Hey!
I know I’ve been silent for a while. My bad! Starting up is crazy. But it’s a good crazy and I get by with a little help from my friends. One of these friends (also my co-founder, Saahil) features prominently in this edition of my newsletter.
For my first time readers- I share a tale, a take and a related piece of trivia (The 3Ts).
This edition features a crazy story and an outlandish take. But hey, you’ve been warned.
Here we go!
The Tale
Setting the Scene
This tale is set in September 2019. The place, Ladakh. For those who haven’t been Ladakh is a region in the north of India. It’s right in the midst of the Himalayas. It’s capital, Leh is at an altitude of ~11,500 feet.
Thousands of tourists flock to Ladakh annually. Why?
Primarily for the unique landscape . Ladakh is a high altitude desert. So there’s very little greenery. The sky is incredibly clear (partly why Delhi folks love it so much). It’s very raw.
That said, the true beauty of Ladakh comes from the fact that every few kilometers, something stands out. The brown is interrupted with a dash of colour. It could be a stream, icy walls, rocks, greenery. You will always be pleasantly surprised.
Now photographs never do the region justice. But here’s one of mine that I kinda liked which captures the blue skies, greenery, snow and the typically rugged brown terrain.
Like a number of tourist hotspots in India, Ladakh’s popularity rose massively thanks to one of India’s biggest opiods- Bollywood.
3 Idiots changed tourism in Ladakh forever. You can read more about that here.
But unlike most people, I wasn’t in Ladakh to visit the stunning Pangong Tso (pictured above) that almost every Indian tourist flocks to. Crazy 23 year old me decided that running a half marathon at 12,000 feet was a good reason to travel (this decision, and the marathon itself, are stories for other editions).
T-1 (The day before the Tale)
We land in Leh. On day one, everyone tells us that we had no business walking around. We were supposed to acclimatize afterall.
But youthful exuberance prevailed over sanity (yet again), and we ended up walking about 6 kilometers and even did a little hike. Why? Because it was fun.
Defying conventional wisdom proved useful though. On day two, we were raring to go.
D- Day
Now keep in mind race day is six days away. Our plan, lets start getting used to some exercise. Our hike from the previous day made us feel fairly confident.
The agenda. Rent mountain bikes. The destination? The stunning Thiksey Monastery (pardon my sub-par phone photography skills )
The monastery was about 25 kilometers from our hostel. In our heads, 50 kilometers sounded great. The sun was shining. It was a lovely September day. What could go wrong?
So we leave from the hostel, and we quickly cover the first ten kilometers in no time. It helped that most of this was downhill. The gradient was steep, so as much as we loved clocking some real speed, part of me dreaded the climb that was to come.
We breeze through the steep downhill portions in no time.
The next few kilometers were lovely. Rolling hills that were not too steep. Smiling locals. Blue skies. Small streams next to us. It was an absolute joy. Here’s what the roads looked like.
Now I know all this sounds great. Until……
Plot Twist #1
I distinctly remember this moment, as we had just banked left into a turn. On the right is this vast field, surrounded by mountains (some of which were snow-capped) on either side. In the middle, locals are playing cricket in what has to be the most pictureseque setting possible.
The ground was made of mud. There was barely any grass (Ladakh is arid after all). An approach road was being used as a pitch. The wickets were bricks stacked together. As someone who has played street cricket in many Indian towns, this was truly a step up.
What followed for the next ninety minutes was incredible.
Saahil and I entered the ground, and asked the locals if we could join them. If there’s one thing that’s true about India, its that no one says no to a game of cricket. Soon we get divided into teams, and we have a 10 over game on the cards.
Here we were. Two kids from Bangalore with our mountain bikes, now playing cricket with 15 absolute strangers in the middle of nowhere at 11,000 feet. Before the match begins, we do a quick trial run so that they can gauge our skill levels. Once we have their trust, it’s game on.
I won’t bore you with too many details of the match. What I will tell you is that much to Saahil’s joy, my team pulled a South Africa and choked.
But for a change, losing didn’t hurt. For you see, every six I hit was cheered like I was their own friend, brother or son. I wasn’t a random stranger from Bangalore. I was their opening batsman.
90 minutes after our first meeting, we were sharing food and drink and cracking jokes. One of my teammates was a musician and he even invited us to a gig he was playing at later that night.
It was an incredible experience. But it had to end. After all, we had a monastery to see.
Plot Twist #2
Post the cricket, we had adrenaline pumping in our veins. What we didn’t factor was that playing at attitude would be far more tiring than we thought. So we take our bikes and head on towards the monastery with directions from our dear friends.
Those of you who looked at the picture of the monastery closely will realise that the monastery is atop a hillock. This made the last few kilometers of our ride predominantly uphill. That’s never great. The silver lining was the view. So we chatted, walked occasionally and finally reached the monastery.
The Monastery
The Monastery was lovely. We walked around, drank a lot of water and re-charged. We greeted the monks, who had the most lovely smiles and even found some lovely messaging.
Just the motivation we needed as we decided to pack our bags and head back to the hostel.
The Reverse Journey aka Plot Twist #3
Now here’s when the fatigue from the cricket set in. We head downhill fairly smoothly. As soon as the rolling hills arrived, we knew we were in trouble.
On the way back, we get motivation from the cutest source possible as we push through, only to realise that we will never make it.
Thankfully, we had hit the next hamlet, where we were lucky enough to find a bus stand. The issue? We had our cycles with us.
So Saahil climbs onto the roof of the bus to load our bikes. We get in the bus and pray that the bikes don’t fall of the roof and get wrecked
Thankfully they don’t as we get down in the next town, now only 10 kilometers or so away from Leh.
Bemused strangers look on as they see a yellow haired skinny kid (Saahil) try and hand over these mountain bikes to me as we get down at the next village.
We get moving (knowing that the odds to get a bus to Leh were low). We wouldn’t have travelled more than 500 meters until we saw a promising restaurant. We exchange looks and we knew we had to stop. We were surviving on bananas post breakfast, and the idea of food seemed to restore our energy.
I don’t think dal and jeera aloo have ever tasted better.
Plot Twist #Sorry I lost count
Turns out, the food was too good. We stuff our faces, and realise that hey, we really don’t want to do a killer uphill ride.
The result? We cycle slowly for a while and give up.
The solution? Hitchhiking.
So there we are. In the middle of absolute nowhere. Two kids waving frantically hoping that someone drops us to Leh.
15 minutes later, we find a ride. But hey, it’s not that straight forward. The ride we find is a pickup truck.
So we load our bikes in the back, and realise that they only way we make it, is if we stand in the back of the truck.
Five minutes later, we are told that the speed may pick up. So, we hang on to the rails of the pickup truck.
That’s me. Standing in the back of a pickup truck, cycle in tow. The view was incredible. Strangers were smiling. The breeze would hit me flash in the face, and it felt epic.
This was one of those unforgettable moments. A moment in which I felt infinite.
The Take(s)
This story reflects a number of strong beliefs that I have.
Take 1
Itineraries are overrated. Planning too much is a terrible idea. I genuinely believe that there is nothing worse that you can do than pay for someone else curating a travel experience for you. If its personal/ customized that still works. But if it is one of these group tour things where you have a day by day schedule. Just no. *cringe*.
Travel is about meeting locals, hanging out and having life-changing experiences. It really isn’t about going and clicking a photo at famous place X. It certainly is not about having a list of items that you have to see like a checklist.
If that’s why you travel, you are not travelling for yourself. As soon as you take the pressure of the checklist, or your social media feed away, I guarantee that your trips will be better.
Take 2
Travel can kill prejudice. We witnessed the kindness of strangers on multiple occasions in just one day. If that won’t make you believe in the good of people, I don’t know what will
Trivia
Hitting sixes in Ladakh seemed easier than usual. I was wondering for a bit, until I remembered why.
The thin air at high altitudes means that the ball travels further. Here’s a lovely tweet/ graph explaining this. This fact first came to my notice thanks to the legendary 434-438 ODI where the sixes were flying in Jo’Burg (which is at a height!).
Until next time,
Sanjay (say Hi!)
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I genuinely enjoyed reading the whole experience, it was as if I was there with you guys the whole time. Now I feel like going there. Thanks