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My last
Indian trek of the Year - Rupshu |
Posted:
Aug 21, 2003 11:49 PM |
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My final
trek of my year was one I had been looking forward to for a long time. And,
this was the one to the remote part of eastern Ladakh referred to as Rupshu
or Changtang. In this area, there are very few villages. Instead, there are
nomad settlements that shift as the goats, sheep and yaks' demand for grass
require. The landscape is moonscape, like most of Ladakh, but with more
gentle rolling terrain. This is in contrast to the rugged, jagged peaks of
the Zanskar Range further west. These rolling peaks are snow-capped, and
often top 20,000 feet in elevation. In between are grassy valleys, and a few
lakes. This is about the only place in Ladakh with natural lakes, and both
salt and fresh water lakes can be found. The terrain is very similar to
Western Tibet, and many of the nomads are Tibetans that cross the border,
rather than Ladakhis.
For this trek, my good friend Kurt Schneider came out and walked with me. He
was my college roommate back in Wisconsin. Due to his flight schedule
restrictions, and his request to climb a 20,000 foot peak enroute, we
started near Leh, and first went through the Karnak area of the Zanskar
Range. I knew of tall peaks back in there, and did not yet have the
contraband (military-forbidden) map of the Changtang area near Tibet. Had I
been able to secure the map earlier, our route might have been changed, and
we would have had time for a more relaxed schedule within the time frame of
our airline itineraries. I'll give a day by day update as to our trek
highlights.
15 July: Kurt arrived at the airport in the morning. I showed him parts of
Leh on the way home, and we had breakfast. Kurt then took a long nap to
start acclimatizing to the 11,500 foot altitude. In the late afternoon, he
watched me give some music lessons, and then we started ordering trekking
food for our trek. I took Kurt to my favorite Kashmiri restaurant.
16 July: We did most of our preparations for the trek today. We started by
meeting with our ponyman, Sinon Chostar. With his help, we ordered the rest
of our main trekking food and supplies. After he left, we supplemented with
other things that we wanted to add, such as concentrate juice, dried
apricots, and stainless steel plates and cups, among other things. In the
late afternoon, we walked up to the old Leh Fort and Palace, which give a
great view of the city. At the palace, we were also fortunate enough to see
a show of local dances and singing. Kurt was happy to see this program. We
ate Tibetan this evening.
17 July: The start of our trek. We got up early, and had a driver take us to
where we were meeting Sinon. In order to get a head start on the trek, Sinon
convinced us to take the taxi up to Shang Sumdo, saving the first three
hours of walking. This turned out to be a mistake, due to altitude. Sinon
has 5 horses, but only 4 are loaded up. The 1st horse is the "old man." This
horse is 30 years old, and has virtually no teeth left with which to eat
grass. He got mush the whole time in the evening and morning. He was also
the smallest horse. But, he knew the routes and led almost every day;
without Sinon leading him. The 2nd horse is the big black one. This is the
one that carried our two huge duffles almost every day. The weight didn't
matter, as long as they were balanced. This is also the horse that Sinon
rode across river fords. The 3rd horse is the white one that was always in
the back and farted a lot. The 4th horse was gray, and I don't have anything
to say about him. The last horse is only a year old. Next year, he will be
broken in. The four horses had HEAVY loads. We walked for a couple hours to
Chuskyermo, my intended campsite, and had lunch. At 4100 meters (13,500ft),
it made good sense to camp there. But, Sinon and Kurt both wanted to walk
further. So, we went up to base camp of Gongmaru La at 4650 meters (15,000
feet). We all felt good.
July 18: Kurt didn't sleep at all last night, and had a headache. So, I dug
out my diamox and we took a layover day. We were behind schedule for a week
after this. As this was on the "freeway" Markha Valley trekking route, lots
of horses (with bells) and people (with LOUD talking) came by. I finally
went out and convinced them to continue on, as they arrived, if they wanted
to talk. In the afternoon, we ascended to the pass, and then returned to
camp.
July 19: Kurt slept a little and felt some better, so we went over the pass.
He wanted to climb a high peak in the area, so instead of going to the
Nimaling campsite, we went upvalley closer to the target peak. We camped at
4890meters (16040feet) by lunch time, and relaxed the rest of the day. Kurt
took a sponge bath near the creek, and I studied my Tibetan and worked on
journal.
July 20: Our climb day. We went up-valley and ascended the ridge we thought
led to the 20,000 foot peak. It turned out to be a false ridge, and we found
a huge glacial tongue between us and the correct ridge, which had been
hidden the day before from the pass. So, we compromised by climbing a 19,000
foot peak. On the descent, we had to go down snow (glacier) to the flat
glacier at the bottom, which we then crossed. On the steep snow, I hit 2
crevasses which left a foot dangling over black nothing. After a long
traverse around the hillside, we finally got to Sinon at the new camp he had
established. But, we were on the wrong side of the high late-afternoon
river. Rather than get boots wet, I opted to bivouac and cross in the
morning when water levels were lower. But, Sinon rode over with the black
horse and got me.
July 21. Not a good day. We took the shortcut trail over to the Karnak
Valley, which involved an uphill travese, followed by a long descent into
that valley. After lunch, Kurt was moving incredibly slow, as if he were
looking for shells at the beach. I then found out that he was sick. To make
matters worse, we had 6 stream crossings we hadn't been warned about. Kurt
went through in his boots, as he had an extra pair. I opted for barefoot.
After this, we always asked Sinon about river crossings for the day. One
highlight was that we met up with another trekking party consisting of 2
girls from Switzerland, and one from Florida. We camped with them this
evening, as well as the next 3 nights.
July 22: Kurt's worse day. Sinon has been giving him some home remedies, but
we had to get Kurt over Zarlung Karpo La pass. What took everyone else 2
hours, took us 4. But, I kept him in sight, and assisted him on the descent.
We camped at Zokra campsite.
July 23: Kurt wasn't feeling well yet, but we had little elevation gain or
loss. And, we walked through a spectacular gorge that resembled something in
Zion National Park. Kurt loved that area, as he likes to rock climb. I've
got to get over to Zion, as I've not done much over there yet other than
Kolob Arch. We camped near Dat village, and walked in to that village in the
early evening. This village, like Sorra this morning, was completely empty,
save for one monk at the gompa. In winter, the Ladakhi nomads pull back into
these villages. Many houses had padlocks, solar panels and prayer flags like
the family was away on a picnic for the day. Kurt and I surprised the girls
by singing a good-night song to them in English, German and French. As Kurt
knows all 3 languages, he adapted the song for this.
July 24: Today started our long mileage days, as we shifted from the Zanskar
Mountains to the Changtang area. Walking was easier, and we moved quickly
across the map. We set off across the plains, and then ascended Yar La,
which was easier than the other passes we'd done. We camped for the last
time with the girls near Lungmuche Village (also deserted). To celebrate, we
had both our ponymen cook up a couple dishes each and all shared the food.
July 25: Kurt slept well for the first time in days. We separated from the
girls and set out to the north on an uneventful day that gave us one river
crossing, and an early campsite at Zara, which I kind of liked. About the
only other event, was that we saw a Tibetan Wild Ass. Kurt had an appetite
tonight, which was good.
July 26: A LONG day today. We crossed the paved road to Manali and entered
the nomad area, again moving quite a ways across the map. By lunch, we were
at the Tso Kar area (Salt Lake), where we ate at a permanent nomad
headquarters. After lunch, we continued another hour to a beautiful campsite
(but by the dirt road) near the lake. Saw many bar-headed geese at the
lakeshore.
July 27: Another LONG day. But, these two days put us back on schedule. With
the scarcity of both grass and water, camping sites are far between, and we
had to do 3 days' walking in 2 days in order to get back on schedule in
order to finish the trek on time in order for Kurt to catch his plane flight
out. It was either this or scrap the entire trek. But, it was not fun. The
morning had us going 2 hours on an incline on soft sand. We then hit the
jeep road and followed that over a small pass. The afternoon was in and out
of 3 gorges before finally reaching our campsite at Nakpo Gozing. This was
at 5000 meters, or 16,410 feet, and was our highest one yet. Kurt was
exhausted, of course, but recovered at dinner. His appetite is back, which
is an answer to prayer.
July 28: We moved across the map today. But it was almost all downhill,
after the initial 100 meters over the pass. We ended up at Tso Moriri lake,
and had most of the afternoon to relax. Kurt and I walked to the lakeshore
and watched birds, read, and other things. Besides the geese, there were
black-necked cranes and some kind of kingfisher there, as well as smaller
birds that I didn't know.
July 29: We followed the road around to Korzok Village, the only inhabited
village that we passed through since the first day of the trek, with the
exception of the nomad camp at the salt lake that had some permanent
residents. At Korzok, we looked at the gompa, which was being spruced up in
anticipation of the upcoming festival. We also had a 2nd breakfast at a
restaurant there. Believe it or not, I passed up a coke, which is unlike me.
Not warm enough for me to be thirsty. But, Kurt had the cup of coffee he'd
been talking about! After our stop in Korzok, we went up-valley to the base
camp to the next pass and camped at 5100 meters, which is about 16,800 feet.
We were at this elevation both tonight and tomorrow night, and it was the
highest we slept at. On the way to the camp, we walked around a huge nomad
camp.
July 30: We ascended the 5400meter (17,800 feet) pass, and I found on my
contraband map that there was a 20,000 footer up the ridge to the right. It
turned out to be an easy dome-shaped peak as easy as Mt. Sherman in Colorado
- as long as we avoided the snow on the northeast side. So, I got Kurt up to
20,000 feet anyhow, even though it wasn't the peak I had intended. We
descended a gully to Sinon's tent down by the stream that we could see from
above.
July 31: We went over 2 fairly easy passes today. The second one was also at
5400 meters. But, as we had camped at 5100 meters, we had only a thousand
foot gradual ascent. From the top, we could see the way back to our high
peak, as well as forward to the Tso Kar. Camp tonight was in the midst of
more nomads. We met a monk from Dharmsala who invited us to his sister's
tent for curds (yogurt made in a sheepskin). This was a treat I had been
hoping to show Kurt. We spent 2 hours in that nomad tent, and were treated
like kings. In the evening, we again played cards with Sinon.
August 1: Last full day of the trek. We went over one pass from camp, and
descended to our only river crossing, where we had lunch on the other side
near many wildflowers. We then had one short hour to our campsite near the
top of the 2nd pass. I got some good pictures of "old man" horse sticking
his head into the teepee tent of Sinon's right at 6:00 when it was his
dinner time. Sinon surprised us with mutton meat tonight that he had gotten
at the nomad camp. He made our favorite Ladakhi dish: skew. It is like stew,
but with homemade bits of dough boiled in water for the pasta. Excellent!
August 2: Today was a 2-hour downhill to the Manali road. The first vehicle
that we flagged down turned out to be a Tata truck that took us back to Leh.
But, it was painful on the backside, and incredibly slow. We had to go over
Taglang La pass and everyone, including other trucks were passing us. Then
we had a flat tire on the other side of the pass. Then, we had to stop for
load checks several times with the military. Finally, we had a meal stop in
Upshi Village. We got back to Leh and home by 7:30 PM, when I had been
hoping for 3:00. Still, we cleaned up and got most of Kurt's "to do" list
done.
August 3: Before Kurt's flight, we had a sunrise walk back up to the old Leh
fort. Good views, and this was also my last trail mileage of the year in Leh
for me.
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I Love the Mountains |
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