Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Thread approved.
That is a sad sad ending to what could have been another beautiful travelogue.
'If you let go of the destination, the road becomes it...'

Eagerly waiting for more pictures!

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Amazing shots, love the snow sheet on the sleeping bikes

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Thanks for the approval.
Ya, I had planned quite a bit and then this happened.
Nonetheless, it was an experience on its own. It isn't everyday that we get to witness snowfall

Thank you

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Day 1
20-09-2018
Jammu to Anantnag

A ride/drive of torture.
The road from Udhampur to Quazigund is under construction and the dust is unbearable. Jams are pretty common nowadays. I was able to maneuver my bike through the jam at Banihal. uff..

Day 2
21-09-2018
Anantnag to Kargil

All ready to leave


Unlike during my last trip in May when it was raining, it was sunny all the way this time.

Dal Lake was hazy as always and pics never come of that are worth sharing.
My first break came at Sonmarg for a hot cup of tea. From here on, I took frequent photography breaks. The weather was amazing and I was enjoying the ride.

Start of haze




Part of the Thijwas Galcier
View from Sonmarg market






The road is truly amazing and a joy to ride on
Butter smooth tarmac, beautiful views.. ah! what else could one ask for..








Zoji La was dusty.
I met a group of riders at the checkpost who were going to Leh and who knew they would have a change in their plan and we would be stuck together in Rangdum.

I love this image
A centered lonely cloud atop rugged mountains..
















One of my favourite images from the trip.
This particular spot is just after crossing the Drass town.
Loved the colours and the flowing river.




Stopped at the Kargil War Memorial








I reached Kargil around 3:20pm and went to see Hunderman Village. One can see the Pakistani village and outpost from here. Proceed further to see the ruins of the Hunderman village.

The small green patch is in Pakistan




Closeup of the village on the Pakistani side.


a little further up the road, we get to see the Hunderman Village
















Not a sign you would want to see
The road was mined during the 1999 war and some may still be there along the road..


I then returned back to Kargil and took a room at Afzal Guest house. I had also stayed here in May. The rooms are big, clean washroom with gyser and parking. Paid 600 for the night.

P.S.. I used a CPL filter for the first time in this trip, so some pics may have irregular colour shades in sky.

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Wow. Truly breathtaking images there dude. Makes me jealous people get to go on solo trips to these beautiful places.
Of late, quality of posts/pictures in the tourer(in general in all xbhp sub forums?) section have been coming down as regular/old members are not that frequent and perhaps new members are not very 'into' it, but logs like these make me want to keep coming back.
By quality, I don't mean grammar or punctuation, but content, knowledge etc. But I digress, thanks for sharing these beautiful photos and keep riding!

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Nicely put!
Carry on brother!

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Thank you for the appreciation
I am kinda lucky that such amazing places are only a couple of days journey from my place. So trying my best to visit and show the same to you all.

As for the general trend, the number of new travel logs on the forum has gone down through the years. Also people don't show much interest in reading logs these days. Maybe due to many moving towards video stuff on youtube

Thank you

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Day 3
22-09-2018 K
Kargil to Rangdum

The day started with the view of a bright clear sky through the window. Since I knew the distance isn't much and even if take frequent breaks, I should reach well before sunset. I left at aound 7:45 am from the hotel. Had breakfast in a shop below.
Tanked up the fuel, carried extra 7L and proceeded onwards to Zanskar.

It was a beautiful morning with clear blue sky and a calm warmth of the sun


Welcome to Suru Valley


There wasn't any traffic and the smooth tarmac was to joy to ride on






This scene
Exactly what I hadimagined when I started touring on a motorcycle..
A high performing bike, smooth tarmac, colourful foliage and snow clad mountains in the backdrop





At Sankoo, I went to see the Maitian Buddha statue.
I had some difficulty in finding the place as people were giving random directions. In all, these 14 kms approx. took over an hour and I went back to the road for Zanskar.

We have to cross the Suru river








After asking for directions from a few locals there, I finally found the statue.


Maitriya Buddha




I was enjoying the solitude of riding alone with no one around, clicking pics wherever i liked and simply loved the clean atmosphere.
















As I neared Panikhar, clouds started to build up.
I stopped here at a dabha at Panikhar and had omlet for lunch.

View of the glacier from the dabha




Mosque in the village


The road ahead





It looked magnificent in real.









Around 2 pm, it started drizzling and this kept on till I reached Rangdum around 4:15 pm.

Some pics I took between Panikhar and Rangdum.






































Entering Rangdum village.


I went to JK Tourism guest house for accommodation. Checked the room and it was pathetic to say the least. Really dirty rooms, sheets. Add to that, there was no running water and one had to go outside to use the handpump. The caretaker was asking Rs. 500 for the night.
I then went to the Himalayan Inn and inquired. The lady there was asking for 2000
I told her that you have an empty hotel and I am the only one, I won't pay this much. Then she came down to 1000 and I told her 700 to which she took a few minutes and then agreed.

At around 5.30pm, another rider on a dominar came.
It was now raining hard.


We met and started chatting. He was from Delhi and incidentally, when I had contacted Master Ji the night before asking for info on Umba La, he had told me a solo rider is also travelling to Zanskar. He was the same person.

Rainfall slowly turned into snowfall and its intensity kept on increasing with every passing hour.

Later at around 11pm, a group of 8 riders from Kerala arrived, covered full of snow. They had started pretty late from Kargil and luckily didn't get stranded enroute. That would have been dangerous. This group was the same one which I had met at Zoji La checkpost.

The snowfall continued for the next 24 hrs with a couple of hour break in the next morning.

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Damn. I just had a visual treat with beautiful narrative to enhance its taste.
Personal opinion : shouting into a microphone while a camera records everything isn't as glorious as going through a journey - reminiscing through it and reliving it through the words. It's something else. It isn't for everyone, and it can never be.
Thank you for this post. Happy miles.

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Well done and beautiful pictures. Guess you fulfilled the age old saying"I wish there were no other vehicles on the road except mine."

As far as what you have mentioned about not many members contributing to travelogues nowadays, I agree. Personally, my approach to posting regularly on my Day Rides thread has been to keep a record or diary to refer to in the future for myself, family and friends. Perhaps the promotor and moderators at xBhp should take this opportunity and encourage members to be actively involved.

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Thank you for the lovely comment Doc *

Same here. I too enjoy reading stories more than watching videos of the same.*Words are more expressive, thought I need to work on that [emoji28]


Haha.. Ya. I was the first one to cross the sankoo checkpost and had only*two army trucks to pass enroute. Rest I had the whole route to myself and it was fun.*


Exactly, these travel logs are an electronic journal of sorts and I do read my own stories to refresh the memory.

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Great going!

Re: Autumn Ride - An Unsuccessful Ending (Sept. '18)

Day 4
23-09-2018
Rangdum

It was snowing throughout the night and I had a restless time. I woke up around 3am and felt sick. Strong feeling of vomit. I opened the door and window for air and took long breaths. Had a glass of water and took strolls in the corridor. Slowly started to feel better and came back to room and took refuge under the blanket.

I woke up again at around 6am and went to the kitchen were many other rider were already present. Felt like I wasn't the only one who had a rough night.

Snowfall had slowed down a bit and went to check on the bikes.
Not bad






Had breakfast at around 8am and the snowfall stopped for an hour or so.
Took these pics around the hotel










The snowfall started again and it poured like anything.




But I got this amazing shot
One of my favourites..


Confined to the hotel, there was nothing to do. We talked for most of the time and somehow time passed.
In the evening around 5pm, the snowfall stopped and got opportunity to view the amazing snowclad scenery around and witnessed the most amazing sunset of my life till now.

Aftermath at 5pm


But the scenery was worth it
















Finally, golden rays of the setting sun





Now let me show you all the sequency of the setting sun and how beautiful it got within 20min

6:10 pm


6:17 pm


6:19 pm


6:21 pm


6:23 pm


6:25 pm


6:29 pm


6:30 pm


Army trucks from a camp nearby visited the hotel and we asked the driver about the situation ahead (towards Padum). We got to know that the snowfall was even more intense around Pensi La and the pass would not open for a week or so. Hence we all decided to ride back to Kargil and hope to visit Zanskar valley in the future.


Day 5
24-09-2018
Rangdum to Kargil

The snowfall had stopped last evening and the sky was clear. Sun was shining and we were optimistic of going back to Kargil. We inquired from a couple of Army truck drivers in the morning and they told us that the road was open and if we are confident, we can ride to Kargil.

But the constable at the check post in the village was really not in a mood to let us go. From 9 am, we were ready to go and finally were able to leave at 2:20 pm.

I think he and the hotel guy had some arrangement as when we were packing out bikes, the hotel guy called the constable and told him of our plan to leave. This happened twice.

After that he started stopping us from leaving and was giving excuses that the road was blocked and he has orders to not let anyone leave (which was a complete lie as apart from snow, there weren't any landslides enroute which he was claiming have happened). Even the guys at the Sankoo checkpost were shocked as to why we were allowed to leave earlier.

The weather was sunny, but the route was slushy as expected due to snow. Tyre deep water crossings were in abundance and slushy all the way. We reached Kargil around 9:15 pm. Since we had started pretty late from Rangdum, we didn't take many breaks as we wanted to cross the snowed out part before sunset. It would have been really tough to ride in such conditions after dark.

Only a few pics of the return journey. It was really beautiful all around but lack of time didn't allowed me to stop and take pics.















My bike's stock tyres were fine while going, but I had difficulty at a few slushy sections while coming back. Rest it was all fine


Day 6
25-09-2018
Kargil to Anantnag
The ride was usual, nothing worthy of sharing. Clicked a few pics enroute and enjoyed the ride.










ERECTED IN THE ESTEEMED MEMORY OF LATE CAPT NC VADHERA OF 13 FIELD COMPANY (4 ENGINEER REGIMENT) WHO FACED THE UPHILL TASK OF CONSTRUCTING THIS VERY STRETCH OF ROAD IN 1964. HE TOOK UP THE CHALLENGE AND COMPLETED THE TASK ON 27TH JULY 1964. WHILE NEGOTIATING THIS CURVE, HIS JEEP WENT DOWN HILL AND HE EXPIRED. SINCE THAT VERY DAY THIS CURVE IS REMEMBERED AS "CAPTAIN'S CURVE".
WE SALUTE HIM



Day 7
26-09-2018
Anantnag
I took a day off to rest at a relatives place.

Harvest complete






Day 8
27-09-2018
Anantnag to Jammu
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This concludes my ride
It was a fun short ride and even though I had to cut it short, it was full of adventure and excietment.
It isn't everyday that you get to experience snowfall
Now looking forward to next year..