cyclingthehimalayas.com : Mission Impassible!
Cycling in Central Asia, Cycling the Himalayas, Cycling in North India, Cycling in Nepal
Cycling in Lahaul, Spiti, Kinnaur Valleys
Challenging terrain, cycling across sometimes knee deep nallahs and dragging the bike over roads full of rocks deposited by big nallahs. Challenging high pass of Kunzam La. Stunning landscapes in Spiti between Losar and Tabo and the beautiful climb up to the jewel in this route: Nako
Day 1 - Rhotong Pass - Gramphoo - Chatru (25km)
Having cycled the Rhotong Pass we weren't interested in going over ground we'd already covered, so we got a jeep just over the pass and cycled down the muddy road to Gramphoo where we stopped to adjust brake cables and have a thali plate before setting off onto the Lahaul road, which is a right turn approximately 50m below the Dhabas. It's off road, no asphalt, but manageable, not the worst hard packed rock we had experienced. Be prepared to get wet on this route, we must have traversed 7 or 8 freezing nallahs on the way to Chatru (bottom left pic), a couple of these deep and fast flowing, cycling isn't an option and we had to drag our bikes through the water hopping from rock to rock. The 'road' was downhill for the first few km but then climbs on a few switchbacks before descending again, but it feels like more ups than downs. About 7km from Gramphoo a wonderfully old lady excitedly shouted 'Chai Chai' and bid us to drink in her higgeldy little rock home which had a few plastic chairs outside. We should've stopped but we'd only just started cycling and weren't in the mental space to stop. The road conditions; rough with nallahs; makes for a slow ride and so when we arrived in Chatru we decided to stop there as it was mid afternoon and we wouldn't make a great deal more progress - it was a good decision, little did we know then how tough the next stretch would be. Chatru has a few Dhabas and basic 'shed' like accomodation. It's a rocky place but the surrounding sandy/rocky mountains offer an impressive view. We'd only been there 30mins and an english guy joined us having cycled from Shimla. He sported an impressively muscular Surly Ogre which was amazingly well packed with super light folding front panniers and a frame bag. Great weight distribution.
Day 2 - Chatru to Batal (32km)
We'd read that this was the worst road in the Himalaya, and finally we're on it! Climbing out of Chatru, it's all off road scree and packed mud, but isn't too bad going until we'd covered about 7km - at which point it gets stupid. We'd kind of defined roads at different levels of off terrain difficulty starting with packed mud (not bad at all), packed mud and scree, packed mud and larger scree, packed rock, and the worst: hard packed rock and scree which makes the bike bounce around and shakes the soul out of you. However, the Chatru to Batal route introduced a whole new level of difficulty: Rock falls (see top right pic). Where the glaciers and/or snow melts, the water tears rocks down the mountain and it covers the already hard going 'roads'. In places up to 1 km of 'road' has been covered by these rocks and twice we had to dismount and drag our bikes because it was just too difficult to ride a fully loaded bike over. The nallahs also took on another dimension with one creating a deep pool across the road and sand made an appearance amongst all the rock crating a kind of beach, like an oasis in the mountains! The only way through was to take off socks and trainers and wade through the nallah. Chotta Dam is half way to Batal, we were hoping for a dhaba or shop but it consists of three empty abandoned buildings and little else. The scenery is desolate, totally inhopspitable, no greenery at all, just a rocky and sandy landscape with snowy mountain peaks. After Chotta Dam conditions worsen with mostly hard packed rock and the occasional rock fall which feels traumatic for the body and the bike. The last km or so across the valley to Batal is literally just a valley of white rocks and by then we had really had enough of the rough cycling, almost ready to give up. Batal is a truck stop with two dhabas with comfy beds in parachute tents. It feels isolated and the environment is so inhospitable that its a bit grim, but the sunset shone an incredible light across the mountains. We're guessing this is where we exited Lahaul valley.
Day 3 - Batal - Kunzam La - Losar (30km)
You can see the climb up the Kunzam La pass from Batal. It's a cycle across a bridge and then the climb begins up the side of the scree ridden mountain: It's desolate and rough going all 11km to the top. Half way up, the road splits: Ahead and to the left, the road has been destroyed and you can see the old route up the mountainside which has taken a bashing from endless nallahs; and thus a new route has been devised which goes off to the right climbing in switchbacks (bottom left pic).
The Kunzam La pass, 4551m, is quite flat and so feels expansive and is signified with stupas and a thousand prayer flags. The descent is still rough going but a bit more colour in the landscape appears (top right pic), most notably a pink looking river to the left and a bit further a blue looking river. There are occasional glacial ravines, and wherever there is one, you can be sure the road is trashed by rocks dragged down by nallahs. A sign welcomes you to Spiti valley just as you enter Losar which looks like it's been plucked straight out of Ladakh with the whitewashed houses with flat roofs covered with sheaves of hay. There's a few places to stay, overpriced and/or a bit basic. We stayed in the place just past the prayer wheel, on the right, where the water gushes out of the pipe. It's run by a lovely family who make local dishes like hearty pasta soup. Double room for 500Rps. Unfortunately for us, a jeep load of noisy Arthurs piled in quite late and kept us, and presumably the family awake.
Day 4 - Losar - Kaza (60km)
After 3 days of really rough traumatic cycling we
were ready to pack it in...thankfully itgets better
from here, for a while anyway. From Losar the
road is mostly old tarmac with rough patches
which traverses the open, expansive valley floor.
The next village we reach is pretty little Hamsa,
and after this, the landscape becomes more
desert like in beige, browns and terracotta
shades, as the road dips down into a canyon,
across a new sturdy looking bridge and then back
up the canyon to the other side and the road
climbs up the valley, soon to really open up into
an expansive stunning desert landscape with a
huge river bed on the left with incredible natural
rock formations shaped by years of meteorological
history. It would be a good spot to camp, it's a
powerful place and as it's so hard to get to, you're
cut off from the world! The road continues through
the valley alongside the river bed through pretty
Ladakhi style villages with wonderfully neat fields
of agriculture. On the right, over the river bed, the
famous Ki Gompa comes in site, proud and
whitewashed on the terracotta mountainside.
From Rangrik you can see Kaza in the distance,
ahead on the left mountain. As you leave Rangrik
the road drops down and curves to the right to a
junction: The left (hair pin) road takes you to
Kaza...at the end you cross a bridge and go right
which then climbs a km or so into Kaza. We stayed at Kangsar Guesthouse, which is the 2nd or 3rd guesthouse you come to, soon after entering the town, on the right side, close to the big new super colourful temple. The rooms were sparklingly new with balcony, a good choice at 500Rps, and the friendly guys cook quite good food too. Kaza is hopeless as the district capital! We stopped here for a couple of days to recharge and fill up on food. There's lots of guesthouses, a veg market and lots of shops in the old town in which to top up on provisions. It's a necessary stop to get our 'Inner Line Permit' in order to continue through Spiti. However, it's energy supply is appalling, and you could count in minutes the time we had electricity while we were there. We read in the local paper that the energy supply was a raw problem that the locals were raging about, worried about the cold they would suffer with the oncoming winter.
Day 5 - Kaza - Tabo (49km)
It's the 1st of October 2013, it's chilly at night as we're above 3500m but it's still hot and azure in the day. This stretch is about 80% off road conditions, the tarmac tries to make an appearanace here and there but it's rough and broken up. Luckily it's mostly descent as the rough road follows the lovely blue Spiti river which literally snakes it's way down the valley. At about 22km the scenery is beautiful (bottom left pic) following the river, colourful shrubs here and there, distant snowy peaks and Dankar Gompa, a small spek perched on top of the left mountainside. It's a 500m climb up to the Gompa which we weren't interested in climbing, but having seen a documentary about the Gompa since, it's definitely worth a visit, if not just for the views from the top. It's likely you can stay there for the night. After 32km there's a taxing and very dusty climb of about 200m but the top of the climb has a place to sit next to the road to take in the wonderfully colourful views of the snaking river winding it's way up the valley (bottom right pic). There's lots of guesthouses in Tabo from expensive to cheap and damp. We rode all the way around Tabo on the road that takes you to the famous ancient Gompa and found Ki Kangsar Homestay. It's a pretty little place with a courtyard of apple trees.
Day 6 - Tabo - Nako (66km)
The road is mostly tarmac but with some very rough brown scree in this desolate and uninspiring landscape. Luckily, it's downhill and pretty quick going, we covered the 29kms to Sumdo in 2hrs. Sumdo signifies the Spiti/Kinnaur border and is the start of the Inner line permit, and thus, is a check point. The permit check took 10mins, there's no food or shops in Sumdo, it's just a military base. After Sumdo the road deteriorates into bad scree and the inhospitable landscape is adorned with the pretty little, subsitence living village of Shialker. There's a dhaba on the left as you enter. Further on is Chango, there are a couple of dhabas here but they weren't open. There is a basic shop though for sugary drinks, crisps or poor local cake or chocolate. We didn't hang around though, it was full of idle and indifferent men. When you cross the Chango bridge, the left road goes further up into the village (perhaps it's nice?) and the right road takes you to Nako - it's a pretty road with old stone walls along the roadside protecting little apple orchards with gorgeous looking apples. The blue Spiti river runs to the right of the road and the colourful mountains loom above in colours of red, browns and yellow shades. We stopped by the roadside for a quick snack and this ancient woman struggling with a heavy wicker basket of apples hobbled towards us. She stopped, but her basket down, ferretted in her apples, picked some out, and with a big heavily wrinkled smile, proudly gave us both 2 apples. They were the best apples we have ever tasted and still are to this day! It's 2km beyond Chango that the 800m switchback climb up to Nako begins. It's steep in places but good tarmac. Looking up, you think you can see the pass, but the top you can see is nowhere near the pass! Once you reach the top, the road traverses the mountain top before starting a climb on another mountainside. As we got higher the winds got stronger but the fine views of snowy peaks and the deep blue river below compensated for this. The final 4km to the top is meandering and punishingly steep, the toughest part of the climb, a real sting in the tail. As we reached the top a military vehicle pulled up and four, obviously senior, tall, tough looking military guys got out purposefully. They wore smiles as wide as their impressive moustaches and just wanted to shake our hands, impressed as they were that we were cycling these crazy rough roads in these isolated valleys. There's a 5km quick decsent from the top to Nako. We rode past the 'Malling slide' without a problem, although some small first sized rocks were rolling past us - it's a piece of road that is constantly trashed by rock slides and sometimes is impassable or requires carrying the bike over a large rock fall, but we got lucky. Just before Nako, there's a corrugated iron slum that house the Bihari Road workers whose virtually impossible task is to keep the Malling slide clear. Nako is the jewel in the crown of this route. The main village is a mass of old wooden and stone buildings which are piled on top and next to each other with tiny alleys burrowing in the maze of modest homes. The landscape is incredible, there are walks all around the mountains and some tracks are marked with prayer flags. You can easily spend a few days here, possibly leave your stuff at a guesthouse and just go off for a couple of days camping exploring the valleys. It's clearly an ancient and very holy place: Old crumbling stupas dot the mountain sides, as do meditation caves and there are literally millions of mantras carved into rocks and stones: The stone walls along the roadside are all topped with rock carving after rock carving. If you do trek up the mountain behind Nako the views at the top are unbelievable. Most mountain views offer views of one or two valleys and a few peaks, but Nako seems to be perched in the middle of a knot of mountains such are the countless valleys and peaks you can see from mountain behind Nako. What a place! As you enter town, on the right is the bus station, you can stay here too and there's a barely average dhaba which sells beer, but barter the price! As you enter the main part of Nako we stayed at the first guesthouse on the right which has it's name 'Lovon Guesthouse' on the wall. The front room with balcony has amazing views (bottom left pic), at 500Rps, how can you not stay here for a few days?? The Guesthouse has a quality Tibetan kitchen but we mostly ate at Dr Shaksuka's 'cafe' (Inside it looks like it is/was a kids nursery). If you follow the road into town, after about 400m you'll see Dr Shaksuka's 'cafe' and adjacent shop. He's a lovely guy who will cook you up a fresh thali plate for 70Rps by prior arrangement, it was one of the better thali plates we had eaten, the freshness makes such a difference.
Day 7 - Nako - Spillow (68km)
It was a chilly start, downhill on good tarmac from Nako, mostly on switchbacks named the 'Kazigs'. Eventually we reached the valley bottom where the good road follows the rushing river on your right and the road has been blasted out of the rock. Once we crossed the valley bridge, the road is on a ridge along a basin above the river. We stopped at Dubling for a cold drink and snacks before carrying on to the rather aptly named Pooh!? Pooh is a major military base and a sprawl of buildings cling along the mountainside. Just as we were exiting Pooh a military guy excitedly flagged us down and asked us to have a chai with him, we declined, but perhaps we would've been better stopping as two minutes later Ian got a back tyre puncture and a problem with his gears that resulted in him only having his front 3 gears to use! After Pooh, the road seriously deteriorates to a very dusty road full of large scree and occasionally hard packed rock. There was evidence of many landslides, some of which had recently been cleared and others still being cleared (bottom left pic). Spillow was a contrast to Nako, not shanti or as freindly; it has several shops and dhabas and lots of men hanging around staring. It seems to be a truck and local bus stopping point. We only found one hotel which was noisy, dirty looking and overpriced at 500Rps, but it looked like a new hotel was being built here.
Day 8 - Spillow - Recong Peo (40km)
It's an odd road after Spillow, it's tarmac for 100m and then rough and dusty for 70m, then tarmac for 100m etc etc. After about 12km the road is mostly tarmac and a few km before Akpa is the permit check. After crossing the Akpa bridge there's a small hill climb and as you turn a corner at the top there's a dhaba tucked off the road, we didn't stop here but the spicey smells wafting out of this dhaba were amazing. Just after this a waterfall pouring onto the road wore a rainbow across the sparkling water, and then we crossed another bridge back over the Sutlej river. It's now deep valley, but greener with pines and mostly tarmac roads that are often blasted out of the mountainside. The turn off to Recong Peo (district capital) is on the right and is a 5.5km climb over 300m, it's mostly switchbacks and very steep in places, to the extent we had to get off the bike and push, especially difficult for Ian who still only had use of 3 gears.
There's an increase in traffic, but still it's a pretty climb through pines which give some much needed shade in an otherwise sweaty climb. We arrived at the busy bus stand and went straight over the big roundabout, past Snow View Guesthouse on the right and cycled on up the hill past The Ridang on the left and continued through the town until the road hairpins to the left. Up this left hairpin is Fairyland Guesthouse, 350Rps a night, and we could lock our bikes just inside the entrance - this was a bonus as many of the guesthouses are accessed via lots of big steps. Recong Peo is a busy place but has charachter such is it's situation high up on the mountainside. However, it's worth carrying on up the switchbacks past Recong Peo for another 7km and 450m climb to the wonderful shanti old village of Kalpa. It consists of small old wonky buildings and little alleyways decorated with the colours of the flowers, shrubs and prayer flags located right up amongst the surrounding snowy peaks (pic above right). It's a sleepy friendly place, well worth a few days chilling.
Day 9 - Recong Peo - Rampur (102km)
Back down to the main valley road, it's atrocious conditions, the abundant dust hides the hard rock underneath which makes it hard to find the least obstuctive route along the road. There's also the occasional flooding from nallahs which makes it incredibly
muddy, to the entent that we passed one stuck truck that was holding up the traffic. It's a poor road all the way to ugly Tapri, and just after Tapri
You can either carry straight on (passing the bridge on the left) on an increasingly dust bowl of a road, or you can cross the bridge to a much better new road. The new road continues as far as Sholtu at which point you can cross back over on another bridge - this way you avoid quite a bit of the old dusty road. At Wangtu good tarmac appears, but only for 3km, then it's back to crap roads until about 5km from Bhabunaggar when the asphalt returns permanently. From Bhabunaggar the landscape is greener, luscious and dramatic with roads blasted from the mountainside with hefty drop offs, but there is the rare appearance of a barrier along the roadside (see pics below). It's quite a taxing uphill on the way to Nigulsari, it's also around here that cows tend to be a road hazard: In fact, one cow, over protective of her calf was a serious barrier: As we reached the brow of a hill Ian cycled in front as he passed a jaywalking cow which tried to butt him half heartedly as he passed. Then it had me in it's headlights and started to charge me, i braked and the cow pulled up about a foot from my front tyre. It backed away and was clearly getting ready for a second charge...by this time traffic on both sides of the road was piling up and making the situation far worse with beeping horns and one guy leant out of his van shouting for me to move on...i had to make my move before the cow did, so i pedalled trying to go round the cow and as i did the cow charged but luckily the road was going downhill and i had just enough speed to get round the bovine bully. It was close, i was a whisker away from having a horn up my arse and having to live with people mooing at me for the rest of my life. Anyway, once you're over the Nigulsari Bridge it's quick downhill on a good road all the way to Jeori. By Jeori the landscape is almost tropical as we drop in altitude. Jeori is a small but busy place, the shops are rather oddly stacked above one another up the mountainside above the road. We spotted one rudimentary hotel and lots of dhabas but it didn't really appeal to us and a political rally was just starting up, which was our cue to move on. The road continues downhill for a few km and then there's a taxing 100m climb over a few km before the final long descent to Jhakri and onto Rampur. There are places to stay in Jhakri. Rampur is a bustling, holy bazaar town. There is the upper part where you have the busy traffic laden bus stand by the main road which also has the banks and a couple of good dhabas, and there is the lower part with it's winding colourful bazaar stalls and a few hotels...it's not easy to see how to get into the bazaar, there are some steps down to the right of the main road and also there's a road which drops down through the stalls. The hotels are almost at the very end of the bazaar, so it's quite a trek through the hoards of people: You'll have to dismount the bike, it's too hectic to cycle and probably the polite thing to do - in fact we had to ask locals where the hotels were as it's a bit of a labyrinth.
