2008-07-26 - Sach Pass Pangi Valley

Snaps: http://picasaweb.google.com/zenosh/20080726SachPassPangiValley

We met up with Sobby and Pravo at New Delhi station and went to Srinath Cargo to collect our bikes. After chatting with them for a while we left for Karnal bye-pass and zoomed towards Jalandhar, our planned stop for the night. There was a brief bout of heavy rain en-route and then a night ride to hot and humid Jalandhar.

Next day we started towards Chamba via Pathankot. The Chakki Bridge was broken so we had to take the Dhar route to Chamba. We inquired en-route about Sach Pass route and checked into Hotel Royal 6 km before main Chamba town. A very good choice if you want to avoid the crowded town.

Before going towards Sach Pass we thought of trying out the Bhandal Valley route. The road finally leads to J&K so the usual security issues since the terrorists had seeped into this area some years back.

To stay at Bhandal Forest Rest House you need to book the place from Chamba. Also to go ahead of  Bhandal towards J&K, you need to get permission from Chamba S.P. (Police). There is a police check post at Kijar, after Salooni where we need to do entry before proceeding ahead to Bhandal.

The route was nice with lots of greenery but nothing exceptional so if I could have turned back the time I would surely have avoided this route and spent more time near Sach top and Pangi valley.

Turning back from Bhandal FRH after having lunch we stayed the night at a very beautiful Agricultural University Guest House 5 km off Salooni reachable via a dirt track. There were so many beautiful flowers in the guest house compound that we spent quite some time in the evening and next morning just photographing them. Overall a very nice place to stay if you have nothing to do but just want to laze around.

Next day we took a very big short cut to the main Sach pass road from Salooni. Cutting from Manjeer, down in the river valley, crossing the river by the bridge, climbs back up the mountain and there you come out 28 km before Tissa.

We had some very nice breaks on this ride to Bhairagad, rest by a road side water fall, afternoon siesta in the Pine forest and a rock climbing session J. We reached the beautiful Bhairagad PWD guest house and decided to spend some days there.

The guest house over looking the opposite mountain, lush green valley and a small cute garden in the compound was a very grand sight indeed. It makes you feel at home and some thing more such that you don’t want to leave this place. There was a small View Point 2 mins away from the guest house after crossing the road. I spent some very good lonely moments hereJ just gazing at the lazy surroundings and the clouds playing hide and seek with the mountains.

Next day would be the turning point of our ride which almost made a mess of the planning we had done for the ride.

We started our ride from Bhairagad to a old 17^th century Chamunda Devi temple through a dirt track off the main road just before you reach Bhairagad from Trella.

It was a very scenic ride through some amazing mist filled pine forest. Things were looking perfect and I was expecting this to be a very good day with a short scenic ride and lots of  rest later in the day. We parked our bikes some 15 minutes before the temple due to lots of slush on the road, and walked towards the temple. It was a very old temple by the valley. Well maintained except the writings on the 400 year old Krishna Leela paintings by our innovative Indian tourists (“I was here 1987”, names etc scribbled on the paintings). There was a very old hand-pump by the temple which was worth a photograph. After spending quite some time at the temple it was time to turn back.

While negotiating a slimy stretch on the way back, my bike slipped and the petrol started leaking. I panicked and tried to lift my bike in a hurry and SNAP goes my lower back with a typical severe muscle sprain. I felt like my trip going down the drain in this split second. Anyway I just sat on the firm ground trying to rest and not to panic at the same time trying to gauge the extent of my injury.

A small boy who was going to school helped Ameya and his wife to push both the bikes out of the slush, and he got all dirty in the attempt. He had to miss his school due to this, and we were not sure on how  to thank him for his help.

After that it was a very painful ride for me back to the rest house 12 km away. Fortunately for me the setting was very ideal here. Both the care takers Baijaram and Dharam Singh were going out of the way to help me recover quickly so that we can proceed with our journey to Sach pass. They used to get me hot water twice a day for fermentation and also gave me some local oil to apply on the back. Ameya also had a very big role to play in my quick recovery massaging my back and helping me with all simple things which were very difficult for me due to my injury, especially for next 2 days. 

The whole next day went in starring at the sky and the mountains from my room window and trying to do some basic stretching in hopes of recovering. It was a rainy day which made it all the more gloomy but then I sort of enjoyed these painful but peaceful moments, doing nothing but just looking out of the window and trying to enjoy each passing second.

I told Ameya and Asmita to go ahead and not wait for me since I was not sure if I would be able to ride on the rough road ahead, so even though it was raining they made a gutsy but failed attempt to Sach Pass and had to return back after going 9 km due to horrible condition of the road and bad weather. So here we were stuck at BhairaGad and not sure of how our remaining trip would materialize. But god favors the brave and the patient J

Next day the weather cleared up and after a lot of discussion I agreed to take the risk and all of us decided to Jeep it out till Killar. This would give me time to recover and also Ameya/ Asmita would not have been able to do this stretch alone. The only risk for me was if I do not recover soon or if I have another fall or a slip from the bike and hurt my back, I would have to be air lifted from the remote Pangi valley, which I was willing to take. Life is too short to go back and think, what if I could have done it J.

The drive till Satrundi was on bad stretches of road and in very dense forest. Riding or you can say pushing our bikes up this would have been a good challenge and lot of fun, but here we were sitting in the jeep to make the best use of the 2 weeks we had in hand. We also passed a place known as Kalaban, where 35 villagers were massacred by the terrorists in the 90’s. The place surely had a haunted feeling to it surrounded by dense forest.  Nearing Sach pass we could see snow all around. The cold also started to increase and Ameya who was sitting behind snuggled between the bikes and the luggage with the helper for company was also finding it difficult due to the extreme cold.

At one place the driver stopped the jeep and showed us a wild deer with a small cub going up the glacier on the higher reaches of the mountain. It was a very rare sight which made us forget about our troubles. The scenery was mind blowing on the other side of the Pass. The sky was cloudy where we stood, but further down we could see the dry scenary of Pangi valley through a small opening in the clouds. It looked as if we were seeing a photo frame of Pangi valley decorated with fluffy cotton.

The road down hill from Sach Pass to Killar was the worst I have ever seen. As Eric says it seemed to be laid by a madman with the intention that no vehicle should be able to come up this road from Killar. It was a complete steep downhill for us for approx 35 kms full of rocks strewn on the road and parts of the road caved in with nothing but steep unrelenting rock face on the other side. There were no hairpins or flat stretches to give some breather to the engine already burning in first gear. Just a road winding down continuously at a very steep angle for kilometers at stretch.

We had a nice and a refreshing break at Bagotu which is a small temporary settlement after the initial downhill from Sach Pass. There at a make shift tent a drunkard was there who entertained us very nicely and we all had a hearty laugh by looking at his histrionics. He sang some cool songs, calling Ameya his Brother, Asmita his daughter naming her as Guddi, and not wanting to believe that she was Ameya’s wifeJ and finally me as his Bhanja. He also treated me with a glass of local daru which gave me lot  of heat and I felt very comfy after that. He made our day and also gave us some good humorous moments to remember for life.

After the blind man and the broken bridge fiasco we finally made it to Killar at 11:00 pm in pitch dark. The PWD guest house was full and so we had to settle in a very filthy Laxmi Hotel, where people just came to drink I guess, which had food dropped all over the place and also vomit. We had no option for the night so all 3 of us packed up for the night in a very small room, promising to shift early next day to some decent place.

Pangi valley is dry and sunny like Ladakh so it gave a fresh meaning to our trip and livened up our sprits, which were a bit dampened by my back injury and the jeep ride, and the cloudy weather on Chamba side of Sach Pass.

I gave a good sun bath to my back which helped me to recover fast. Had a nice walk around the very beautiful guest house compound overlooking the high mountain on the opposite side of the valley. I like these rest days in the dry and sunny weather of the upper Himalayas doing nothing but strolling around the village all day and interacting with the locals, writing about the trip so far etc. I also went for a walk with Shemsher Singh whom we had befriended the previous day. He gave me lot of information about places to see around Killar, about how he used to smuggle drugs to Ludhania and earn 300 % profit.

Based on his suggestion we planned the next days ride to Sural valley. We sat by a terrace of the house overlooking the valley just enjoying the cool breeze and the view for almost 2 hours chatting away as we had nothing to do the whole  day. It suddenly started to get cloudy and in no time started raining heavily. After a light dinner and a game of batteries it was time to sleep.

Next day we started early on the dirt road to Sural valley. The road initially was parallel to a very deep valley carved by the violent Chandrabhaga River. I was getting used to riding on bumpy dirt tracks with an injured back, albeit recovering. The route was very scenic with the road winding through the valley surrounded by lush green forests and then snow capped mountains as we gained altitude. We reached the Sural village after 2 hours of riding. The monastery was further 2 km away. The road ahead was full of stones and a river was flowing on the road so with my bad back we decided to abandon the plan to go ahead to the monastery. We rested for a while and went back to Killar. This ride gave me the confidence that I would be able to handle  these roads now.

In late afternoon it started to rain at Killar so our plan to go to Purthi seemed to be going kaput. Ameya was very keen to go to Purthi to stay at the haunted forest guest house. I was a bit tired and wanted to stay back and leave next morning. We had a fight over this and Ameya was upset. Finally the weather cleared and we started for Purthi after some quick packing.

The route to Purthi was the most forested we saw on this trip. The road passed through some very dense Pine plantations. By the time we reached the bifurcation for the guest house it was dark. We had a tough time finding the guest house which was 2 km from the main road in dense forest and a nala crossing which was very difficult at night. The knowledge that the Guest was supposedly haunted and on top of it we were in a forest in pitch dark gave us an additional adrenaline pump J. The gate to the guest house was closed. I went ahead and opened it and walked towards a house which had a dim yellow light. I called out couple of times and no one answered. I got a feeling that we were getting into a mess, just then a man opened the door and I asked him for a place to stay for the night. He was actually the Block Forest Officer – Purthi division – Mr Paramchand. We were in safe hands. He led us towards the guest house which was 5 mins away from his quarter.

The guest house was built by Tude, an English man in 1805. It seemes that his wife fell into the Chandra Bhaga River some 5 mins walk from the guest house and died, and her ghost haunts the guest house. It was a beautiful wooden structure. It was very warm and cozy inside. There was a small hall at the entrance, after which a small room dimly lit, with 2 rooms on either side. On one end the door opened to a big lounge with a sofa and few chairs. The door from the lounge opened into a small veranda overlooking the forest and the Chandra Bhaga River. All this was dimly lit with yellow bulbs giving the perfect setting for the night in the haunted guest house. I was in love with this place. We were so excited that after having dinner of MTR which we cooked in the hall on the stove, we chatted till 1:00 am sitting in the lounge and also did some star gazing outside the veranda.

Next day we went downhill towards the Chandra Bhaga River. It was the most violent water flow I have ever seen in my life. We spent almost 2 hours sitting on a huge rock by the river side observing the tremendous flow of water and the beautiful forest around. The flow of water is so strong here that some times big rocks come flowing down breaking bridges built over the river. Also they say that a jeep had fallen in the river some years back and they could not find any trace of the vehicle nor the people in it, such is the tremendous power of the water flow here.

It was time to leave for Udaipur after having a good breakfast at the Forest Officers house. He was a treasure trove of information of this region. His son volunteered to give us some apples for our journey, which we happily accepted. After clicking their snaps we left for the main road to Udaipur. It was really amazing to see the scenery slowly changing from lush green to barren as we approached the Lahaul valley. There were lot  of nala’s on the way to Udaipur. One of them in particular was very big and we took almost 20 mins to cross it and dry our selves before we could proceed ahead.

We had a sumptuous late lunch at a small Dhaba in Udaipur. The food was the best I have ever eaten in few days. Udaipur is a small pilgrimage town surrounded by high barren mountains. After that it was a chilled night ride to Keylong where we stayed at Nalwa Guest House.

The route from Keylong to Manali was full of slush, due to the 2 laning of the Manali Leh road. The BRO had dumped the sand by the road side to facilitate the road widening. But due to the rains all the sand turned into slush on the road making riding very difficult. To add to the delay Ameya’s rear break was locking the wheel so we spent quite some time fixing it unsuccessfully and finally left for Manali at 1:00 pm.

We finally made it to Manali at around 9:00 pm and I was sure of where to stay put- our good old Diplomat Guest House in Old Manali where you have a very crazy atmosphere with these Israelis doping and listing to some unique music, bullets thumping by the narrow lanes and good eateries by the road side serving some great food and beer. Next day went just lazing around, shopping and checking out the various restaurants in old Manali.

We had 3 days to reach Delhi so we decided to go via the Jalori Pass route which passes through very dense rain forest in Himachal and a treat to ride in. It was nice and sunny till Aut.

After that the road started getting smaller as we approached the Jalori Top and it also started getting cold and cloudy with spells of heavy rain. Of course the scenery was breathtaking with lush green forest by the road side. Jalori top was very foggy so not much to see there. We settled at a small shop there owned by Goram Singh to have tea and noodles and also some good country liquor which gave us much needed warmth, so much that I was roaming around the top in just trousers and t-shirt for quite some timeJ.  Goram Singh was an old man in his 70’s but was fit as a fiddle breathing the pure mountain air since he  was born. 

The police man posted on top was kind enough to open up an abandoned hotel owned by a Nepali (Hotel Hill Top Snow View). It was all ours for the night for Rs 100/- which we handed over to the police man. There were packets of chips and cold drinks also for us but we thought it to be morally wrong to have it allJ. At night we had dinner of Rice Dal and MTR.

Due to bad weather we had to skip the ride to a small lake which is an hours ride from Jalori top (3 hours walk) and also a Fort which is 4 hours walk.

Best time to visit Jalori area is May-June or Sept when the skies are crystal clear blue, giving a very good view of the surrounding forests.

Next days ride would have been uneventful if not for the landslides and the way they happened. The first one was a fallen tree by the roadside just after Khanag, which was cleared within half an hour by the villagers.  The second one changed our course for the dayJ

I was riding ahead, just approaching Ani. I decided to take a break at a small shop to wait for Ameya. He did not come even after 15 mins, that’s when I cursed him thinking he must have taken a long break with his wife. I turned around to check and I see people telling me that the road is closed don’t go ahead. That’s when I realized that a landslide might have happened with them being trapped on the other side. Just 10 mins later my assumption was confirmed.

Thus started our discussion on how to get out of this. One option for Ameya would have been to go back to Jalori and Aut and come to Delhi via Manali Delhi highway which would have been very out of way. Other option was to wait till the locals clear the landslide just enough for the bike to pass by. We decided to go ahead with the latter, shifting our entire luggage to a guest house at Ani doing multiple rounds on my bike. We did not expect this to get cleared today itself.

We had our lunch and rested at the guest house for a while. At 3:00 pm we decided to go and check if we would have any luck of getting Ameya’s bike on the other side. And yes we made it J. Just when we reached they had made a small clearing for the people to walk. With some calculated risk and help from the PWD workers Ameya’s bike was pushed to the other side. After thanking the workers we decided to go ahead and cancel our night stay at Ani. We left for Shimla at 4:30 PM in hopes of reaching there by 10:00 PM.

The road till Narkhanda was very good and scenic, so we thought we could even make it ahead of Shimla and cover maximum distance to Delhi today. But just after it was dark the road turned from good to horrible with lots of slush and bumps and on top of it heavy fog which made it almost impossible to continue ahead. We took a night halt at PWD guest house at Theog after having dinner at a small Dhaba just opposite the guest house.

Next day was a long and boring 400 km ride to Delhi. Met up with Sobby at night and exchanged crazy travel notes till wee hours of morning. Also met Ashwani the next day. Thanks to the Delhi guys who took out time and came to meet us after the ride.

Rajdhani to Mumbai and our ride ends. Hope to be in the Himalaya’s next year too!