Beautiful morning. Perfect for taking your two wheel set to a nice ride. The mountain was bright and majestic. The concerns about tent, petrol and other things immediately took back seat when I saw Rohtang Pass in the morning. I was going to do it.
Packed, filled my tanks and was on the road by 10.30 am. Had noodles and saw teenagers from Delhi bawling around high on adrenaline and new found hormones. And then, almost immediately hit the first roadblock of the way. Fresh landslide – less than 20 minutes ago. Thankfully, it was close to Manali and before Rohtang. BRO was already on work with their huge earth moving machinery.
Half an hour of waiting around and we were going again. The road till Rohtang Pass was strewn with SUVs and trucks. For such an important tourist destination, the road is suprisingly bad. Especially given that the rest if the highway is actually in much worse surroundings. Anyway, slowly the bone crunching cavalcade of some 10 SUVs, 5 trucks and one bike reahced Rohtang after what seemed eternity. Over a 100 people frolicking in the snow. It was a good sight. But one I had no time for. I had other thoughts in my head.
There was snow. SNOW!! You will have to forgive my excitement but this is the first time I have seen snow let alone been in the place where I am surrounded by it all over. There was snow as far I could see. I didn’t know the texture of snow. So, I had a handful of it by the side of the road. I was excited like a schoolboy who just talked to his crush for the first time. It was amazing. But unfortunately I couldn’t stop there. I had to keep moving. Because I was holding up traffic. On both sides. Because in front of me there was a hug puddle which I just had to cross if I wanted to stay dry. So I put her into first gear and rumbled on. After about 20 minutes I stopped again for a more leisurly look and feel of that beautiful thing called snow. It was like there was a white blanket all over. I took a few photographs. Saw two guys astride a Bull coming from the other side. Stopped them and asked them about the way.
There is awesome news. The road is cleared and working. All the way to Leh. I was jumping around all over again.
The road till Khoksar continued in its bad form. Endless puddles of mud. Big stones strewn around. 3 feet deep puddles of water. Gravel. Sand. Anything apart from a nice tarmac. Had a couple of close calls (as usual). Came across atleast 2 accidents and one hanging by the thread.
Khoksar dhaba
The junction at Khoksar where the road from Spiti comes and joins the Manali Leh Highway
After Khoksar, the roads improve very much. The first few kilometers are as good roads as you can expect on any express-bloody-way in the whole damn country.
But then there was no dearth of the sand-gravel-stones-water-mud combine even here. The final 12 kilometers to Tandi and then to Keylong were beautiful. Pothole free twisties.
Filled up at Tandi. It proudly says – “Last filling station for 365 kilometers”. Now staying the night at Keylong. There are a couple more chaps staying here who are likely to go to Leh tomorrow. Will see if I can tag along.
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