EN ROUTE WITH CINDA HUNTER
LADAKH AND NEPAL 

In the August heat and humidity, Cinda Hunter decided that a visit to cooler Ladakh and Nepal would be a merciful respite during her buying trip to India. 

Cinda, an intrepid traveller, takes us on an amazing journey through the vast mountainous areas over precipices and breath taking scenery, staunchly telling us that Nepal remains one of her irresistible destinations in spite of the vile weather encounted during the summer months!

Despite August being the hottest and wettest month in India (with serious floods in northern India and Bangladesh when I arrived), I decided that a visit to somewhat cooler Ladakh and Nepal would be a great idea.  A mercifully brief stop-over in Delhi. 45 degrees, plus what felt like 200% humidity and then I headed to Ladakh (a province of India to the North of Kashmir, running along the Chinese border).  Getting there meant flying over the Himalayas, over the Indus river, to reach Leh, the capital of the region.

 

Leh is located in a valley surrounded by mountains.  North lies the Karakoram mountain range, home of K2, the second highest mountain in the world at 8610m.  Leh is situated at around 3600m, so altitude sickness can be a problem.  The area has a short hot summer and is only accessible by road for three months of the year before it is snowed in.

The tourist season is short and the people have only a little time to take advantage of the sudden influx of visitors.  Despite this, there are lots of hotels, guesthouses, restaurants, shops and tour businesses all aimed at the tourists who so briefly invade this otherwise sleepy and laid-back small town.  

Not only do the tourists invade the area, but the season also brings with it visiting Kashmiri traders (including Objets d!’Art Useless Wali (regd)!) who set up shop, manically competing with the laconic locals to milk the seasonal bounty…. 

Interestingly Leh is on the old silk route – the route the trading caravans used through China, Tibet, Nepal etc., so it has a long history of trade.  

 

The scenery is breath-takingly beautiful, diverse and totally awe-inspiring.  

You think you are high (and the valley below has trucks moving like dinky toys at the bottom) and then you climb yet another mind-blowingly huge mountain.

There are lots of rushing streams and waterfalls from the snowmelt, even now at the very end of summer. The region is peculiar particularly in terms of landscape.  Ladakh lies in a rain-shadow and is basically a desert.  Water comes from snow melt - streams and waterfalls joining to form wide, flat rivers flowing through the valleys.  Even in August, the end of summer, there is a lot of water.  There is a huge, muddy fast flowing river in the Nubra valley itself, called the Shayok.  On each bank is a narrow strip of spiny scrub, then desert all around. 

There are snow-covered mountains, rock strewn hillsides, desert sands and then odd patches of lushly green cultivated ground where villagers have funneled off water to create artificial oasises. They channel the water from the snow melt or the rivers into furrows to irrigate crops.  There are fields of wheat, vegetables, huge fruit orchards (especially apricots and plums which are a speciality of the region) and groves of poplar trees, mainly grown for wood.

Houses are whitewashed and flat roofed and they usually cover the roofs with straw/grass in a half metre layer for insulation.  

The scenery is  bizarre as there are these incredibly verdant green patches surrounded by the roughest boulder strewn terrain and desert sand, in blistering heat with snow topped mountain peaks all around!

After Ladakh, I flew on to Kathmandu.  Security is hectic in both places and six hand baggage and body checks are the norm! Nepal is still one of my favourite places to visit even at this time of year when the weather is vile.  

It is very hot and humid and it rains almost all the time.  The streets flood and wading through unmentionable muck - I needed gumboots! If anyone is under the illusion that traveling to these amazing places is all fun, think again!

 

In Kathmandu I bought wonderful old Tibetan chests and cupboards, bed/tables from Bhutan, exquisite very high quality cashmere jerseys, suede shirts, Buddhist statues in metal and various old artifacts, weapons etc.  These will be sent later by sea. 

What I carried back with me were Buddhist Thangka paintings, I found extraordinary antique amber beads from Tibet of a type and size which are incredibly rare, more spectacular Himalayan turquoise and exquisitely crafted silver and brass beads and jewellery.

Another day I visited Patan, another nearby town.  This has a particularly beautiful central square with wonderful old buildings.  This time the rain let up long enough for pics!  

If you look at the roofs you will see that one could grow a vegetable patch on them!

I decided to re-visit the neighbouring area of Bouddha (normally a 15-30 minute trip), site of a Tibetan Buddhist Stupa (a solid edifice that the Buddhists circle around while chanting). What I and my local expert did not know was that there was yet another "strike" on the go - actually a political rally with endless blockades, burning tyres and “toy-toying” activists.  Since the King was deposed, this is apparently pretty much a daily occurrence in the Kathmandu region but it is a moveable feast and can be around any neighbouring town/area, the idea being to cause as much disruption as possible.  

There are two groups - the communist Maoists and the Student Congress party - both blockading (different) roads into the same area.  Only with a bizarre mind-set can one contemplate political rivals conspiring against everyone else and not doing each other in...!   They very kindly limited the insurrection on this day to 10am to 1pm, but sadly this is when we were trying to get past!   We tried every possible back, side and drainage tunnel route to try and get there, only to have to give up and wait the final half hour in sweltering sun and humidity until a road was opened up!  Two and a half hours later, completely sweated out (no air-con) we got there!  It then bucketed with rain so no chance of any pics of the stupa! Sorry….

Kathmandu has a power outage in the evenings for 3 hours, so a lot of the shops just close instead of staying open for business until the usual 9pm. Makes it hard when you are there on business!  The restaurants (which are diverse in type/origin but generally excellent) are all geared for this and keep on cooking.  Unfortunately no aircon or fans, so hanging out a window to breathe is the only option!  Walking down the road one morning, one of the over-loaded electrical pylons exploded just in front of me with sparks and flame, which had me thinking “bomb!”.