Ride the Himalayas
7-11-2019 Day 2 of the ride
The mechanic checked all our bikes and lubed he chains first
thing in the morning. We all broke down
our tents and helped put things together to load the truck after breakfast. Of course, the first difficult task of the
day would be to get back up to the main road.
That treacherous boulder field of large rocks didn’t disappear overnight! Again, I think I was one the last to get to
the bottom of the steep road up. I could
see the road had already taken numerous victims with bikes littering the road in
various places. Then I said to my self
it’s time and I eased the clutch out and gave it gas. I started bouncing and rocking all over the place
but kept my speed. Near the hairpin turn
was Evan and his bike on the downhill side, I approached rapidly and somehow
kept left and passed or bounced up to the semi flat turn area. The turn around was my goal and I was going
fast enough that the front tire went up the back bank a little before I could
grab a handful of brake. My front tire
got stuck in some boulders but there were many guys there to help pull me back
so I could start turning around for the next section which was just as
punishing. Again, I saw bikes strewn
across the road but felt confident after the first section was successfully complete
so off I went. Up and up I managed until
I got to the next hairpin curve where there was a large grassy area and the
semi paved section of road began. The
others that had made it congratulated me and I felt like I had just summited
Everest. Ha, ha, ha. Everyone that made it waited at this spot
until all the bikes and support vehicles were up. There was one major accident on this section
and unfortunately it was Vanna. Vanna is
a very petite, lively, fit and fun woman and had a tumble yesterday (if you
missed it go back and see photos) today the bike landed on her ankle again and
it did not look good. She had to go into
the support vehicle while one of the other staff rode her bike.
Finally back up to road 305 we keep riding until we get to road
# 5 or highway 5 north & East. This is the Deothi-Mashnoo
road according to Google maps. Another
day like yesterday where we wound through small towns and villages, said Hi and
High Five’d school children along the road.
Some of the road was really cool,
carved into the sides of the mountain.
Finally, we came to a waterfall and since it was so hot and humid everyone started stripping down to jump in. I’ve never bothered to be like the rest and have just jumped in rivers, lakes, etc with full gear as when you start riding it will provide evaporative cooling effects and drop temps easily 20 degrees below ambient so I showed them how it was done. LOL
This shot of me cooling off in the waterfall was right after
the falls knocked my expensive photochromatic color changing prescription glasses
in it never to be seen again. What a dumbash! At least I brought a spare pair of glasses but
they were clear. J
This actually turned into an impromptu lunch spot which served us all well. I think around the next curve was another police checkpoint which I'm sure I would have blown right by if someone didn't say something. I think most of us went over individually, took photos of our license plate to take into the small police building where they wrote it all down and our passport information. I don't know if they ever used this information but they wrote it down on a paper notebook and told us we could go.
After lunch we took off and headed further north and east to the mighty Karchamm Dam. It was very windy through there and the prayer flags were fluttering all around.
Once we got all back together and had a small break we headed South East to our next days lodging the Eskape Adventure Eco-camp on the Sangla-Chitkul Road. When we arrived at the location to detour down and across the river to the camp Rahul told us that if we wanted we could continue down the road to the end where we would be very close to China. Also we would need our passports for the checkpoint. So.... A few of us kept on. It was another 35Km to the end of the road at the small village of Chitkul.
Von and I arrived at the checkpoint to find 2 Army men ready to greet us. These to guys were great and I think both were bored to death and were very happy to see a couple guys from the USA to practice their English. We were more than happy to sit and chat with them but after quite a spell decided we better get going or we'll get back to camp quite late so we said goodbye and headed on down the dusty road.
I was late getting out and Von was screaming up the road. I took off and was flying a little faster than I was comfortable with but doing ok and then blasted through a stream deeper than I thought it should be. Water was splashing up over my head, all around the sides, I got a good wash job on it. ha, ha, ha and then still going to fast around a corner the front tire started washing out. I pulled a Valentino Rossi slide out of it without putting a foot down and decided I needed to chill out. The rest of the ride to Chitkul was uneventful. Only the military could go further to the border but it was fine with us. I took some photos and a short video and then Amit, Vikas and I headed on back to the adventure camp.
The turn off to the camp was a concreted cow path with big sewer pipe square concrete raised spots in it and some of it also had fencing both wire and brick wall. Oh yeah and there were stairs to go down so they were really testing my abilities as a street rider. Ha, ha, ha
This was our camp with nice Swiss tents. It was very cold that night, the beds seemed hard but we were so exhausted we slept like rocks. Here is a shot of the camp.
The mechanic checked all our bikes and lubed he chains first
thing in the morning. We all broke down
our tents and helped put things together to load the truck after breakfast. Of course, the first difficult task of the
day would be to get back up to the main road.
That treacherous boulder field of large rocks didn’t disappear overnight! Again, I think I was one the last to get to
the bottom of the steep road up. I could
see the road had already taken numerous victims with bikes littering the road in
various places. Then I said to my self
it’s time and I eased the clutch out and gave it gas. I started bouncing and rocking all over the place
but kept my speed. Near the hairpin turn
was Evan and his bike on the downhill side, I approached rapidly and somehow
kept left and passed or bounced up to the semi flat turn area. The turn around was my goal and I was going
fast enough that the front tire went up the back bank a little before I could
grab a handful of brake. My front tire
got stuck in some boulders but there were many guys there to help pull me back
so I could start turning around for the next section which was just as
punishing. Again, I saw bikes strewn
across the road but felt confident after the first section was successfully complete
so off I went. Up and up I managed until
I got to the next hairpin curve where there was a large grassy area and the
semi paved section of road began. The
others that had made it congratulated me and I felt like I had just summited
Everest. Ha, ha, ha. Everyone that made it waited at this spot
until all the bikes and support vehicles were up. There was one major accident on this section
and unfortunately it was Vanna. Vanna is
a very petite, lively, fit and fun woman and had a tumble yesterday (if you
missed it go back and see photos) today the bike landed on her ankle again and
it did not look good. She had to go into
the support vehicle while one of the other staff rode her bike.
Finally back up to road 305 we keep riding until we get to road
# 5 or highway 5 north & East. This is the Deothi-Mashnoo
road according to Google maps. Another
day like yesterday where we wound through small towns and villages, said Hi and
High Five’d school children along the road.
Some of the road was really cool,
carved into the sides of the mountain.
Finally, we came to a waterfall and since it was so hot and humid everyone started stripping down to jump in. I’ve never bothered to be like the rest and have just jumped in rivers, lakes, etc with full gear as when you start riding it will provide evaporative cooling effects and drop temps easily 20 degrees below ambient so I showed them how it was done. LOL
This shot of me cooling off in the waterfall was right after
the falls knocked my expensive photochromatic color changing prescription glasses
in it never to be seen again. What a dumbash! At least I brought a spare pair of glasses but
they were clear. J
This is the inside of our tent which was very nice. The front had a porch that was covered and through the door was the main room. In the back through another door was the bathroom. Typically there was a toilet, sink to wash up and a small area to wash up if you cared to use cold water to take a sponge/washcloth type shower with the faucet and bucket. This one looked like it had hot water but I didn't bother to check. The camp had a generator they used for a while in the evening and also used Solar water heaters which was cool.
This is the inside of our tent which was very nice. The front had a porch that was covered and through the door was the main room. In the back through another door was the bathroom. Typically there was a toilet, sink to wash up and a small area to wash up if you cared to use cold water to take a sponge/washcloth type shower with the faucet and bucket. This one looked like it had hot water but I didn't bother to check. The camp had a generator they used for a while in the evening and also used Solar water heaters which was cool.
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