Distance traveled: 150 kms
Ride time: approximately 7 hours
Total time (w/ breaks): 9 hours
Health check: Just defeated AMS (Acute Mountain Symptom)
Mental check: Adrenalin-pumped
Motorcycle check: All systems go with clutch plate being the weakest link
Skipping directly to Day 6 as we didn’t have network connectivity last 3 days. I’ll upload those posts shortly.
Waking up in the fancy tents without hot water at such a high altitude with low oxygen caught me off guard with AMS. I thought I was done with it already! Every morning the biggest struggle is putting on layers of clothing – not only for protection from cold and rain, but also from falls and accidents. However, that struggle was exaggerated due to lack of oxygen. At one point I just stood aimlessly for a minute not realizing that I was in the middle of zipping up my jacket. I even had to get Gopi’s help to tie my bandana. This is when you realize the importance of oxygen – all that was studied in schools is now being experienced practically! A few of us felt AMS with headaches and slowness, but Kyle and I felt the most.
Kick-start at 7:30am was delayed slightly to about 8:15am attributed to our group photographer (our road captain Sachin) finding a perfect spot in front of our campsite facing the serene Pangong lake.
Ride started of easy back-tracing our trails to Durbuk via Tangste. Having defeated AMS (hopefully for good) and not having Gopi in the back made me a kid with a toy zooming through open freshly tarred roads before the challenge started getting more and more interesting, or should I say tougher – similar to the adaptive GMAT-like tests. The more streams and unpaved roads we crossed, the longer, deeper and tougher ones kept coming to test us.
These water streams had soft and ever-changing clay soil with small loose rocks that keep moving with the pressure of wheels causing the motorcycles to slip and skid. It not only requires skills, but also patience and confidence. Nature has its way to play with our minds, a simple lapse in confidence cause a few falls or leaned motorcycles in our group. Unfortunately Pramod and I picked the wrong path or the “weakest link” like he portrayed and had a lean in the water saved by Sachin and our mechanic Imran from falling.
The moment we thought that we passed all the streams is when one of the locals mentioned that this morning’s waterfall on Shayok river caused the roads to break ahead and it was flooding with almost waist deep water!
When we got to it, our mechanic Imran got in the water to confirm that the locals were not at all exaggerating. Our captain along with the crew started scouting the route in the water stream that we could take with the minimal number of falls. That was quite a nerve-racking moment not realizing what to do if we can’t pass through. They finally caught a break with Sachin testing it out successfully. Then one-by-one we started crossing it in zig-zag with the most depth of knee high water. Now it feels like we all graduated to ride in the water streams. Zoji La Pass just seems like Kindergarten now.
The starkly contrasted mountains continued all day – we just kept climbing a mountain from one-side and getting off the other only to start climbing another one. Thankfully the rocky mountains didn’t blow rocks on us like the high pressured sand that mountains with sand dunes would blow! These ascends and descends were pretty strenuous where we had to constantly keep your eye on the road – one split second diversion to enjoy the scenery and we would be gone. All of us had a few close calls. Gopi would literally stop breathing so many times – I guess she would have done enough Pranayam breathing exercises in these handful of days as she would have in her entire life. If we had our Fitbits on, then I’m sure the high heart-rates would have marked our work out goals completed for a month!
We stopped for lunch at Khalsar. Finally after passing Diskit, a place with a tall Buddha statue, we started seeing a lot of sand dunes and greenery marking the apricot and lehberries that are grown in our destination Hunder in Nubra Valley.
Network connectivity to Facetime with Armaan, hot shower, drinks with awesome friends, hot dhaba-style food, and an actual bed ended the day splendidly well.
Stay tuned as we head back to Leh before the toughest day of riding to Sarchu day after tomorrow.