Oct. 15. Nadine, the brave soul that she is and myself are leaving for Rajasthan tonight and Kris leaves for Manalli tomorrow morning. Outside they are hanging lights and preparing for Diwali.
Oct 13. Road blocked above Nako, the had been working a week on trying to move a boulder 40-50 feet high that had slid onto the road along with a continuing slide of rubble. We walked up the 6 k to watch as they finished drilling the rock, but just as they were doing this another slide came down the hill, as the 3-4 workers scrambled for cover the drill and hydraulic cables were bent and buried. As the dynamite crew, a guy with a rolled up red fuse and another guy carrying a beat up cardboard box. One guy threw the sticks up to the others feet as he stuffed the sticks into the drill holes. They had the boulder drilled on three sides, attached the fuse and actually lit it with a match, then ran like hell for cover, about 2 minutes later the explosion was impressive but only 1/3 of the rock cracked off and slid down the face of the cliff. So the road was still blocked and we were out of luck! We decided to return to Shimla and hoped Nadine was still kicking.
Oct. 12. An overturned Tata truck on a hairpin blocked all traffic including the school bus, so all the uniformed kids, walking up hill added to the color of the morning. The military type tow truck, using a big pine tree as a pulley to pull the truck back onto its wheels so we could finally pass. Met the Spiti river and up the valley and following the cutouts in the mountain for the road until we reached Nako. A nice Buddhist goat herder village, prayer flags on every roof, next to the satellite dish and solar panels! Watched while the locals gathered and the young girls brought the goats down from the high country, this area is famous for the Pashmina wool.
Oct. 11. Kalpa and a great lunch of egg curry. Again music and laughter, this time women threshing the grain with long sticks and having what looked like a great time. Not unlike our group effort of pounding mochi at home at new years, only without the Saki!
Oct. 10. Great hotel in Sangla, overlooking the river and the locals humping the straw down from the higher valleys for the winter animal feed. Up to Chitkul at 12, 000 ft. More dancing and drums in the village, this time 15-20 women dancing in a celebrating the “Phulech “festival or flower harvest festival.
Oct 9. Sangla valley, deep gorges, apple orchards. If you ever see apples from Himachal Pradesh try them, great red and juicy.
Oct 9. Sangla valley, deep gorges, apple orchards. If you ever see apples from Himachal Pradesh try them, great red and juicy.
Oct 5-7. Stayed in Shimla and Nadine has decided to stay, Kris & I have a jeep with driver for $12/day. We will go for 10 days follow the Sutlej River, into the Lingti, Pin & Spiti valleys. We left Nadine at the Willow Banks hotel just as a bout of Delhi belly hit her. She told us to go so off we went with “Bobby” our driver, the next 7 days while on the road reminded me of Mr. Toads ride. This guy had competed the last few years in the “Raid de Himalaya” Rally from Shimla to Srinagar and no cars ever passed us. Tata trucks and sheer drops with no guardrails were just another day in the office for him.
Oct. 4. We left Delhi 7:40 am going AC second class changed trains onto the narrow gauge railway (Toy Train) at Kalta and arrived Simla at 7pm. We met an Indian family on the train into Simla Sam the father was in his late 30 and very bright and informed in regards to politics, religion and finance, his wife is a teacher, he works for the government in defense, he has worked for the UN in four African countries. He was very interested in the “west” and how the family unit is perceived and how we take care of our elders. He is a Christian and a true believer in his faith. His wife’s brother is a software engineer for Microsoft. Narrow cliff hugging roads in the dark so unable to get a feel for the place. There is a definite vertical feeling to Shimla.
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