Step over Mountain
Aspiration
to cross over the mountains cherished for a long time in my mind. It would
remain dream if I had not shown little courage. I have read the book The
Seven Year in Tibet of Heinrich Harrer[I].
This book hugely boosted my enthusiasm to jump into Adventures world and
Books of Rahul Sankrityayan[II]
encouraged me to write what I had experienced.
I was fed up by traveling by
bus and taxies every year in summer vacation. I had experienced of walking on
wonderful frozen river of Zanskar with
father in February 2001. He escorted me on frozen river when I had to seek
admission in Leh for my further studies. Then I was 8th passed
student. My father is a strong mountaineer. In the case of emergency he has
courage to cross the mountain and frozen river alone. He is quite well known by everybody in Zanskar for his courageness as well as
drink behavior.
We had few days left and we immediately decided to go by walking to
Darcha, from where we could take taxi to Manali. For foreigner it takes 9 days. We completed in three days. A couple of months ago. We planned to walk
over Omasila pass to Paldar valley, which is near to Jammu. Our plan was fail, because my friends confident had lost by people
rumour of danger to walk on glacier. Soon
I am going to be experienced this Glaciered pass too.
Day: 1- 5 july 2011
The journey
begin from my village Pipiting with light
breakfast. We travelled by texi from padum to Muney village. On the way
we enjoyed the view of water fall of Sila village on opppsite mountain. Then we
got the bless of Barden Gonpa. We stop for lunch on Chuzin house in Muney, which is on the way. In the
after noon we traveled via Raru village to Itcher. In the evening we stayed at
relative house in the village of Itcher.
Day:2- 6 july 2011 Birth day of His Holiness the Dalai
lama.
On the following
day, early in the morning we start our adventure journey. The 21 hour
continuously walking. We travel for two
hours and at the time of sun rising we reached at small village called Ammu and
we stop for tea. The Border Road Organization (BRO) has been working in the project
of Padum-Darcha motor road. the road was constructed almost 40 km from Padum.
We travel beside river which is flowing between huge mountain. Some time we
have to climb up and down. After a
while we crossed a rope bridge and on other side we find a single house, opposite
to village of Cha, we got breakfast in
this single house. As we were walking, we enjoyed the nature and beauty of
mountains and villages. We could see the fields and houses of cha village and route of the famous Phuktal Gonpa via Purney,
we were high on opposite bank of Purney. I already had done pilgrimage to
Phuktal Gonpa in my first journey with my brother. We often found an Environment awareness words on
rock by Lungnak student welfare. I appreciate it very much.
Three hours later, we reached at a village named Yal, there we
encountered a man working in front of
his house. He was preparing for his son up coming marriage ceremony. We asked for some drink and he happily offered us
strong local drink. Despite of having lot of water in the way. I
still felt thrust and to quench the
thrusty, I had three bowl of Chang in a
movement. I felt relex by the liquid but not aware of it affecting on me. As we
get up to go I realized that the chang began to affect. I felt light and the minor
pain in my legs eliminated. Later my
friend told me that I almost running on the way.
As I was having liquid, two young
boys and a girl passed besides the house,
the girl is horse back. We called them for drink. But they go on refusing
because next village is their own. We prefer to walk with them, so we could get
some delicious lunch at Testa. We were lucky, we welcome with delicious lunch
and continuous our journey. As the affect of Chang goes off, I felt tire
and heavy. So on the next village, we once again asked for drink at the
house below the route. The liquid seem not strong as before but it helped
me to reach the destination village
Kargyak
On the way we encounter some villages. Tablay, Kuru . A village name
Tanzay had small tea shop beside the road. In Tanzay i found the white colored
rock, which is break in to powder and mixed up with milk and use in
paint for Guru Stupa in Pipiting. We arrived at Kargyak at 8 pm. Our plan was
to stay in Kargyak and spend the night.
We knew a monk named chophel. who is studying at Drapung Gomang monastery mondgod.
We were informed that he was there at his village for vacation. We asked for his house as we encountered the villagers. A
man helped us to find his house. Chophel
gave us tea and bread. We had been walking for 15 hours then and put
off our shoes and prepare to stay in the house.
According to my experience during travel, I asked
a jug of chang , because I knew, it could help in the journey. With my belly full of Chang, we continuous our journey along
with a bottle of liquid . It was already dark and there was little moon
light. Fortunately we got a torch, with the torch we could travel till 2 am. On the way after two hours we
encountered a temporary nomad house and we stop for milk
and curd. I use the term TEMPORARY
NOMAD. Because they spend only three months in summer with their cattle. they have their own well built houses and fields in village, where they are
spending whole year. We went there and
few young girls received us. We
exchanged our items. We gave them coke and meggi and they offered us milk and
curd. Together we exchange talk and
joke. Frankly saying, they are good hearted and nice girls.
After an hour when we get up to walk , it was 12 am then. the moon
light was already faded. We could see only the huge dark mountain
and twinkling stars over our heads. we often
lost our way especially after crossing
streams. It was hard to put naked
foot in water but its harder when we
could not find the way after crossing the stream. The route was more confusion when we were at
the base of the mount Gonpo Rangjon near the base camp. There were huge rocks on the way and the
route was zigzagged.
I remembered my first journey when I accompanied my brother Kelsang
Thinley. We were walking near the base. At that time we reached at base camp at 9 PM. There was small river to cross. The base camp was on the other side of the
river. We were new and travel with information and map instruction and could
only see dim light by tent across the small river . Though we both had torch but could not find
any bright. It was raining and we already got wet head to toe. We immediately
cross the river and reach other side. While we were crossing the river, we were between the rain and the cold freezing
river. The dim light of the tent was
only our hope and we focus our eyes on it.
We hurriedly rushed inside the tent and found group of men talking.
Their talk interrupted by our appeared in the tent and began to ask questions. They were laughing at us for our stupid adventure.
Travel over there at night is really stupid. The men show sympathy on us and lent warm clothes to change. Early in the morning we found small bridge
just near the spot we cross the river.
Surprisingly, this time we found the bridge instead of tent. We tried to search the tent for few minutes
but in vain so we slept on rocky land in open sky. We are fortunate that there
was no rain and we have comfortable sleeping bag.
The following morning we could see
the hotel tent was perch on other side, beside the route we walked
through it. We went there and found few
small tents beside the hotel tent. We
talked with horsemen and they told us that their purpose to cross the Pass has
cancelled because the Rinpoche has already arrived at base camp. However we
were happy that a man was still going other side with two horses. We change riding time to time. I used to ride horse when I was very young.
We had white colored horse in our house. Father sold it long time ago and it
quite long I have not ride horse.
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Day 3. 7 july 2011
We wake up early
in the morning and went to the tent and had breakfast. There was still snow and
glacier in the top and it would be best if we reach there as early as possible
because as the sun light fall on the glaciers,
it hard to walk over them. We were at the top after almost four hours. Medicine
herbs and flowers are growing in this mountain. Sova Rigpa doctor (Tibetan
medical) often visit here to collect flowers and herbs. We could see lot of others series of Himalayan
mountains by the top. Small type of lack formed in the top by melting of
Glacier. Prayer Flags are waving there in non stop motion. It is said that
spiritual words written in the flag could carry by wind to all direction to
spread peace. I liked the idea but still I have to learn lot of things in
Buddhist culture.
It was pleasant walking on other side of Shinku-la. At noon we
arrive at Zanskar Sum-do, which is state border of jammu and Kashmir and
himachal Pradesh. A new road was also constructing from Zanskar Sum-do towards Zanskar
by BRO. Motor road has been constructing both side and in a few years, it will
be complete. I felt that the joy of walking
would not be exist as soon as motor dominate the trekking route. We arrived on time in Darcha and we took taxi to
Manali. And… .. .
[I] An Austrian, (6 July 1912 – 7 January 2006) who was
an Austrian mountaineer . He traveled to Tibet during 2nd world war and spent sever years in Tibet. The book seven years in Tibet was written by him as a dairy during his
travelling. He was one of the earliest
English teacher to 14th dalai lama.
[II] An Indian scholar, (April 9, 1893 – April 14, 1963), who travelled
in Tibet for four times for
restoration of Buddhist Sanskrit text in Tibet who is called the Father of
Hindi Travel literature, was one of the most widely-traveled scholars of India,
spending forty-five years of his life on travels away from his home.[1] He
became a Buddhist monk (Bauddha Bhikkhu) and eventually took up Marxist Socialism.[2]
Sankrityayan was also an Indian nationalist, having been arrested and jailed
for three years for creating anti-British writings and speeches.[3] He is
referred to as the 'Greatest Scholar' (Mahapandit) for his scholarship. He
accompanied Gadun chophel to India in
his second Journey to Tibet.
