourists were arriving frozen out of their wits. It was a funny sight to see women in summer attire walk out in snow, completely baffled and shivering while men were too confused and frozen to do anything worthwhile — they just wandered about aimlessly.
Only exception were the local men and women, they all were walking with a purpose… fast, long strides on a slippery road that would make me walk like a japanese woman wearing restrictive kimono. Ok, clear that imagination out of your head.
We gave up hopes to ride this day. “Maybe tomorrow.” Was the best we could come up with. It snowed even more. Transforming the landscape into something entirely different. This was the first snowfall I had experienced in person. Wow!
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It was almost noon by now, and we wondered when it would stop snowing. Nobody was ready to give even a hint. “You never know, it could clear up in an hour or go on for a week.”
Soon enough the news came in: ZojiLa was declared closed. All vehicles were being turned back.
The hotel owner, feeling slightly greedy, thanks to hordes of tourists pouring in decided that if we wanted to stay for another day, the rates would be doubled, else we had to vacate at 12. Awesome! We finally took the decision that we were wanting to make, but were hesitating due to availability of comfort. Ride on. Into the snow.
Our bikes were dressed for the occasion…
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10-15 kicks later, my “Bagheera” came to life, roared a bit and settled for a nice purr. Such a soothing sound! Only a real cat can outdo this beast. Which reminded me of my pets back at home, slight homesickness followed. Made a phone call, chatted with Mom, told her we were going to ride in snow, on slippery roads and unknown territory. She was excited, told me to take lots of photos (I did, and eventually lost the same damn SD card.) It definitely helps when your family is supportive of your adventures!
NOTE: there are not photographs of the trip from Drass to Kargil. You will have to make do with my words and your imagination!
Anyway… we spent some time to pack and load the bikes, and rode out into the snow. Within five kilometers, our hands were cold. The riding gloves that we bought were hardly any match for snow. We pushed each other to continue riding and not give up just yet. Kargil was barely 60km away. My head calculated “60 km = 60 minutes” for plains and “60 km = 120 minutes” for mountains according to what I had learned so far. We expected to be in Kargil for evening tea.
We covered 20km in snow… on a road that was slippery on the plain surface left between large potholes. Whatever romantic ideas I had of riding in snow were destroyed here. Crushed into infinitesimal particles. It was so dark that I wondered if it was evening already! I removed my gloves to check, and what we feared was happening… hands were turning bluish. Very wet and very cold is definitely a bad idea. Fortunately, we had bought gum-boots in Drass the previous night, so feet were in a better condition than hands. Moreover, they had _some_ radiating heat next to the engine. Hands, on the other… hand, were out in cold, the first parts of our bodies to reach out, into the cold unknown territory.
Shrenik obviously panicked (yes you did!) and wanted to either turn back or find a place to stay immediately. We agreed and started looking for any settlement. Another 10km later, we made our way into a small town, greeted a bunch of locals waiting for a bus and asked if there was any hotel or a guest house. None. “This is a very small town, tourists don’t stop here.”
We stopped near a house and asked if there was place to stay. They hesitated to say yes. We changed the request: place to sit and warm our hands for half an hour as we were freezing. They very kindly let us in, welcomed as if we had known each other for many years. Made us sit right in front of their stove and offered us salted tea, a peculiar beverage in Kashmir. Brought out some food and almost forced us to eat while we insisted on being happy with the chai!
It was a pretty house, well kept… a family of five. The man is an English and Urdu teacher in village school. His wife, a daughter and two sons. Everyone joined in the conversation. We talked about our land and customs, they educated us about theirs. If I wasn’t all frozen, I would had recorded it all.
We talked for a while, and realized after a good chat that we had been sitting for over an hour. Thanked the family, took a group photo (which too was lost BTW) and dressed up for the remaining ride. We were quite warm by now, but our jackets and shoes were still cold. And to make matters worse, my jacket was fully drenched from inside. How does a 100% waterproof jacket get so wet from inside, when properly zipped up is something that I am yet to ask the owner of Pro-Biker in Pune. Let’s see if he has an explanation for that and the knee guard that keeps losing screws. And the glove that tore itself while I was wearing it.
Mr. Abbas Ali, the man who helped us out assured us there wouldn’t be snow ahead, only cold rain. He insisted we stay over at his friend’s place instead of continuing. On our way out he also showed us why they hesitated in letting us stay: ceiling was leaking in all rooms of their house and only the kitchen was still dry. They were gracious to let us in and showered so much hospitality on us! We had made up our mind by now, ride on.
It was nearly 5pm when we left their place. Kargil was another 30 km.
We reached in Kargil at 9pm. I was FULLY wet, from neck to toe. Helmet saved the head. But I was very cold and shivering. Yogesh and Shrenik headed out to look for hotels while me and Sumedh waited at a crossroad. Rates were exhorbitant compared to everywhere else. Oh, and they were lacking essential services like hot water and room heater too. So we went looking for a guesthouse that would at least not rip us off while giving similar (lack of) services. Realized the guest house people were charging on par with hotel guys. Hmm… what to do?
So after some debate, we decided to take two rooms at a hotel for four of us, and order some hot food. In the meanwhile, me and Sumedh had ordered three hot mutton soups at a roadside stall. He was just sitting under an umbrella with a big can and some bowls. It was definitely tasty and good for my shivering, but the goodness factor wore off the minute we asked how much we were expected to pay. For a small bowl of soup from a roadside stall, where you don’t even have a place to sit, you would expect somewhere like 20-30 INR. A total for three people whould be well under 100 INR. This bugger claimed that each mutton ball was 30 bucks and he had served us 4 each in advance. We were shocked and angry. He was asking for some 350 INR!
We fought him off, but since the soup had helped too… we agreed among ourselves to give him 200. He must have had a smug laugh at the hopeless idiot tourists later. I wondered how could such a cheat survive in a big tourist place like Kargil.
We checked into a hotel, again… no consideration for lowering rates (which everyone else, everywhere else did) and to top it, there were barely any amenities. I took out my clothes to see clothes still wet (from Sonamarg) shoved on top of my dry clothes… everything was cold and wet. I took Yogesh’s jacket which was dry and Shrenik’s spare shorts and got under the “rajai”. It was colder than me! Shivering returned and stayed for half an hour. We ordered the quickest food: four plates of maggi “2 minute” noodles.
Half an hour later, we reminded them that it was 10pm, we were hungry and waiting for the food.
Shrenik and Yogesh went down to make a call home, but all PCOs were closed, landlines were not working so the hotel manager gave them his mobile phone to send SMS.
I asked them to tell my mother that “I have reached Kargil safely, feeling cold so sleeping, will contact later.” On phone. Shrenik sent something on the lines of “We are at Kargil, call as soon as you see this” from the fellow’s phone. First rule of communication: do NOT create panic especially when there is no need. Anyway, mom called and the manager sent his phone to our room so we could talk.
An hour later another reminder for food.
One and half hour later, I went down to see what the problem was. The hotel manager replied with the same thing he was saying… “Don’t worry, it will be there in just five minutes.”
I did raise my voice a little because we were desperately hungry and waiting since one and half hour for a damned bowl of maggi! We had not had any lunch, only half a roti and chai in between and a small bowl of soup in Kargil, but it was not enough to compensate what we had been through. The manager, definitely drunk yelled at us and threatened to throw us out of the hotel… even wondered out loud if we were terrorists and if we had misused his phone… threatened to call the police. I backed off and explained that I was not angry… I was desperate for some food, something I had asked for 90 minutes ago. Something that takes 5 minutes to make and serve. His buddies/colleagues took him aside and sent us back to our rooms.
Another 45 minutes later, food arrived.
While we were eating the manager came in and apologized, I accepted his apologies because we did not want any further issues till morning.
Next day, we bought rubber gloves and some dried apricots. While shopping, we also realized everything was overpriced… you had to bargain, and begin bargain at one third of the quoted price to come close to realistic number.
I had not seen any city till now where so many rude and greedy citizens. I hate to generalize, but whoever I met in Kargil contributed to the impression that makes me say this: never give any business to this city. Skip it, stay at Drass or Khaltse/Khalsi instead. Less chances of you getting fleeced and even if they do, at least they are polite and helpful after they pocket your money.
That’s all for now! Thanks for bearing with the “word-heavy” post ;-)
Kargil somehow doesn't leave too many people without a good experience. I, however, had a very different one. I had a guest house manager who did his best to accommodate me despite a heavy weight politician cornering all the rooms. He even offered me space in the guard's quarters. Raid de Himalaya guys had taken up just about everything else. I took it because there was nothing else available. For a few hours only, tho'.
In any case, its a city in the middle of mountains. For that reason alone, I hate it.
@Abhimanyu: Good to hear a different story! Gives hope :-) But I'll still skip it next time :-P I could had taken my chindhi ( चिंधी ) raincoat and it would had worked better!
@Sumedh: How am I supposed to keep the promise? I'm sending them some photos from the trip and a letter explaining what happened… fair enough?
and about water proofing there was no other jugad that you could have done at that time... never trust anyone about water proffing stuff, we had bought thicker docktos' rubber gloves and used wollen govles followed by another so called water proof glove which saved us from rain n shivering cold...
but you finally passed through it man... it really takes courage to go though such conditions... great...
:-)
The rubber gloves helped a lot, but sometimes we used to sweat and get wet from inside when it stopped raining for a while :-P
A little courage and lot of faith in a lot of things, including your ride partners — knowing they will go with you through this.
Was quite an experience!
The rubber gloves helped a lot, but sometimes we used to sweat and get wet from inside when it stopped raining for a while :-P
A little courage and lot of faith in a lot of things, including your ride partners — knowing they will go with you through this.
Was quite an experience!