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A Road Trip to Leh and Hanle in a BMW 330i GT

Last year in September, when I visited Hanle for Astrophotography (documented here), I dreamt about driving my 3GT in those beautiful sceneries and also to Umling La pass. This October, that dream came true. I completed a road trip to Leh and Hanle that spanned 4 weeks and 8500 kilometers. This travelogue is to document this road trip. As this is a 4-week road trip, I will keep mundane parts of the drive (like the first 4 days and the return part from Jaipur) short and cover the more interesting parts of the trip. I will also provide an index in the next post so that the reader may jump to the topic of interest.

Credits:

Let me begin the thread with a note of thanks to the following people:

• My wife, who let me take on this long road trip.
• My friend Karthik who gave me company for half the trip till Leh
• Fellow BAS member Mr. Subhendu who organized stay and food in both Leh and Hanle
• Friend and TBHPian Megazoid and Mrs. Megazoid for giving me lots of input on things to do in Srinagar. Mr. Megazoid also had driven through Zoji La in his 330i and I took many inputs from him on the drive.
• Friend and TBHPian RobiMahanta for lending me his 20 liter jerry can to carry spare fuel. This was very useful when I drove to Hanle and Umlingla, where the last petrol bunk is in Karu which is 225km from Hanle.
• Friend and TBHPian sud who gave me the oxygen canisters he had. These came handy in Pangong Tso
• Friends RobiMahanta and Dr.AD who gave live updates on road conditions when they visited Leh in the past couple of months.
• My friend and TBHPian APV from Coimbatore, who had recently done a Leh drive in his XUV500. He gave me lots of information on traffic conditions, road conditions, monitoring the twitter feed of J&K police for status on timings etc. This proved very helpful in the Jammu-Srinagar and Srinagar-Leh sections.
• My friends and fellow TBHPians quicksilver who lent me his OBD dongle for BMW for debugging any fault situations, and Asta_la_vista who gave me a couple of cans of engine oil for backup
• Mr. Karthik and his team at KUN Coimbatore who have maintained the GT in very good condition that the car did not give me any trouble throughout the trip
• Several TBHPians who documented their drives to Leh region. I have been reading up all the road trips and the information from these threads have been very useful in planning this trip.

TL;DR Version:

• I and my friend Karthik left Coimbatore on the 30th of September. The first three days were more of a truck driver's life when we drove almost 1000 kilometers every day, driving from 5 or 6 in the morning till 7 or 8 in the evening.
• On 3rd October, we reached Udhampur and spent some time visiting Mansar Lake.
• On 4th October, we crossed the infamous Rambhan and Banihal stretches and reached Srinagar. We spent the evening visiting the Shankaracharya temple and Dal Lake enjoying the sunset.
• On 5th October, early morning we went for a Shikra ride and visited the famous floating market. After this we left Srinagar and drove towards Kargil. We drove through the Zoji La pass in the afternoon, visited the Kargil war memorial on the way and halted in Kargil.
• On 6th October, we drove from Kargil to Leh. On the way, we visited the Lamayuru monastery and checked out the mountains that resembled moon craters. We reached Leh in the afternoon and rested the day at the hotel.
• On 7th October, we drove to Pangong Tso Lake and stayed the night at Pangong Tso.
• On 8th October, we returned back to Thiksey and reached Dakpa House, a homestay. My astrophotography friends too arrived by flight on that day. I set up my astrophotography equipment and was able to capture some data on the 8th. The nights of the 9th and 10th were washed out with clouds and I could not do any photography. I and my friend did some local sightseeing in Leh on the 9th and 10th of October. We visited the Indus-Zanskar Confluence, Thiksey Monastery, Shey Palace, and Leh market. We enjoyed some local cuisine at Tibet Kitchen and Namza Dining.
• On 11th October, my friend took a flight back home and I drove to Hanle. My Astrophotography friends hired a couple of taxis and reached Hanle. We stayed in a place called Hor Cottages. We set up our equipment in the evening on the 11th. We had clear nights on the 11th, 12th, and 13th, and I got lots of good data on several deep space targets. On the 14th, we had bad weather and the sky was clouded till 10 PM. After this, the sky became clear, but we had very heavy winds. I was able to collect about half a night's worth of data on the 14th. On 13th October, I and another Astrophotographer friend Snehith hired a local guide and went birding for a few hours. We were able to spot and photograph several birds and a red fox. But we were unlucky in spotting the famous Palas Cats. On 14th October, I drove to Umling La. My friend Snehith joined me in this drive. We also took one of the taxi drivers to guide us through those unmarked roads.
• On 15th October, I packed up all my equipment and drove to Leh, and stayed the night there.
• On 16th October, I drove from Leh to Kargil and halted at Kargil. That day, I got a puncture on the rear left wheel. Fortunately, I found a puncture repair shop within 20 kilometers and was able to fix the puncture. This held well throughout my return drive.
• On 17th October, I drove from Kargil to Srinagar. Due to bad weather and heavy snow in the mountains, traffic in Zoji Las was halted. I had to wait several hours in freezing cold in Miniamarg before the road opened to traffic at 11 AM. Drove through ice and snow in Zoji La Pass and reached Srinagar in the afternoon. Rested in the hotel for the rest of the day. We had bad weather on this day too and there was heavy rain. I was monitoring the Twitter feed of J&K Police and found that there was a landslide after Banihal and traffic was closed. There was nothing to be done except wait for the road to be cleared and traffic to be allowed.
• On 18th October, I saw a message at 9 AM that traffic was restored between Srinagar and Jammu, and I started immediately. Except for an hour's traffic snarl near Banihal, this drive was quick. I reached Jammu at around 5 PM and halted for the night.
• On 19th October, I drove from Jammu to Amritsar. I spent the evening visiting the Golden Temple and enjoying local Punjabi food.
• On 20th October, I drove from Amritsar to Jaipur. Reached Jaipur around 6 PM. I had booked an Airbnb apartment for 4 nights. On the 21st of October morning, my family arrived in Jaipur by flight. We spent three days doing local sightseeing in Jaipur. We visited several places like the Palace, Museum, Nahargarh Fort, Amer Fort, and Jal Mahal, enjoyed lots of local cuisine like kachoris, gol gappas, kulfi falooda, and lal maans, and did some shopping too.
• On 24th October, my family took a flight back home and I started my drive back home. I halted in Indore, Solapur, and Bangalore on the 24th, 25th, and 26th nights and reached home by afternoon on the 27th of October, concluding the 28-day road trip.

Below is the map of the whole trip.


The below table shows destinations and distances covered on each day of the trip.

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As this is going to be a very long trip report covering 28 days, use the below index to skip to sections of interest.

Index

Planning and Preparation, and a Few Tips to Would Be Travelers
BMW 330i GT - The Hero of this Trip
Coimbatore to Udhampur, The Truck Driver's Life
Udhampur to Srinagar
Srinagar Sightseeing
Drive through Zoji La, and Kargil War Memorial
Kargil to Leh, Lamayuru Monastery and Moon Land
Pangong Tso Lake, and Astrophotography in Leh
Sightseeing in Leh
The Drive to Hanle
Birding in Hanle
Drive to Umling La
Astrophotography in Hanle
The Drive through Zoji La in Snow
The Drive from Srinagar to Amritsar, The Golden Temple, and the Drive from Amritsar to Jaipur
Sightseeing in Jaipur - Part 1
Sightseeing in Jaipur - Part 2
The Jaipur Cultural Experience - Food, Shopping, Folk Art etc.
Final Leg of the Road Trip, and Conclusion

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Planning and Preparation

Usually in our astrophotography group, we start planning almost 6 months before the trip. This includes planning equipment, targets to capture, flights to take, hotels to stay etc. I too started the preparations for this road trip 6 months in advance. There were several parts of the trip to be planned and prepared. I will go through all this briefly in this post.

Route Planning

My first version of the route to take was as below:

Onward: Coimbatore - Hyderabad - Nagpur - Gwalior - Agra - Chandigarh - Manali - Leh - Hanle
Return: Hanle - Leh - Manali - Chandigarh - Agra - Gwalior - Nagpur - Hyderabad - Coimbatore

However, I was told that the Manali - Leh route is risky as the route gets closed often due to snowfall in Rohtang Pass. Also, this route is more suited for an SUV with a higher GC. I was instead suggested to take the Jammu - Srinagar - Leh route. As this route is a highway taken by trucks too, this route is better suited for a sedan. The only risky sections would be the Zoji La pass and the Ramban and Banihal sections between Jammu and Srinagar. As the Navrathri holidays were coinciding roughly with my return dates, I also decided to add a 4-day break in Jaipur to have a family holiday. The initial plan was to spend a couple of days in Agra and Gwalior visiting the historical monuments (Gwalior fort, Taj Mahal, Fatehpur Sikhri etc.) in these places.

I made several tweaks over the 6 months time and finally made this route.

Onward: Coimbatore - Hyderabad - Nagpur - Agra - Jalandhar - Udhampur - Srinagar - Leh - Hanle
Return: Hanle - Leh - Srinagar - Jammu - Amritsar - Jaipur - Indore - Solapur - Bangalore - Coimbatore

I was prepared to make last-minute changes to the itinerary. Some changes I made dynamically to the trip were:

• Due to the Cauvery protests, I had to go via Vellore to Hyderabad on the first day
• Skipped Gwalior and Agra sightseeing and added Srinagar and Pangong Tso to the plan

Preparations for Astrophotography:

Initially, my plan was to use the same equipment that I used last year in Hanle. This included the EQ6-R Pro German Equatorial Mount. This mount is huge and occupies a lot of luggage space and weighs about 35 kilos. As roof boxes were banned in some of the states I had to drive through, I decided to remove the roof box from the GT. This greatly reduced usable luggage space in the car. When I did a mock fitting of luggage in the car, I found that it was not possible to fit all the equipment and other luggage for a month long road trip into the car.

So, just two months before the trip, I decided to get a portable setup for the trip. I bought the ZWO AM5 harmonic mount which has the same payload capacity of the EQ6 R Pro, but weighs just 5 kilos and is much more compact. I also decided to use a 250mm wide angle telescope setup. This resulted in all my equipment fitting in the same space that just the EQ6 R Pro would occupy.

The below picture shows the complete equipment setup assembled.


The below picture shows all the equipment disassembled and packed up.


As usual, I also did a dry run of assembling and disassembling the equipment in my living room.

https://youtu.be/jZrjoPSHXks

I had planned for 3 nights in Leh and 4 nights in Hanle, a total of 7 nights of astrophotography. For these 7 nights, I prepared the below list of targets to be captured. However, I lost 2 nights in Leh and half a night in Hanle to bad weather and could only get about 4.5 nights of data. I covered 6 of the targets from the original plan.



Preparing the Car

As my car is under BSI, BMW services the car only if the service requirement notification pops up in the iDrive. I was initially worried that some or other service requirement would come up in the middle of the trip. I was very lucky that oil service and front brake pads and disc service came up 2 weeks before the trip. The rear brake pads had some 4500 kilometers of life left (they would need replacement in the middle of the trip). But during service the service team at KUN, Coimbatore found that the rear pads and discs too had worn below specifications and they got approval from BMW to replace these too. This gave me total peace of mind with no worry about any service requirement in the middle of the trip.

The rear tires had only about 5K kilometers of life left. So, I changed both the rear tires and also used one of these tires mounted on a spare alloy wheel to get a full sized spare wheel.

I have covered this service in my 3GT ownership thread in the below link.

https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/long-...ml#post5633189

Other Essentials:

Hydraulic Jack: In the high altitude of Hanle and Umling La, at those low oxygen levels, it is tiring to even walk. I thought how hard it would be to use the factory supplied jack to lift the car and change the tire if need arised. The thought itself was terrifying. So, just a couple of days before the journey, I purchased a 2 ton hydraulic jack and loaded the car.

20 Liter Jerry Can: Between Leh and Hanle, the last petrol station is at Karu, which is about 225 kilometers from Hanle. I was planning to drive to Umling La which is 150 kilometer round trip from Hanle. So I will need a range of about 600 kilometers after topping up at Karu. With the bad roads that I needed to drive to Umling La and the high altitude and low oxygen levels, which may affect FE, it would be impossible to reach back Karu with a single tank of petrol. My friend RobiMahanta recommended that I carry at least 20 liters of spare petrol on the drive to Hanle. He also kindly lent me his 20 liter Jerry can. This came very handy. With the 20 liters of spare fuel which I filled in the tank after the Umling La drive, when I reached Karu on the return, I had about 30% of petrol in the tank.

Oxygen Canisters: Last year when I visited Umling La, I got severe cough and had to be put on oxygen therapy for a whole night. This was mainly due to the reason that we spent more than an hour in Umling La last year. This year, I decided to be very careful and spend only 15 minutes max at Umling La. Also, as a precaution, I thought of carrying some oxygen canisters. My friend and TBHPian @sud, kindly gave me several oxygen canisters that he had bought for his visit to Leh which were unused. These came handy in Pangong Tso when my friend had altitude sickness symptoms. More on this later.

Tent and Sleeping Bag: Last year, all astrophotographers suffered in the night without a place to rest when we had set up our equipment in front of the IIA (Indian Institute of Astrophysics) guest house. This year too we had an option to set up our equipment in front of IIA. So, I bought a tent and a sleeping bag rated for -10 degrees. I did not have to use them though, as we set up our equipment in the same place where we stayed just in front of our cottages.

Warm Clothes: With temperatures expected to dip as low as -10 degrees in October, I packed up several layers of warm clothes that included thermals, fleece pants, fleece jackets, woolen socks, 2 layers of gloves, a winter jacket rated for -10 degrees, balaclava and head and neck warmers.

All my astrophotography equipment and the full-size spare wheel filled the boot.


The hydraulic jack, jerry can, camera bag, and duffel bags of mine and my friend were placed in the rear seat. I took care in arranging the bags in such a way that they don't get thrown around.


With all this preparation done, ready to roll at 4:00 AM on the 30th of September 2023.


A few tips for people who plan for a road trip to Leh and Hanle (particularly sedans)

1. From the research I did, the best time would be September and early October (before 2nd week when winter starts setting). During this time, roads are mostly dry without any water crossings due to snow melt and with some careful driving, the bad sections can be easily done. I saw several sedans making it through these sections.
2. Stay in Udhampur during the onward journey. Leave very early, preferably by 5:00 or latest by 5:30. This way you will be able to beat the traffic build-up in the tunnels, Rambhan, and Banihal areas. These sections are traffic bottlenecks and once traffic builds up, takes more time to clear. Google Maps traffic will show red in these areas in the later part of the day than the early morning.
3. There are two checkpoints for Zoji La pass - Sonamarg on the way from Srinagar to Leh and Miniamarg from Leh to Srinagar. J&K police release a traffic advisory on their Twitter feed every day. In this advisory, they mention the timings when traffic will be open from both sides. Be at the checkpoint before the traffic opens. They allow cars and light vehicles to pass before letting heavy vehicles like lorries. It will be quicker to cross Zoji La if you get in before heavy vehicles which will slow down the traffic.
4. If traffic opens at 7:00 AM from the Srinagar side, then plan your stay at Sonamarg. It takes about 2 to 2.5 hours to reach Sonamarg from Srinagar. Similarly, if traffic opens at 7:00 AM on the Miniamarg side, better to stay in Dras or Kargil to be able to reach the check post in time.
5. At the high altitudes of Leh and Hanle, staying hydrated is crucial. Keep on sipping water. Add some electrolyte supplements (Electral or other sugar-free electrolytes). This will keep symptoms like headaches minimum. I used to consume 3 to 4 liters of water every day, and also a portion of sugar-free electrolytes. I did not face any high altitude symptoms.

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BMW 330i GT - The Hero of this Trip

Before I start this travelogue, I would like to dedicate one post for my 330i GT which I consider as the hero of this trip. The car handled all types of terrain - smooth 6-lane highways, pothole-filled roads in Madhya Pradesh, bad roads of Zoji La, high altitude and low temperature at Umling La, ice and slush in Zoji La on the return, that we had to cross during this 4-week trip without breaking a sweat. Innumerable people who I met on the road while in Ladakh were surprised that I drove there in a low-slung sedan. In the 8600 kilometers, I drove the car in 4 weeks, I experienced underbody scraping only on 3 occasions, which were extreme conditions. Sharing a few pictures of the 3GT in various terrains throughout the trip in this post. I will post these pictures again in the relevant posts that cover those particular sections.

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Coimbatore to Udhampur, The Truck Driver's Life

The first four days of the drive were more of a truck driver's life when we drove almost 1000km each day, except the fourth day when we drove about 400 km. We would start driving early morning by 5:00 or 6:00 and drive till 6:00 or 8:00 in the evening. We kept these first few days dynamic. We used to decide the location to halt by late afternoon depending on the distance covered and energy left and booked our rooms. The only criteria I had in finalizing the hotels was if the hotel had safe parking. As I had to leave all my astrophotography equipment in the car, this was very important.

I did not keep accurate records of start and stop times, distance traveled every day, fuel consumption, etc. I did take pictures of the trip meter on some of the days. But on days when we were too tired, I used to forget. So, after a couple of days, I decided not to track these statistics. Apologies for the same.

My initial plan was to spend a couple of days around Gwalior and Agra doing some local sightseeing and arrive in Leh on the 8th. But on the 2nd day of the drive, we decided to skip Gwalior and Agra and instead spend a couple of days more in Leh so that we could drive to Pangong Tso which was not in the original plan. We also decided to add some sightseeing in Srinagar.

Day #1, September 29th: Coimbatore to Hyderabad

I and my friend started from Coimbatore at 4:30 AM and reached Hyderabad by 8:00 PM. The initial plan was to drive through Bangalore. But just the day before, there was a bandh in Bangalore due to the Cauvery issue. All my friends advised me to not take the Bangalore route with a Tamilnadu-registered car. So, we took the Coimbatore - Vellore - Kurnool - Hyderabad route instead. This increased the distance by about 100km and time too by a couple of hours as we had to drive through 2 lane roads after Vellore for more than 100km. We stayed in a small service apartment type of accommodation called Lime Boutique Suites. Had our dinner and went to bed at around 10:00. Started driving at 5:30 the next day.

Day #2, October 1st: Hyderabad to Sagar

On day #2, we wanted to push till Jhansi if possible. However, once we entered Madhya Pradesh, the road conditions became very bad. For almost a 100km stretch, the road was filled with deep potholes due to which we had to slow down a lot, and our average speed dropped heavily. So we decided to halt at Sagar. We stayed in a hotel called Vardan and started the drive early at 5:30.

Day #3, October 2nd: Sagar to Ambala

We hit the worst roads in the first few kilometers as we were trying to get out of Sagar onto the highway. For a 10km stretch, the roads were totally broken, and it took us almost an hour to cover this stretch. After driving through this section of road, every other stretch I had to do in Zoji La and Umling La felt so easy. Even after getting on the highway, the road conditions were horrible for a couple of hours. It took us 2 hours to cover the first 40km. After this, road conditions became smooth and we were able to cruise at 100.

We crossed Agra at 3:30 PM and bought a few boxes of the famous Pethas. We hit the Yamuna Expressway at 4 PM. This was one of the best stretches where we were able to cover a good distance in a short time. We took the Eastern Peripheral Expressway to bypass Delhi and had a nice dinner in a dhabha outside Delhi. The initial plan was to halt at Panipat. But I decided to push till Ambala. We reached Ambala at around 10 PM. We stayed in a hotel called Hotel Golden Orchid. As we had a relatively short drive to Udhampur the next day, we decided to take it easy and started at 7:30 AM the next day.

Day #4, October 3rd: Ambala to Udhampur, and Mansar Lake

The drive was uneventful on this day. We had very good roads all the way to Udhampur, except for some bad stretches after we exited from NH-44 and entered Jammu and Kashmir. About 40 KM before Udhampur, we crossed a lake called Mansar Lake. There was a small park with rides etc. We spent some time in this park and continued the drive to Udhampur. We reached Udhampur at around 5:30 in the evening. As we decided to start driving at 5:00 AM the next day to beat the traffic in the Ramban and Banihal stretches, we had an early dinner and went to bed.

A few pictures from these four days of drive.

Masala chai somewhere near Nagpur.


The 3GT crossed 1 lakh kilometers somewhere after Nagpur.


Parathas and Poha for breakfast near Jhansi!




Picking up pethas from Agra.




Kullad chai in Yamuna Expressway.


Simple, yet tasty food in a dhaba outside Delhi.




Sunrise from the hotel room in Ambala.


Black coffee and sandwich in a Barista somewhere in Punjab.


Lunch in a dhaba somewhere in Punjab.


Tea and bun near Udhampur.


Mansar Lake.


Feeding the fish at Mansar Lake.


The fish. Locals consider these fish as God.


Awakening the child inside. Enjoying some rides in the park near Mansar Lake.




The below video shows the worst section of the road we faced outside Sagar. Took us an hour to cross 10 kilometers in this stretch.

https://youtu.be/hYvJ13sK6bk

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Udhampur to Srinagar

Day #5, October 4th: Udhampur to Srinagar

The interesting and adventurous part of the drive started this day. I had heard a lot about the traffic snarls around the Ramban and Banihal areas and the bad roads that had to be tackled. I had also been told by a few friends to start early to beat traffic. So we started driving at 5:30 AM from Udhampur. We reached the entrance of Dr. Shyamprasad Mukherjee tunnel at around 6:30AM.

Dr. Shyamprasad Mukherjee Tunnel or Chenani - Nashri tunnel is India's longest road tunnel with a length of 9.28 km and the country's first tunnel with a fully integrated tunnel control system. It reduces the distance between Jammu and Srinagar by 30 km and travel time by two hours. The all-weather tunnel bypasses snowfall and avalanche-prone areas in winter at places like Patnitop, Kud, and Batote that obstruct NH 44 every winter and cause long queues of vehicles; sometimes for days. It was an awesome experience driving through this tunnel. There are two tunnels each for one side of traffic, and it was relaxing to drive at a constant speed of 50 kmph.

There were a few more tunnels of various lengths, at various stages of development. Also, till Banihal, a lot of construction work is underway with very bad road conditions. However, the 3GT was able to cross these sections without any issues. There were several traffic snarls caused due to narrow road sections or nomads with their herds of sheep crossing the roads etc. Banihal was a big bottleneck. Due to the narrow road running through the town, it took almost an hour to cross the 5km stretch. Once we crossed Banihal, it was a smooth 4-lane highway to Srinagar. However, in this section, we were frequently stopped by the side of the road to allow army trucks to pass.

It took us 6:30 hours to cover the 180km to Srinagar. We reached Srinagar by 1:00 PM.

I had booked an AirBnb cottage near Dal lake. We thought of having our lunch at Ahdoos and then proceeding to the AirBnb. However, as we could not find a parking space near the restaurant, we changed our plan and went to the AirBnb, checked-in and took an auto to the restaurant. We came back to the cottage and rested for an hour. In the evening, we hired an auto and visited the Shankaracharya temple and Dal Lake to view the sunset.

And now a few pictures from the day.

Traffic jam. We had several such jams till Banihal.


During one of these traffic jams, I saw the moon was about to set behind the mountain. I used this opportunity and shot these pictures of the moon setting using the 500mm telephoto lens.





Nomads crossing with their herd of sheep.


Another group of nomads and another traffic jam.


When we crossed Banihal, this was the trip statistics. It had taken more than 4 hours to cover 90km. Of this, the first 30 kilometers were covered in 30 minutes.


They had converted a 4km stretch of the highway into a runway.


A short video that shows some of the aspects of the drive from Udhampur to Srinagar through Ramban and Banihal.

https://youtu.be/e1PfgosQ4t0

A few pictures of the Airbnb cottage.








Ahdoos restaurant. It's a very famous place for having Kashmiri Wazwan, a feast.


The Wazwan is a feast with many types of gravies, rice and kebab.


The smile on our faces tells it all.


After lunch, we returned back to the cottage and rested for a while.

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Srinagar Sightseeing

As we had only one evening in Srinagar, we decided to keep it simple and chose just a couple of places to visit.

Shankaracharya Temple and Sunset in Dal Lake

The Shankaracharya temple is situated on the top of Shankaracharya hill. There is a Shiva temple on the top with beautiful views of the city of Srinagar. It was about 6km drive to the hill top. It was a good decision to hire an auto. As there was lot of tourist rush, parking was very tight at the top of the hill. We had to climb 200+ steps beyond the parking lot to reach the temple. A few pictures of the temple and the views of Srinagar.

The steep steps leading to the temple.


The temple.


View of Srinagar from the hill top.






After Shankaracharya temple, we visited the Dal lake to view the sunset. Dal lake is filled with boats of various sizes. It was a beautiful sight of these boats and the shadows they cast on the lake in the evening sun. A few pictures of the boats and the sunset.

















After this, we returned back to our Airbnb. We had some street food near the AirBnb before hitting the bed.


TBHPian Megazond and Mrs. Megazoid had recommended that we do not miss taking a Shikra ride early in the morning and visit the floating market. Mrs. Megazoid also gave the contact of Mr. Rashid who owned a Shikra. We called him and he asked us to come to the lake at 4:30 in the morning to ride to the floating market.

Shikra Ride and the Floating Market

We reached the shore of the lake at 4:30 and Mr. Rashid was waiting for us. We immediately got onto the Shikra. As he paddled and steered the Shikra, we saw boat houses lined on one side. He took us through small lanes where there were floating shops and houses. After about 45 minutes of paddling, he reached a spot and stopped there. Within 10 minutes several boats started arriving. The first to arrive was a Kashmiri Kahwa vendor. He parked his boat by our Shikra and offered us freshly made hot Kahwa. Having piping hot Kahwa in that early morning cold was bliss. After this, several boats started arriving. There were vendors selling chocolates, flowers, vegetables, and souvenirs. From Mr. Rashid, we came to know that this is more of a tourist attraction. All these vendors come to this spot in the morning and stay there for about an hour. After this, they go back to the land where they have their shops. It was a great experience to see all these boats loaded with merchandise in one place.

A few pictures from this Shikra ride.

Mr. Rashid waiting at the lake.


A view from the Shikra.


Fresh hot Kawah being made.


Hot Kawah in that cold was bliss.


Flowers.


Turnips.


Souvenirs.


Vegetables.


Trying my hand at paddling the Shikra. I paddled for almost 15 minutes. Had some muscle soreness for the next two days.

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Drive through Zoji La and Kargil War Memorial

Day #6, October 5th: Srinagar to Kargil through Zoji La

After the Shikra ride, we returned to the cottage, packed our stuff, and started the drive. Per the J&K police Twitter feed, traffic from Sonamarg to Kargil would be allowed at 1:00 PM. As my friend Mr. Prabhu had advised, we wanted to be at Sonamarg at 12:00 noon and be early in line when the traffic opens. We reached Sonamarg at 12:00 as planned. But on that day, due to clear weather and dry road conditions, traffic from both sides was being allowed to pass. So, we were allowed to continue.

The road condition was good in the beginning followed by a fair bit of cobbled sections. We were able to maintain decent speeds in these sections. A few kilometers before the summit, we encountered broken roads which continued till a few kilometers past the summit. After this, road conditions improved. As we reached the foothills, and exited Zoji La section, we were on butter smooth tarmac that ran all the way till Leh.

I had heard a lot about bad road conditions on Zoji La and about the need to drive very cautiously on the road to avoid underbody hits in a sedan. However, I found the road to be quite manageable. Except for a few places with very deep craters, it was not different from the bad roads I have faced in the South. Also, after driving through that bad section outside Sagar, this felt like a walk in the park

We were able to cross Zoji La very quickly in an hour's time (we took some breaks to take some pictures of the landscape) and reached Dras by 3:00 PM. The initial plan was to halt at Dras. But as we reached Dras very early, we decided to drive to Kargil and stay in Kargil. On the way to Kargil, we stopped for a couple of hours at the Kargil War Memorial.

A few pictures of the drive through Zoji La.

Busy Sonamarg village.


A beautiful scenery of grasslands in Sonamarg. On my return, this was completely covered in snow. More on that later.


A couple of beautiful views of the mountains on the way to the summit.




The GT at the summit.


Once we got to the other side, it was butter-smooth roads till Leh.


A short video of the drive through Zoji La.

https://youtu.be/rKnetplt4Hg

Kargil War Memorial

Because of the extreme cold weather conditions during winter, it was a practice of Indian and Pakistan armies to vacate some of the forward posts and re-occupy in summer. But in 1999, Pakistan army breached this mutual trust and occupied some of the key Indian posts 10 to 12 km crossing the line of control. With control of these posts, they could sever the road links between Srinagar and Ladakh and Siachen glaciers. The intrusion areas included Dras, Kargil, Batalik, Chorbatla and Turtuk sectors. The Indian army quickly responded and mobilised close to 30,000 troops. Several attacks were made on the occupied posts and the posts were reclaimed. The operations carried out by the Army was called Operation Vijay, in which 559 soldiers sacrificed their lives. The Kargil War Memorial was built in 2004, in memory of these soldiers who laid their life during operation Vijay.

Inside the memorial, there is a museum that displays scale models of various peaks that were occupied and how these peaks were recaptured, last communication from the soldiers (who laid their lives) to their families like wives, parents, friends, weapons and ammunitions recovered from the defeated Pakistan army etc. They also screened a small documentary on the Kargil war. We left the memorial with heavy hearts and tears in the eyes. As we were not allowed to take pictures inside the museum, I could only click a few pictures of the outside views in the memorial.















After visiting Kargil war memorial, we reached Kargil around 6 in the evening. We had booked a room at Zoji La Residency in Kargil. We had a sumptuous dinner and went to bed.

[graaja]

Kargil to Leh, Lamayuru Monastery and Moon Land

On the 6th of October, as we had to drive only about 225 kilometers to Leh, we took it easy. We had breakfast at the hotel and left at 8:00 AM. The drive to Leh was very good through absolutely smooth tarmac with beautiful scenery.

We stopped at several locations to admire the scenery and take pictures. We visited the monastery at Lamayuru and spent some time admiring the rock formation that resembles the moon's surface. We reached Leh at around 5:00 PM. We stayed at the Indus Valley Hotel which was very close to Leh market. We went to Tibetan Kitchen and had some momos, Tibetan rice buns, and lamb. Finished off with ice cream with dry fruits sauteed in butter and retired for the day.

Starting the day with a simple breakfast.


The grand view of Lamayuru monastery on a hilltop amongst the mountains. We visited the monastery, but could not take any pictures inside the monastery as photography was not allowed.


Prayer wheels outside the monastery.


View of the valley from the monastery.


Moon Land. The mountains resemble the mountains on the surface of the moon.


Another view of the moon land.


The GT in front of the mountains.


A selfie with the GT.


The GT with rocks.


Another view of mountains on the way.


Buttersmooth tarmac all the way to Leh.


The road winding along the mountains.


As we neared Leh, the road ran along the mighty Indus River.


A panorama of the Indus River and the greenery along the river just before entering Leh.


Magnetic hill.


We parked the car at the designated spot, but could not feel anything strange. As we did not know what to look for or feel for, we could not experience the magic of the magnetic hill.


Cozy room at The Indus Valley Hotel.


Went to Tibetan Kitchen for dinner.


Momos, tibetan buns and lamb gravy and ice cream with dry fruits in butter.

[graaja]

Pangong Tso Lake, and Astrophotography in Leh

Day #8, October 7th: Pangong Tso Lake

In my initial plan, we were supposed to reach Leh on the 8th, spend 3 days/nights in Leh for sightseeing and astrophotography, and then 4 nights in Hanle. I had initially thought to include a visit to Pangong Tso on one of these days.

Between Leh, Hanle and Pangong Tso, there are two routes. The first route is from Leh to Pangong through Kharu and Chang La. This section is known to have decent roads except for some broken roads around Chang La, which can be managed with a sedan. The second route is between Pangong and Hanle via Chusul. This route has almost 50 kilometers of drive through unpaved tracks. Every review that I read suggested this road is suitable for SUVs with high ground clearance. Dr. AD and Robimahanta who had visited Leh earlier and had traveled this section in a rented cab too advised me to avoid this stretch. Though I was confident the car could do this stretch if there were no slush or deep water crossings (which would be the case in October), driving through 50 kilometers of unpaved surface would be quite tiring and I would have lost one night of astrophotography too. So, I dropped Pangong Tso from the plan. I was quite unhappy that I would not be able to visit Pangong after driving all the way to Leh.

However, as we reached Leh two days earlier than planned, I decided to bring Pangong back into the plan and drive to Pangong on 7th.

As it was a 4-hour drive to Pangong, we had a relaxed breakfast at the hotel and started driving at 9:00.

We faced mixed road conditions. The roads alternated between smooth tarmac and rough road stretches. We crossed some bad roads around Chang La and again after Durbuk. We also drove through some butter-smooth roads. It was a joy driving through these sections. We stopped at several places to admire the scenery. We had piping hot Maggi on the way in a small village and reached Snow Pine Cottages around 3:00 PM. As this was the end of the season, the cottages were empty. Other than I and my friend in one cottage, only one other cottage was occupied. Most of the cottages and homestays had already closed. The manager at Snow Pine told us that they will also be closing after the 13th when they have one batch of tourists coming in. After this, they will open only after March.

In the evening we drove down to the lake and took some pictures of the lake, the GT, and some selfies. They prepared a huge dinner at the homestay and we had a sumptuous dinner. In the night, I set up my camera and took a timelapse of the stars and clouds over Pangong Tso with the moon and Venus rising over the lake.

We faced very low temperatures. The temperature dropped below freezing in the night. There was no electricity. They have a generator that runs between 7PM to 11PM. After 11PM, the generator is turned off and there is no light or heat source in the rooms.

We faced one problem. In the night, due to the combination of high altitude and low temperature, my friend developed some altitude sickness symptoms like headache and difficulty breathing. We used the small oxygen canisters. But these canisters ran out of oxygen after very quickly. Fortunately, they had a bigger oxygen tank at the cottages and after about 15 minutes of breathing oxygen, the symptoms reduced. This experience prompted me to hire an oxygen tank from Thiksey before the drive to Hanle.

We left Pangong at 8:00AM and reached Dakpa House in Thiksey at 11:30AM.

A few pictures from this drive.

The view of the road running along mountain side on the way to Chang La.


The GT in Chang La.


Broken roads with loose stones.


Piping hot Maggi on the way to Pangong.


The GT parked at Snowpine Cottages.


Sumptuous dinner at Snowpine Cottages.


The view of the Pangong Lake with those multi-colored mountains in the background is grand. Photographs can't do justice to the scenery. A few pictures of the scenery at Pangong Tso.










I got several pictures of the GT both on the way and at Pangong..












And a few selfies.






A short video summarising the drive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Esp4FmgiFk0

Astrophotography in Leh

On the 8th of October, after lunch and afternoon rest, I started setting up my astrophotography equipment in front of our Homestay. We had a clear sky on the 8th of October. But there was moonlight in the 2nd half of the night. So, I only collected data on some deep space targets for half the night. I continued data collection in Hanle.

One of the astrophotographers Mr. Mahadevan in the BAS group is an expert in Milky Way photography. He usually scouts nearby locations for good foreground scenery for framing the Milky Way. He found a spot a few 100 meters from the property with Indus River and snow-capped mountains. He showed this location to others in the group as well. In the night, I took my DSLR to capture a timelapse of the Milky Way with this scenery. But unfortunately, after shooting a few frames, clouds rolled in. So, I could not finish the timelapse. Instead, I processed a few single frames of the Milky Way with this foreground.

On the nights of 9th and 10th October, the weather became worse and the sky was covered in clouds. So, I could not do any more astrophotography in Leh.

One of the days, I and my friend went to the same spot along the Indus River to spend some time admiring the beautiful scenery. There was also a small monastery atop a small hill in the backdrop of the Indus River. I clicked some pictures of this location and also captured a couple of timelapses.

The Astrophotography equipment in action.


The equipment early morning, with the Moon and Venus in background.


The Indus and the Monastery.


A timelapse in progress.


Milky Way with Indus and snow-capped mountains, with some clouds photobombing.


A timelapse of clouds over Indus River with a Monastery on a hill in the backdrop.

https://youtu.be/ab8ygnbbYPw

[graaja]

Sightseeing in Leh

On 9th and 10th October, I and my friend did some sightseeing around Leh.

Indus - Zanskar Sangam or Confluence

Some 25 kilometers from Leh on the way to Kargil, near Nimmu village, Zanskar, a tributary of the Indus River, merges with the Indus. At the confluence point, both rivers' distinct colors can be seen. A few pictures

The view of the Indus River flowing through a canyon a few kilometers before the Sangam.


The confluence point. Note the distinct colors of both the rivers. The darker one is the Indus and the lighter one is Zanskar.




There was a Cafe and steps to get to the exact point of confluence. We did not go there though.



Thiksey Monastery

Thiksey Monastery or Thiksey Gompa is a Buddhist monastery located on the top of a hill in Thiksey. It is a twelve-storey complex and houses many items of Buddhist art such as stupas, statues, thangkas, wall paintings, and swords. One of the main points of interest is the Maitreya Temple installed to commemorate the visit of the 14th Dalai Lama to this monastery in 1970; it contains a 15 metres (49 ft) high statue of Maitreya, the largest such statue in Ladakh, covering two stories of the building.

The grand view of the mountains and plains from the monastery.




Prayer wheels.


The view of a few of the storeys in the monastery.


The walls were adorned with several paintings.










Maitreya temple: The face of Maitreya is visible as we enter. This temple had a very peaceful vibe. As there were no other tourists around, I and my friend sat inside the temple for about 15 minutes in meditation soaking in the peaceful atmosphere.


The front side of Maitreya statue.


The 15-meter statue spans two storeys.


Near Thiksey Monastery, found this neat avenue with trees on either side with fall colors. Clicked a picture of the GT with these colors.


Shey Palace and Monastery

Shey Monastery or Gompa and the Shey Palace complex are structures located on a hillock in Shey, 15 kilometers to the south of Leh. Shey was the summer capital of Ladakh in the past. It contains a huge Shakyamuni Buddha statue. It is the second-largest Buddha statue in Ladakh. The original palace, now in ruins, was built near the Shey village by Lhachen Palgyigon, the king of Ladakh (then called Maryul), in the 10th century.

The current Shey Palace and Monastery were built in 1655 on the instructions of Deldan Namgyal, in memory of his late father, Sengge Namgyal, below the first palace. Most of the sections of the palace were closed to tourists. The only section open was the monastery with the huge Buddha statue.

The palace building.




Prayer wheels at Shey Palace.


The Gold color Buddha statue spans two storeys.




View from Shey palace.


A huge statue near Shey Palace. I am not sure who this statue is of.


Visited Gesmo bakery and had grilled Himalayan Trout, pizza, and their famous apple pie.


I also packed a couple of boxes of their tasty cookies for the group to be had in Hanle.


At Dakpa house, when we were talking with Mr. Sonam, the owner of Dakpa house, I asked him about a good place to have local Ladakhi food. He suggested a place called Namza Dining. We visited this place for lunch one of the days and had some yummy Ladakhi food.

The food we had. The dish on the left side is the starter called Tsilkam. This was made of sausages made of mutton with a tasty dip and bread. The dish on the top right was Yarkhandi Pulav, local Ladakhi Pulav mildly flavored, soaked in ghee with tender pieces of mutton. We also had a blueberry cheesecake for dessert.


The menu explaining these dishes.

[graaja]

The Drive to Hanle

On the 11th of October morning, the Astrophotography team packed up our equipment. I loaded up the equipment in my car and the team hired two taxis for the drive to Hanle. My friend left for Coimbatore by flight.

Before we left, we took some customary group pictures with the Dakpa house team.

With Mr. Sonam, the owner of Dakpa house and his Triumph Tiger motorcycle. He does lots of rides to nearby mountains and is also an avid hiker.


The Astrophotography team with Mr. Sonam and Ms. Nadiya who manages the reservations at Dakpa House.


I had tanked up the GT on 10th, and had also filled the 20 liter jerry can that Robi had given me.

The drive to Hanle was awesome. Last year, after Chumatang, there was road construction work happening for a stretch of about 20 kilometers. This year, most of the construction was complete and I had to tackle only about 5 kilometers of bad roads. Other than these 5 kilometers, I had smooth roads till Hanle. In Hanle, I had to drive through some bad roads to reach our place of stay, The Hor Cottage.

In the first part of the drive to Chumatang, the road runs along the Indus River and there is greenery along the river. After crossing Chumatang and Nyoma, the terrain becomes flat and dry with no greenery.

Road running along the Indus River.


A few pictures of the scenery. Pictures can't do justice.








A few pictures of the GT from the drive.






Hot noodles at Nyoma. Spot the GT.


Place of Stay - The Hor Cottage

Last year during the Astrophotography trip to Hanle, we stayed in a homestay called Milky Way near the IIA (Indian Institute of Astrophysics) guest house and set up equipment near the IIA guest house. As the place of stay was different from the place of setting up equipment, we used to go to the IIA guest house in the evening and stay there throughout the night. Unlike visual observers who spend the whole night out in the field observing, astrophotographers do not need to be out in the field the whole night. We have to be out only in the beginning to set up and start the equipment and then occasionally check if the equipment was working fine. So we need a place to rest when not in the field. Last year, we did not have a place to rest in the night. We had to spend the night in the dining room without a chance to lie down and sleep.

So this year, we started looking for a place where we could set up our equipment close to the place of stay. Mr. Subhendu and Mr. Sudhash of BAS found this new place called Hor Cottages which was situated about 6 kilometers outside Hanle village in the middle of nowhere, with an open space right in front of the cottages to set up equipment. There were 5 cottages available and we booked all 5. So we had the whole place to ourselves.

This decision worked in our favor and also against us. We were able to rest during nights as the equipment were working with data capture. But we had a problem with the continuous availability of power. In Hanle, power is available only from 7 PM to 11 PM. At Hor Cottage, they have a diesel generator which they had promised they would turn on throughout the night. On one of the nights, the generator ran the whole night. But on other nights, there was some problem or other and we would not have power throughout the night.

However, as I had taken my 100AH LiFePO4 battery pack to power the equipment, I was not affected by this problem and was able to run the equipment on all 4 nights I was there.

Another problem we faced (not specific to Hor Cottage) was water freezing in the pipes. We saw temperatures below freezing on all the nights we were there. It would be -2 degrees early in the night and drop to -8.5 degrees by early morning. This resulted in water freezing in the pipes and we would not have running water in the bathrooms. Only in the afternoon after the sun warmed up the pipes, we used to get water.

A picture of The Hor Cottage I took from a few kilometers far while on birding. See how there are no buildings nearby.


The cottages up close.


The inside of the cottage was compact but cozy.


The dome-like structure was the dining hall.


My astrophotography equipment was set up in front of the cottage where I stayed.


View of the equipment covered up during daytime.


Water frozen in the tap.

[graaja]

Birding in Hanle

On the 13th of October, I and Snehith, a friend and fellow astrophotographer went for a few hours of birding in the morning. We hired a local birding guide Mr. Sonam who took us to known birding spots. We spotted and photographed several bird species.

We also were eagerly looking forward to photographing the famous Palas cats. But luck was not on our side that day. When we reached the spot where a family of Palas cats were known to reside, we could not find them. Mr. Sonam said they should have gone out in the field hunting for field rats. We spent an hour trying to locate them, with Mr. Sonam scanning the plains with his binoculars, but could not find them. We finally gave up and returned back to the cottage.

A few pictures from this birding trip.

A buzzard perched on a rocky hill.




Yours truly shooting the buzzard.


A couple of ducks in flight.






A hill pigeon.


Black-necked crane.




A wagtail.




We spotted a red fox afar. It was looking for prey. It found a field mouse in the rocks. It was game over for the mouse within a few seconds.






A rock eagle owl.


A field mouse peeps out of a hole.


A furry yak.


The guide searching for Palas cats.


As the guide was searching for Palas cats, Snehith shooting some ducks.


With my friend Snehith.


I also shot some scenery around Hanle.

The reflection of mountains in a small pond.


The Hanle village at the foothills of huge mountains.


The HCT (Himalayan Chandra Telescope) on the top of a hill.


The Hanle Monastery on the top of a hill with huge mountains in the backdrop.


The Hor Cottage from afar.

[graaja]

Drive to Umling La

Umling La pass, also widely called as The Himalays of motorists, is a pass situated at an altitude of 5882 meters (19300 feet). This is also the highest motorable road in the world.

Last year during the astrophotography trip to Hanle, I visited the Umling La with others in an Innova. We had made the mistake of staying for a long time at Umling La because of which I got a severe cough and had to rest for a whole night with an oxygen concentrator. Details of this incident can be found in the below post.

https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...ml#post5419209 (In Search of Nebulae and Galaxies – An Astrophotography Trip to Hanle and Leh)

During that trip, I had dreamt of my 3GT at the summit. This dream came true on the 14th of October., when I drove the 3GT to Umling La. My friend Snehith also joined me. We took of of the drivers of the taxis the others had rented in Leh, as a guide.

When I got my GT serviced just before the road trip, the service manager mentioned another 3GT (a 320d) owner who had driven his GT to Umling La in June. I spoke to him on the phone and he told me about an issue he had faced with his GT. His car started giving some engine-related warning when he crossed the altitude which marks the height of Everest base camp. Once this warning happened he felt a loss of power and had to drive slow and stop on several occasions. The warning went away on the return when he crossed this altitude. My friend Mr. Prabhu who had done the same trip with his XUV500 also said about some warnings in his car at higher altitudes.

The service manager assured me that my car being a Petrol car, should not face these issues. And thankfully I did not face any problems on the drive. The car performed fantastic throughout the trip, both in handling the rough terrain and the high altitude and low temperature. I did not feel any loss of power or any warnings.

There are two routes to Umling La from Hanle. The first is through Photi-La. This route has a proper tarred road and is 90 kilometers one way. The other route is through the plains and Nurbu La, which is about 63 kilometers long. The first 25 kilometers to Nurbu La is through unpaved plains only marked by wheel tracks. This route is considered more adventurous and is chosen by most who visit Umling La. However, one needs to be very careful in following the posts that are planted on the side of these tracks. After Nurbu La the path joins a proper road which is smooth the rest of the way. I chose to take the adventurous route. As we took the driver who knew this path, we were not worried about getting lost.

We started from Hor Cottage at around 9 AM. The first 25 kilometers through the plains took about an hour and a half and was quite stressful. There were lots of sections where the road surface was very uneven and I had to be very slow and careful. In the switchbacks leading to Nurbu La, there was loose sand which resulted in some wheel spins and ESP warnings. But once we joined the tarred road at Nurbu La, it was smooth sailing after that. We covered the rest of the distance in an hour. It took us 2.5 hours to reach Umling La. As planned, we spent just 15 minutes at Umling La taking pictures and returned back. We were back to base at 2:30 PM in time for lunch.

A few pictures from this drive. As the GT is the hero of this drive, most of the pictures have the car in the frame.

The view from Nurbu La top.




Pictures of the GT from the drive.














The GT at the summit. Mission accomplished.


Some selfies.

At the location where the altitude is the same as Everest base camp.


With the GT


With my friend Snehith.


With the driver who guided me through the unmarked route.


A short video showing the various types of roads driven through. Thanks to my friend Snehith for shooting the last part of the video of the arrival at Umling La.

https://youtu.be/-m2nqWuwWhA

[graaja]

Astrophotography in Hanle

I was in Hanle for 4 nights from the 11th of October to the 14th of October. Of these 4 nights, the first three nights were crystal clear and I was able to collect data the whole night on these days. On the night of the 14th of October, we had bad weather, and the sky was clouded in the evening. The sky became clear at around 10 PM, but the weather remained windy. I only got about 5 hours of data on this night.

However compared to 4 of 5 nights being washed out the previous year, 3.5 nights out of 4 was a very good turnout. Apart from shooting deep space objects using my telescope, I also shot a couple of timelapse videos of the Milky Way and Venus and Zodiacal light.

Following are the pictures I shot. I am posting just the pictures and name of the deep space objects here. I have documented details of these targets, exposure details, equipment details etc. in my Astrophotography thread in the link below.

https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/shift...ml#post5655490 (Rendezvous with The Universe | My Astrophotography Hobby)

Heart and Soul Nebula


North American and Pelican Nebulae


SADR Region


Spaghetti Nebula


Veil Nebula Complex


Witch Head Nebula


Sagittarius arm of the Milky Way. This is the view of our Milky Way towards the center of the galaxy, which is rich in stars and nebulae.


Perseus arm of the Milky Way with airglow. This is the view of the Milky Way towards the edge of the galaxy. Hence this view is less dense in both stars and nebulae.


Venus and Zodiacal light.


Below is a video compilation of the astrophotography in both Leh and Hanle.

https://youtu.be/E_vblDjZ2j4