Tuesday, May 26, 2009

The Ladakh story


Well, the trip was an adventure from start to finish. The flight on Sunday got cancelled - bad weather in Leh. Of course, it was 45 degrees (that's centigrade to the interested) in Delhi. We got back to our acco and begged for a room. And wondered what we would do if the flight was cancelled yet again on Monday!

We made it on Monday with a heartstopping flight - ate idli sambhar airline breakfast flying over the Himalayas. So much for my admonishing the kids to eat what was available, 'we won't get idli/dosa there'. My credibility is already looking tattered and we were not even there yet! The flight lands if there is a hole in the clouds and they actually follow the road to navigate. The flight landed with 200 meters to spare of the runway and when we saw some crew high-fiving, figured it was a tough touch down.

It is moonscape, with a heavy armed forces presence. Think brown, rock, barbed wire. And snow tipped mountains everywhere. Set down in a valley at 11,000 ft above mean sea level...from pretty much sea level! We got picked up, were seen to suite rooms with amazing views and unbelievably affordable rates (early booking rocks! a 50% discount and we had a living area and a bedroom...with two children, this is a blessing that one can pay a million for!) and told to sleep the whole day. Warm soup came to us without asking - found out later that it was a mistaken order that we consumed! We thought it was the hospitality...which was pretty good.

Our friends S, S and their daughter T were with us. And the adventure began.

More later! G'night!

2 comments:

Bharat said...

Have always wanted to go to Leh. I hope more posts and pictures are on the way.

starry-eyed said...

yeah, I found it funny too that there were so many idli-dosa joints in Himachal!!

Sounds like you had some real adventures...hole in the clouds indeed!