Jullay!
Bobbing heads, cows, hooting traffic, heavy pollution, delicious curries, and stares were all a part of my every day journey for the past 3 weeks in India. We were 11 (at one stage 12) people that all had our own bus (tea and pee break whenever wanted) and as we left smelly Delhi behind, going up the beautiful, majestic, mystical, magical, great mountains of the Himalayas! Our first destination after a 24 hour journey, was Manali - a gorgeous and chill, serene little town with thick forests, hippy people, marijuana growing freely everywhere and just surrounded by the green beauty of mountains, rivers and trees. There were a lot of Israelis in this part of the country and further... I saw starry fireflies for the first time:) Our journey from here onwards was scary at most times. (This trip is not for the faint at heart:) It is a one-lane road, gravel mostly, and landslides cause worries of life or death situations whether the vehicle will make it or not. We clapped hands a lot out of pheew, sighs and relief. Sometimes we would get out of the bus, so that the drivers can cross waterfalls etc, on their own. But man, was it beautiful out there. It was emotional. Just forever surrounded by Earth. No photo can represent this in real.
We canceled a major part of our itenary because of exhaustion. It's a lot of driving. Instead we camped wherever we wanted, whenever we wanted, and ate and did whatever we wanted - and therefor called our bus the Holy Cow. The cows in India really do know their status and roam and graze wherever. There were these cute sayings on boards on the mountain roads i.e: "Safety on the road, is safe tea at home", Darling, I like you, but not so fast", "Are you going to a party, then why are you driving so dirty", "Work in progress, inconvenience regretted. Sinking road, inconvenience deeply regretted!" Haha. Cute!! And SOOO many more.
We had good food (which became one of the highlights on this trip), good rest and were keeping well and strong. I experienced altitude sickness when we reached the second highest road in the world at 17582 ft (the boys went cycling on the highest road at 18520ft !) !! Dizziness, nausea, disorientation, migraine, moodiness, and in general shortness of breath and low energy. One night we even found a place to sleep next to a stunning lake, with our own little waterfall, river, surrounded by rocks - my gosh - it was amazing. The whole trip felt like living in a fairtytale:) The clouds were a big bubblebath. Gill and I helped build parts of a road with some locals in Jispa.
Finally when we reached Leh in Ladakh Valley (our final destination), we were back in crazy traffic, street lights and internet. We hired motorcycles (a few of us) and I made my first bike accident. Fortunately, I only hurt my knee (which is still not well even though I'm going back to work tomorrow). We went to interesting monasteries (by the way, the people live and look like Tibetans as soon as you reach the foothills of the Himalyas already). The weather in Leh was so perfect. We stayed for 4 days. We gave our clothes in for laundry service, which means a guy is smacking your garments against some rock on the riverbank and drenching it through lovely gray river water.
The trip was very well planned by Pookie, whose birthday we were actually celebrating and scored us good deals (especially when getting free rooms as ‘tour operator’, haha). It was a fantastic experience.
Back in Delhi, the group started to split and eventually Param and I went to Chandigarh for 2 days where I met his awesome sister.
I got the news that my grandma passed away:(
Now, back in Dubai and Param is visiting me for another week. I’m soon off for more adventures though. Have a very promising roster for AugustJ
I wish I could tell you all more details about the trip. It will be a book if I did. Thank you for those I got to share it with in India. And thank you for those I get to share it with here.
Warmest love,
A
Namaste
