Leh 18th June - 12th July

Took a bus from Srinagar to Leh and set off at 08:00. The bus was full of locals except for us and an Austrian called Robert who we started chatting to. It stopped every 2 hours for comfort stop and we soon left the army camps ans guns behind us. The bus climbed into the mountains and the road became worse, we had back seats (again) and are now pros at sleeping while seeming to be listening to Metalica. There were 3 passport checkpoints on the way whch were a little inconvienient. Arrived at Kargil at 18:00 hours for the night stop and were told to get off the bus. Found a room which we shared with Robert and Ross from Somerset for 50R per night - worse room we have stayed in yet! So we tucked up in our mummy liners.
Up at 04:30 for the bus and just made it in time to stow our bags on the roof and we were off. The scenery changed every hour as we went up into the snowline round hare pin bends and sheer drops, we really wished we could have taken photos but all we would of have captured is blurred vision! The mountains where red, purple and yellow contrasting with the icey blue rivers that we meandered with. Arrived in Leh at 18:00 and shared a taxi with Robert to Rainbow Guest House which was fantastic - double room en-suite for 150Rs.

Leh is in Ladakh, far eastern India. It is an high altiude dessert bordered by both the Himalaya and the Karakoram Ranges (the latter we saw in China at Kashgar). This place gets only 4" of rain per year! Yet this year, speculating global warming, about 1mth after our departure, along with other parts of Northern parts of India they suffered from catatrophic flooding from freak rainfall. The established architechure is very Tibetan and the old town is a maze of mud brick dwelling, in contrast the irrigated farmland provides a distinct difference in land use - its sooo green!
The time in Leh was just what we were looking for - somewhere to be totally lazy. It was aso a good place to stay whilst the World Cup was on. Had many lazy mornings and afterneens with late nights after football games due to the time difference. Tracy visited the taylors to have 2 Indian outfits made and My treat was to have a shave at the barbers every 4-5 days. The weather was perfect with hot,sunny clear days and cool nights. We visited the stupas, gompas and wandered all over the area.
The Hemis festival ran for two days and we took the tent. Hemis is a tiny hamlet based around a large Tibetan temple. We found a farmhouse and asked to camp. On the way to Hemis we were able to see the massive and impressive gompa at Tikse.

We arrived the day before so looked at all the preporations and walked up to the next monastry 2k away - but it was 2k up a steep mountain but was well worth it and we did not see another sole and where warmly welcomed by the monks and pilgrims.

Had a lovely, simple daal in the kitchen of the farmhouse and then retired.

Woken the next day by traffic noise, looking along the valley we saw a procession of motor bikes,vans,busses,jeeps,lorries etc all converging on this tiny place - tourist festival fever in air con jeeps and pligrims crammed in pick-ups. We watched the festival start - wounderful costumes worn by the monks, dancing and dijointed music made with bells,drums,horns and stringed instruments.

The sun was blaring down on us and the monastry was packed so we left at midday. Made our way back to Leh for Roberts leaving party.
While in Leh we ate good ladakh and tibetan fair and was able to refill our water bottles to avoid adding to the plastic waste.