I have wanted to visit Ladakh, India for close to a decade.  The internet promised me gorgeous views and those views looked like they came with cool, crisp air that smelled fresh.  Fresh air that  I would be breathing in while seeing beautiful landscapes with occasional colorful monastaries thrown in.

The internet did not lie.

My driver picked me up in Leh this morning and off we went.   We stopped at Leh view point for a photo.

Leaving Leh, as we were driving in a spiral around mountains, I saw groups of people walking on the roads.  Some had things such as sledge hammers with them. I assume they were walking to work on the roads.  This would make sense since mountain roads are very narrow and obviously people cannot drive to work and park a vehicle.  I would have assumed that workers were picked up and dropped off by a truck.  I am so curious about the ones I saw walking.  Where are you going exactly?  How long is the walk?  Where did all these stray dogs and cows come from?  This is just a road winding around mountains.  I did not see any towns, nor was there any place for a town.  One of life’s mysteries I suppose.

We arrived at Kardungla pass.  I got out of the car to take a photo of the sign for the highest motorable highway in the world.

It was freezing when I went outside to take these photos.  I have been carrying around a puffer jacket that I need ONLY for this portion of the trip and it is during this portion that I forgot to put it on.  I was in physical pain from the cold and hated myself not only during this time, but for the remainder of the trip when I was carrying around a jacket I didn’t even use the one time I needed it.

Shortly after, we stop for coffee. It was the best coffee I have had in India.  I had a second cup and lamented not being able to enjoy a cigarette with it because breathing.

This middle of nowhere restaurant comes with an outhouse restroom

View from outside the toilet:

As I was sitting and enjoying my coffee alone with my thoughts, some guy saunters over and asked me where I am from.  Then asked me if I am alone.  Yes.  “You don’t have any friends?”  Ugh.  I have been asked this (and “where’s your husband”) as million times while traveling solo.  It is frustrating because it is such a stupid, pointless waste of my time and also – leave me alone in my reverie of how happy I am right now, bucko.

We stopped at Lachung Temple:

We passed through Nubra Valley.

There is a bunch of stuff to do here that I did not want to do.  Thing I least wanted to do was ride the world’s longest zipline.  Look at this thing!  I am scared just remembering it.

We continue on through Nubra Valley and Hunder Sand Dunes.

There’s quite a few things you can do here.  Go Karts (no), ATV through the desert sand (no), and….meet Bactrian camels with two humps yes please!!!

You have the option to ride them, which I absolutely did not.  Camels are friends, not playthings.

There was a bathroom here which was the absolute cleanest public bathroom I used in my 47 days of travel.  It was spotless, had a Western toilet, soap (!) and a little seating area where I sat to hide from the sun for a bit.

I left the equivalent of $5 USD.

Then from here we headed to Turtuk, which will be my next post!

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