Return from Leh!

Huge mountains, breathtaking scenery , ice cold rivers, deep blue lakes and beautiful women … after staying there for almost a month and a half, we started feeling at home in Ladakh. The steep climbs became easier, and the body had easily acclimatised to the sub zero temperatures and below normal levels of oxygen. Towards the end we began feeling nostalgic without even leaving Leh. Our last few days were spent in a hectic manner composing and finishing the reports for the NGO ending with a presentation about the work done by us.

One day before we left, we made a dash for the Famous Pangong lake, and thankfully as Changla was merciful, we came back the same day.

Ladakh seemed like a place on a different planet. The mountains are immensely huge and the terrain extremely barren. We were craving to see some shade of green after some time. However it is extremely beautiful and they say it blooms in the summer months of June, July and August. As the Zorjila pass connecting Leh to Srinagar was closed even as we left, we came back after coming within kissing distance of Kashmir.

Though the living conditions are tough, people are always cheerful, and never complaining. There is no electricity and even running water in most of Ladakh. The only water source in few villages was the Village handpump. Still they are simple people with no greed for money. In fact few villagers responded to one of our questions saying “Kya karenge utna paisa ka, Hum aise hi khush hain”.

It is a must for everyone to visit Ladakh atleast once, and im quite sure it is more beautiful than the famed Alps of Europe( though I have only seen it in pictures).

We clicked an astounding number of pictures with an average of 1500 per person( Every locale was so beautiful, we wanted to capture it all, but as in Desi’s words “ Hum uski Mahaanta capture nahi kar paaye”) . The total folder size reached 20 GB. It was tough to decide which to put up in this blog, though I selected few which are in the posts below. Writing about Ladakh has severely tested my knowledge, of Superlatives however some of the scenery is indescribable in words..

PS: The pics in the blog are thumbnails, can be expanded with a click.

Ill update the flick r links of Ankit, Satya and Harsh when those lazy blokes manage to upload on net.

Till then signing off ….

Never ending ranges of Karakoram

Kahwa at Khardungla

Alchi Monastery - one of the oldest in Ladakh

(L to R : Satya, Hanish, Ankit, Harsh, Sunil, Kishore)

Due to the useless design of the Delhi Airport by the useless company of L&T, I had to wait for my flight to Hyderabd alone, away from my friends. In the idyllic moments I clicked this:

Mom won't let me play!