TRAVEL ON YOU CRAZY DIAMOND: Darcha to Lamayuru Trek

By: satnam on 8:22 AM

DAY 3: RESTING DAY AT CHUMIK NAPKO (4500m)

Damn, I still had a mild headache! In the early morning, after assessing my situation, Hoonar advised that I should take rest. Crossing the pass with a headache would have been very risky. I slept till late morning and took things real slow and easy. After a late breakfast of dal and roti, we went for a stroll. And I felt perfectly fine by noon.

Notice the Sunshine? It was not there the previous day.

Quite a perspective

That day, all we did was gain some height and return to the base camp. We spent the day lazing about and resting. The sun was also as well and there was no rain!

Hoonar appreciating the sun

Chakra Asana at 4500m

Hoonar threw stones at me while I was meditating

Lone old lhama

Highlight of the day : Aloo ke paranthe for lunch :)

DAY 4: CHUMIK NAPKO TO LAKHANG (4300m) VIA SHINGO LA (5090m) - 8 Hrs

Imagine the worst weather at the pass, and we had that ! Rain, low visibility, fog and chilling winds since early morning. This is what Hoonar looked liked.

Shittiest possible weather

This is how I looked.

Actually, I was OK!

I had walked in rain a few times during BMC in May, so I was partly used to it. Took some beautiful photographs along the way.

Cold makes you do these things

We lost the trail once, which was when the Nepali guides with the Dutch party came to our rescue. We followed them till Shingo La Pass.

The Dutch party

We had started at 8a.m. that day and we reached Shingo La Pass at 11a.m., which was a fairly decent time for the ascent. Goodbye Himachal ! Hello Zanskar !

Grateful for the successful ascent of Shingo La Pass

Tree pose at Shingo La (5090m)

Some celebration

We celebrated our successful ascent with two small shots of Old Monk and started the descent. Going up was easier than coming down. We had to negotiate a huge glacier. The snow was ankle-deep and slippery, and the land descended steeply into a valley.

Start of the descent

After traversing this valley, the trail turns into another huge valley.

Snow and the steep slope made our descent slow and slippery

While receding from the snow-covered section of the glacier, we saw a few crevasses.

Notice the cracks?

Crevasse, Vertical Limit style!

We had been walking in the rain for 6 hours continuously and no lunch place was in sight. We had entered Zanskar when we reached the huge valley just after descending from the pass.

Ohh rain!

Finally, we spotted Lakhang at a distance at around 2:30pm. What a respite! At this point, we entered another valley, even bigger than the previous one.

The few yellow dots at the bottom right is Lakhang. The orange thing is Hoonar.

Finally, the weather also started to clear. As they say, once the destination is in front of you, your steps get faster and easier. So was the case with us! We reached Lakhang at around 5pm, and the sun shone brightly over us. The whole day was spent walking in the rain, and as soon as we stopped, the sun came out bright and clear. Such was our (bad) luck!