A post-lockdown car tour that recaptured the thrill of travel and adventure was an exploration of routes that Google Maps was yet to discover
Check it out: a silver SUV with a moka pot balanced on its bonnet, bubbling with fresh, hot coffee. A rumbling stream, acres of snowy peaks, fresh mountain air, and miles of none. It’s literally somewhere in the middle.
Traveling again, after months of lockdown, we were determined to find unexplored roads as we drove from our home in Mumbai to Ladakh: routes that Google Maps has yet to find. Despite our teeth chattering, as we battled snow and ice up and down the Shinku-la Pass, our purpose was served: not a single soul.
Being our only car on the road meant we had to be self-sufficient. We packed, among other things, a stove, and an electric moka pot that powered off an inverter connected to the car’s battery. With it we can park at any beautiful place that strikes our fancy and drink delicious tea or coffee, often drawing water from a nearby stream.
how it started
Having always enjoyed road trips, in this age of COVID-19 and physical distancing, the freedom they provide can be truly appreciated. The last time I boarded a flight was in January 2020. Despite this, after the relaxation of Lockdown 1.0 in September 2020, I have traveled by road from Mumbai to Kashmir, Kerala, Uttarakhand and Ladakh.
After months of lockdown last year, when going even beyond my neighborhood seemed ambitious, being behind the wheel on the open highway was a treat. Because we were on a road trip and the masters of where we wanted to go, we could choose destinations that weren’t crowded, where physical distancing was provided. So camping became a big part of many of our trips. When we didn’t camp, we’d find secluded spots, which inevitably involved an uphill expedition that often required raging rivers.
During Lockdown 2.0, as we sat confined in Mumbai, drenched in the summer heat, our minds often turned to the windy valleys and lofty mountain ranges of Ladakh. But the power of the virus had scared us.
We decided that if we wanted to get out even after being fully vaccinated, the car would have to be our cocoon. I was planning to maintain minimal contact with the outside world. We slept in the car at a stop between Mumbai and Delhi and crashed into a friend’s house in Chandigarh.
The route was from Mumbai to Indore to Agra to Delhi to Chandigarh to Naggar – a distance of about 2,000 kilometres.
Manali would have been the most logical place to take a vacation, however, as pictures of hordes of tourists in Manali appeared on my social media feeds, and I decided there was no way we were going to get out. Instead, we stayed at Sonaghi Homestead, 22 km from Manali, eight kilometers from Naggar in Himachal Pradesh. The reason for this is that Sonaghi Homestead stands secluded in a forest and away from any town or town.
Ladakh closed its borders last year and tourists are seeing large numbers of tourists flocking to the 430-km-long Manali-Leh road.
But I was determined to take a path that had recently been cut off from the mountains. This route goes from Darcha to Padum (in Zanskar) and then further to Kargil.
We started from Sonaghi Homestead, crossed Manali and took the Atal Tunnel leading under Rohtang Pass.
We were at Jispa, the last habitable place in Himachal Pradesh on the road from Manali to Leh, three hours before crossing the border into Ladakh.
Till now, we were on the regular Manali-Leh road, but the next morning at Darcha, 14 kms away, I got off on a dirt track and off the regular Manali-Leh road. As we veered off the regular road and climbed higher towards the Shinku-la pass, a Google Maps voice requested me to turn back. I learned about this road from YouTube videos of motorcyclists who had previously explored this route.
The road leading off the Manali-Leh road at Darcha is an ancient walkway that runs from the Zanskar range to Padum, the district headquarters of Zanskar. Till now the only motorable road to Padum was through Kargil. But the Border Roads Organization (BRO) has widened the walkway a bit so it is now motorable, but barely.
dose of thrill
We had an extra dose of thrill as the sleet rain turned into a gust of snow that started coming down thick and heavy as we made our way up and down the Shinku-la Pass.
That night we camped in a meadow at the bottom of Zanskar’s holiest mountain, called Gumbo Rangan. When I left my tent the next morning, the trials and tribulations of the previous day seemed so insignificant. The sky was a deep blue, devoid of any clouds, the sacred mountain rose up like a sentinel and the snow-capped mountains shone in the sun.
After a quick breakfast of coffee and eggs we had bought in Manali, which we had cooked on a small portable stove that we were carrying, we headed to Zanskar. The area was largely uninhabited and painfully packed, so when the first village appeared – Kurgiyakh – a man wearing a PPE suit flagged off us. A health worker, with his rapid COVID-19 test kit, was testing everyone who entered Zanskar. Waiting with a test anxiety for an unplanned pregnancy (the test kits look surprisingly similar), we awaited the test results, which luckily turned out to be negative.
We moved to Zanskar. It would be another three days before we saw any sign of habitation. Which was perfect, making it exactly the trip we’ve been dreaming of.
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