ant
AngryAnt
No way...I can pick you out of a mob from miles away
(and not by the smell)
Oh yeah? Which one is me?
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Trip Report - Ant's Himalayan Adventure
- Thread starter ant
- Start date
Oh yeah? Which one is me?
glipschitz
Long Timer
Not sure how, there’s not enough cable tiesNo way...I can pick you out of a mob from miles away
(and not by the smell
glipschitz
Long Timer
Not sure how, there’s not enough cable ties
Naw, they were for Squiz's front caliper!
ant
AngryAnt
we did have guys for that. The ride crew and a mechanic in the support car were often up for a few hours every night tightening bolts and fixing shit that fell off ;-)
ant
AngryAnt
Day 4 - Kalpa/Sangla to Nako - 29 Jun 24
On this day we had to ride back down the same way we came up the day before, so that rough cliff face road - it was cold and a bit wet as we left and some of us were trepidatious given we'd be on the sheer drop side of the road going down, but traffic was pretty light and we made it safely down to the base of the mountains.
A long ride up into more populated areas followed - we had to go a government office in a town to have passports and documents eyeballed to get into the next district.
I'd started noticing the Classics/Bullets which are basically the same bike, same engines and frames - just the styling is different. This is a 350cc version. A lot of local riders take these onto fairly tough mountain roads, often with a pillion passenger. They are slow but chug up hills OK.
Typical town scene
Although the populations here are starting to be Buddhist rather than Hindu, cows still get to do whatever they want and hang out wherever they want. Sadly they mostly seem to eat garbage.
Out of town and above the treeline again we started the ascent to Nako.
Pooh is a real place
Some more BRO handiwork here - one of their more inspiring slogans
Only a few k's outta Nako the views were impressive.
Notice the town on the mountain to the right - the greenery you can see is cultivated orchards, seemed to be fruit and nuts from what I could see in other places. Unfortunately when we set off from here Paul hit his foot on a large rock which fucked his knee (which was lacking an ACL anyway from a soccer injury) for most of the remainder of the trip! Tough bastard hung in though.. Anyway we kept ascending to Nako which turned out to be a beautiful place.
I'll give Nako its own post.
On this day we had to ride back down the same way we came up the day before, so that rough cliff face road - it was cold and a bit wet as we left and some of us were trepidatious given we'd be on the sheer drop side of the road going down, but traffic was pretty light and we made it safely down to the base of the mountains.
A long ride up into more populated areas followed - we had to go a government office in a town to have passports and documents eyeballed to get into the next district.
I'd started noticing the Classics/Bullets which are basically the same bike, same engines and frames - just the styling is different. This is a 350cc version. A lot of local riders take these onto fairly tough mountain roads, often with a pillion passenger. They are slow but chug up hills OK.
Typical town scene
Although the populations here are starting to be Buddhist rather than Hindu, cows still get to do whatever they want and hang out wherever they want. Sadly they mostly seem to eat garbage.
Out of town and above the treeline again we started the ascent to Nako.
Pooh is a real place
Some more BRO handiwork here - one of their more inspiring slogans
Only a few k's outta Nako the views were impressive.
Notice the town on the mountain to the right - the greenery you can see is cultivated orchards, seemed to be fruit and nuts from what I could see in other places. Unfortunately when we set off from here Paul hit his foot on a large rock which fucked his knee (which was lacking an ACL anyway from a soccer injury) for most of the remainder of the trip! Tough bastard hung in though.. Anyway we kept ascending to Nako which turned out to be a beautiful place.
I'll give Nako its own post.
Last edited:
ant
AngryAnt
Nako - elevation around 3600m, population 574 according to wikipedia. The green crops you see here on the terraces is mostly animal feed - they grow apples and apricots in the orchards.
These pics all late afternoon after we got in. This night was the only night I got sick - not Delhi Belly, may have been altitude related - I hadn't been on altitude meds til this point, but got a bad headache and a chill/fever and had to go to bed early, luckily we were in a nice and warm hotel this night! Was fine the next day.
View from our hotel
Prayer flags fly above the houses (photo by Will, one of the other Aussies)
The bright colours indicate these are Buddhist prayer flags - each flag has its own prayer written on it. The belief is that the wind catches the prayers and carry them out into the world to do good. This seems to work as long as the colour/prayer is visible on the flag, then it must eventually be replaced. We got in on the act and most of us had prayer flags attached to our motorcycles across the bars. Always pays to observe the local customs!
Before we headed out the next morning, I walked around the town.
Local kids going to school - they do play cricket here! The night before Paul had seen some monks playing cricket with some kids. One of the kids had a good fast bowling action which Paul complimented - "yeah, like Mitchell Stark!" the kid yelled at him.
Nako back-alley
Buddhist prayer-stone above a front door
The animals are penned behind the houses - in the morning the women would cut feed from the terraces and carry big bundles up for their cows. You can see the feed growing in the terraces behind the wall here. Prayers are visible on the flags hanging above.
So that's Nako! Beautiful place, dunno if I'd want to spend winter there though...
These pics all late afternoon after we got in. This night was the only night I got sick - not Delhi Belly, may have been altitude related - I hadn't been on altitude meds til this point, but got a bad headache and a chill/fever and had to go to bed early, luckily we were in a nice and warm hotel this night! Was fine the next day.
View from our hotel
Prayer flags fly above the houses (photo by Will, one of the other Aussies)
The bright colours indicate these are Buddhist prayer flags - each flag has its own prayer written on it. The belief is that the wind catches the prayers and carry them out into the world to do good. This seems to work as long as the colour/prayer is visible on the flag, then it must eventually be replaced. We got in on the act and most of us had prayer flags attached to our motorcycles across the bars. Always pays to observe the local customs!
Before we headed out the next morning, I walked around the town.
Local kids going to school - they do play cricket here! The night before Paul had seen some monks playing cricket with some kids. One of the kids had a good fast bowling action which Paul complimented - "yeah, like Mitchell Stark!" the kid yelled at him.
Nako back-alley
Buddhist prayer-stone above a front door
The animals are penned behind the houses - in the morning the women would cut feed from the terraces and carry big bundles up for their cows. You can see the feed growing in the terraces behind the wall here. Prayers are visible on the flags hanging above.
So that's Nako! Beautiful place, dunno if I'd want to spend winter there though...
Last edited:
ant
AngryAnt
Day 5 - Nako to Mud - 30 June 2024
Day, 5, off to a campsite near a village called Mud in the Pin Valley, next to the river. Our second and final night in pitched tents.
Another day that warmed up quickly once the sun was high - the barren terrain and mostly tarmac roads made it hotter. But you could open it up on the ascending sweepers to stay cool. My jacket though vented was too hot, and most days when it was sunny I had the front 3/4s unzipped to get some airflow. I really needed summer gloves too and bought some cheap synthetics at one of the towns for about $5.
The inevitable military/government checkpoint slowed us down. Our ride leads handled all this, we just had to sit and wait - you can see the sign says the Spiti Valley, famous in these parts. Pin Valley is a "sub-valley" in the Spiti region.
Switchbacks galore
First non-military stop was a monastery about 20km up a dirt side road, through a nice valley. I borrowed some pics for this. Dhar Kargyupa was the name of the place.
This person needs medical attention
We were in the red bordered area here - to the west of the red line is China (formerly Tibet) and we were 5km or so from that border.
These handsome gentleman are Indian army lads on a day off - they said that there are live, still used military bunkers up the hill you can see behind them here. Again, I wouldn't want to be stationed here over winter.
We then rode out of the valley to another town, Tabo - here there was a 1000 year old monastery with amazing old frescos inside, but no photography was allowed. Made of mudbrick walls nearly 1m thick - looked like a Mexican pueblo!
en.wikipedia.org
Vegie chowmein anyone?
Day, 5, off to a campsite near a village called Mud in the Pin Valley, next to the river. Our second and final night in pitched tents.
Another day that warmed up quickly once the sun was high - the barren terrain and mostly tarmac roads made it hotter. But you could open it up on the ascending sweepers to stay cool. My jacket though vented was too hot, and most days when it was sunny I had the front 3/4s unzipped to get some airflow. I really needed summer gloves too and bought some cheap synthetics at one of the towns for about $5.
The inevitable military/government checkpoint slowed us down. Our ride leads handled all this, we just had to sit and wait - you can see the sign says the Spiti Valley, famous in these parts. Pin Valley is a "sub-valley" in the Spiti region.
Switchbacks galore
First non-military stop was a monastery about 20km up a dirt side road, through a nice valley. I borrowed some pics for this. Dhar Kargyupa was the name of the place.
This person needs medical attention
We were in the red bordered area here - to the west of the red line is China (formerly Tibet) and we were 5km or so from that border.
These handsome gentleman are Indian army lads on a day off - they said that there are live, still used military bunkers up the hill you can see behind them here. Again, I wouldn't want to be stationed here over winter.
We then rode out of the valley to another town, Tabo - here there was a 1000 year old monastery with amazing old frescos inside, but no photography was allowed. Made of mudbrick walls nearly 1m thick - looked like a Mexican pueblo!
Tabo Monastery - Wikipedia
Vegie chowmein anyone?
ant
AngryAnt
Day 5 continued
Breaking my own rules here but too many pics to skip! After Tabo, some easy dirt riding on good gravel roads. We got into camp at about 3pm where the crew had already made camp for us.
Note the warped lines in the sedimentary rock formations above the river - that used to be seabed folks. And even above that, note the peak is sedimentary rocks forced vertical.
The village on the other side of the river is (I think) Mud - elevation 3800 metres so we were pretty high!
View in the other direction from camp, our side of the river. Again the geological forces that bent these rocks is unimaginable. Talking to Suresh, one of the Indian crew he told us that the Indian subcontinent had smashed into Asia and the subduction of the land mass under the tektonic plate of Asia had caused the Himalayas, a process that still continues today.
Just to the left of the previous location were these hutlike structures built under the overhang of the cliff - the tour guides told us these were Buddhist meditation huts but they were rarely used.
Me and one of the English lads Jason decided to climb the slope which was steep, rocky, and not easy to do at 3800 metres altitude. On the way we saw these guys.
View up the hill - pretty daunting!
I found about a third of the way up my heart was racing and I was hyperventilating - but I slowed down and made it up without too much difficulty although Jason (who is a fit builder in his late 30s) beat me up the top pretty easily. As an Aussie I had to represent against the Old Enemy.
Stove with (donkey) dung to burn - there was a pen where an animal could be kept. There is not much wood around here so locals burn animal dung.
Not much else in the huts, some Buddhist incense, other religious paraphenalia, a few sticks of furniture and a basic shrine with a photo of the Dalai Lama. We bowed three times in the Buddhist fashion just to be on the safe side... (more on this later).
My watch told me the climb was around 140 metres (elevation), we did there and back to camp in about an hour.
Later some of the Indian/American guys in the group said that the Tour lead told them to stay away from me and Jason in future as "black magic" had been done up in those huts and we would be carrying bad luck - but he didn't know we'd showed the proper respect at the shrine so the bad luck didn't eventuate... yet. But people in these places take that stuff very seriously, so I always err on the side of caution.
Breaking my own rules here but too many pics to skip! After Tabo, some easy dirt riding on good gravel roads. We got into camp at about 3pm where the crew had already made camp for us.
Note the warped lines in the sedimentary rock formations above the river - that used to be seabed folks. And even above that, note the peak is sedimentary rocks forced vertical.
The village on the other side of the river is (I think) Mud - elevation 3800 metres so we were pretty high!
View in the other direction from camp, our side of the river. Again the geological forces that bent these rocks is unimaginable. Talking to Suresh, one of the Indian crew he told us that the Indian subcontinent had smashed into Asia and the subduction of the land mass under the tektonic plate of Asia had caused the Himalayas, a process that still continues today.
Just to the left of the previous location were these hutlike structures built under the overhang of the cliff - the tour guides told us these were Buddhist meditation huts but they were rarely used.
Me and one of the English lads Jason decided to climb the slope which was steep, rocky, and not easy to do at 3800 metres altitude. On the way we saw these guys.
View up the hill - pretty daunting!
I found about a third of the way up my heart was racing and I was hyperventilating - but I slowed down and made it up without too much difficulty although Jason (who is a fit builder in his late 30s) beat me up the top pretty easily. As an Aussie I had to represent against the Old Enemy.
Stove with (donkey) dung to burn - there was a pen where an animal could be kept. There is not much wood around here so locals burn animal dung.
Not much else in the huts, some Buddhist incense, other religious paraphenalia, a few sticks of furniture and a basic shrine with a photo of the Dalai Lama. We bowed three times in the Buddhist fashion just to be on the safe side... (more on this later).
My watch told me the climb was around 140 metres (elevation), we did there and back to camp in about an hour.
Later some of the Indian/American guys in the group said that the Tour lead told them to stay away from me and Jason in future as "black magic" had been done up in those huts and we would be carrying bad luck - but he didn't know we'd showed the proper respect at the shrine so the bad luck didn't eventuate... yet. But people in these places take that stuff very seriously, so I always err on the side of caution.
