Most Inspirational Moment
My favourite things about this trip were the Monasteries and large Buddha’s, following the river and crossing on wooden/ stone narrow bridges, up a green corridor surrounded by bare, towering, snow topped peaks, Yaks, mamuts, and other small mammals higher up (I watched a sandy coloured animal about fox size bound up the rocks one day for instance ), and our high point at the Glacial lakes (being unable to trek up the pass). I loved being up in the mountains. What I hadn’t expected was the number of different flowers I saw higher up. The Golden triangle was as expected, very different, chauffeur driven in an air conditioned car, a lot of driving to see the touristy sights of Agra and Jaipur, well organised, but also Abhaneri step well and Fatehpur Sikri that I hadn’t heard of, and a few markets and places to see how things are made and buy if you want. Overall I really enjoyed this trip and there is far too much to mention much of what we did in this review. It was strange to return from the green of India to the brown of early August Uk, where even the heather wasn’t blooming as it should.
Thoughts on Group Leader
Informative, experienced, managed to navigate the hiccups we had with this trek.
Advice for Potential Travellers
There is a lot of forms to fill in and questions asked coming and going at the airport (e.g. it took me about an hour to queue up coming in). There is a number of things that can delay the trek; we had landslips on the road over the pass to get to the start of the trek which closed the road, delaying us 1 1/2days; though our plane was able to land/ take off on time both ways (needed an airline change last minute on the way; planes often get delayed due to the weather in Leh). Bring a basic, non-spring pen, my 2 popped in Leh airport on landing when trying to fill out a form, bits all over the place. There was an episode in the hotel in Leh when many charger plugs were shorted out, some managed to buy a replacement, though might be best to have a spare. With a mix of portable battery packs + foldable solar charger I managed not to run out of charge on my phone. I took binoculars, but rarely used this time. I had to take diamox due to headaches and not being able to sleep; I was ok at first in Leh, then suddenly wasn’t. Our July trip was relatively cool. This was nicer to trek in, but led to their being too much soft snow on the pass for the ponies so we had to turn back. The terrain walked on was easier than many walks I do in the lakes. We not only missed going up and over the pass, but also a spur valley up to camp, so we could make up time. Even going back down the same way was actually much more enjoyable than I had expected and we did cover much longer sections, and got to see the camels we had missed on the way (again needing to save time going over the road pass we missed the main stopping places). I enjoyed the Golden Triangle extension, well organised, very different to the trek. Nb 2 hotels I stayed at had swimming pools, the nicer being Royale Sarovar Portico in Agra. All hotels had kettles, tea bags (no chamomile), and coffee; and toilet paper. My legs got burnt in Dehli under my uv trousers when wondering around on my last day.