I woke up several times last night to use the toilet. My stomach is still not happy. Thankfully the moon was near full, so made the 150 foot (45m) trek to the pit toilet a bit less difficult to navigate, but I still wore my headlamp to assist.
Wind had stopped blowing and it was not that bad temperature wise. I would not want to spend a long time standing around, but for the 10 minutes or so to do what I needed was quite nice. It was actually colder inside the tent to be honest. I had on the long thermal underwear (top and bottom), my pants, shirt, socks, light jacket, balaclava and was inside my thermal insert and the sleeping bag on the sleeping mat and it was still chilled inside.
So with the numerous wake ups and cold temps I was not feeling too energetic this morning and of course my stomach was still uneasy.
I packed up my stuff and got it all ready to load on the bike. Took the camp bag over to the support truck and was going to ride the bike over to the tent to make it easier to load without lugging it all across the campsite. But when I got to the bike the key was missing. They had taken key the night before to fuel up the bikes and for some reason it was not returned to me or left in the bike. Took them 10 minutes to track it down, but they did ride the bike over to my tent for me (I had informed them that was what I was looking to do when I noticed the missing key). That would have sucked if they had not found it!
Put all the bags on the bike and used a better tie down strap that Simon lent me to see if I could stop the camera bag from getting lose and sliding around and hanging off the sides. (It had done it twice the day before). I think it should provide the extra stability I need.
We finally headed out of camp and since I was delayed with trying to find the key and getting the new strap setup, I was the last bike to leave the camp.
The ride was back out the way we came in, so same rough road, and for some reason seemed worse this morning, probably due to my being tired still.
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| The road out of Pin Valley. |
It took a bit over an hour to reach the main road again, then we took a quick 20 minute ride down the highway to near Kaza.
We will actually be spending the night in Kaza at a hotel, but before that we will take a trip up into the mountains to visit Komic village. But first a quick stop to top off the fuel tanks. (They only partially filled them from the cans in camp, just enough to get us to this fuel station.)
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| Highway to Kaza. |
Komic Village is supposedly the highest inhabited village in India, sitting at 4587m (15,050 feet). It also boasts what is supposed to be the highest Post Office in the world. There is a stop along the road near the lower part of the village (where the post office is located) where people take photos with a sign and buy tourist trap stuff. There is a second location further up the road where the monastery is located and the supposed highest restaurant in the world. Though seemed more like a simple tea house, but still serving food and drink at this high altitude.
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| View on road to Komic. |
We took some photos and videos around the restaurant area as the views were incredible. Then a quick visit to the toilet again. So this might sound crude, but I can now say I took a crap at over 15,000 feet in an actual restroom, not just behind a bush!
Had a cup of green tea and then we all prepared to head out. Rode back down the hill to the road side stop which we had just passed by on the way up. Here we hiked down the hill to see this Post Office and for a few people to mail a post card from. What a waste of time! First of all the small stop on the road created a massive traffic entanglement with all the buses and cars and bikes trying to park where there is no parking so they can take selfies with a sign. Then the hike down to the actual building is about 200-300 feet down a steep incline covered in loose soil.
Once down the incline, all the buildings are the same basically, simple mud brick construction with thatched roofs mostly. The Post Office was only marked with a painted wooden sign and was not even open, which greatly annoyed those looking to mail post cards. (Though some did manage to mail them, so assuming the place up by the road would do it for you as well??)
Once back up to the bikes, we took a turn off from this point that would take us further back into the mountains to the village of Langza to see the 35 foot (10m) Buddha statue which sits at 4358m (14,300 feet).
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| Langza Buddha |
We were supposed to have lunch here at a small café (Spaceship), but most of us were ready to head back down since the temperatures were cooling off, wind was blowing and roads were rough, and we were all tired at this point. I think a few of the guys did stay long enough to have a tea or coffee, but the bulk of us hit the road.
The route down was a bit rougher than the one we came up. It was also a bit more on the crazy road side of things with some steep, sharp switch backs and such, but was amazing to be on. At one point we had to stop and wait a few minutes for a road construction crew to re-open the road as they were blocking it to move some material around.
We then continued down the route with a few photo stops and I also had to stop a few times because my bungee cords holding the tank bag on kept coming loose for some reason (been an issue last 2 days, wonder if they are stretching out?)
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| Views on the way down from Komic |
At another point the road was blocked with traffic just sitting there, at first I though perhaps an accident, but then I noticed all the cameras pointing at the hills and saw the mountain sheep that were standing on the steep incline just above the road. So of course I got out my own camera and took a few shots, then was able to weave the bike through the traffic to keep heading down.
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| Mountain sheep on the hillside |
The last event on the route down was more an annoyance. An oncoming car that refused to make room and I had no where to go as the cliff wall and drainage ditch on my side of the road were not going to let a bike in them. I moved to the edge of the pavement far as I could go and the asshole just stayed right in the middle of the road and maybe even more towards my side. Damn chicken shit driver too afraid to drive near the edge on his side (which was a drop off, but still had plenty of room and was a nicely paved section of road). Well, as he and I passed the very tip of my handle bar nicked the mirror on his car. Was not even enough to make the bike move, I just heard it was all. Probably left a nice chip in his paint! I just kept going, was not going to stop since he was the problem, and neither did he, so guess he did not care either.
Once at the bottom of the hills, we regrouped and then headed off on the short ride into Kaza to our hotel. Most of the route was paved roads until the very end when we had to run down some dirt trail across a field to get to the hotel (Spiti Sarai Resort)
We unloaded our bikes and went up to our rooms. I was on the 2nd floor (of 4) and again had the room to myself. Changed out of my riding gear, had a quick bucket shower and then put on my camp clothes. For some reason there was no power to the building, so just sorted stuff in bags and then zoned out staring out the window.
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| The room in Kaza. |
A bit later I did some laundry in the sink, then opened up the windows to hang stuff to dry. A nice wind was blowing and was not too cold yet. Again seemed warmer outside than inside, at least till the sun starting going down.
I then wandered around the hotel taking some photos, and then updated things online as the guys had setup the hotspot again. Then when the power came back on, I got all my batteries and chargers setup to recharge. Then I went through all my memory cards for the GoPro as I had lost track of which were used and which were empty, so needed to figure that out and sort them in the case again.
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| Sunset view behind hotel from my room. |
I thought about taking a nap around 5:00 p.m., but needed to get the journal caught up so I could avoid having to do it all right before I was ready for bed. Once done I can then check the batteries and then lay down till dinner which is typically around 8:00 p.m. I hope to be in bed by 9:00 p.m. tonight unless something interesting is going on.
About an hour before dinner they announced the typical pre-dinner snack session, usually something small and some tea. We met on the 5th floor which was a lounge and shrine to honor the Dali Lama and another more local monk if I understood it all correctly.
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| The lounge shrine area. |
Shortly after that, we walked to the restaurant in the next building for dinner. Tonight we are having Chinese food. I decided to try eating something tonight even though my stomach was still not feeling too good, see what my body does with it.
Once done with dinner I went back to the room to turn in for an early night to get some rest hopefully. It was a long day today and sounds like tomorrow will be similar with more rough road and even more technical riding. We will also be camping again near the destination lake in Swiss tents, so might not be as nice a place and also likely going to be higher up, so probably colder temperatures.
So with that, it is off to sleep!
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| Ride Route (97km/60 miles) |
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