This plan for this trip was originally not mine. Hitanshu, a friend and another enthusiast biker thought up this place. I have never met hitanshu or knew much about him, we had been chatting from some time and wanted to do a trip together. With hitanshu and me getting into new roles at work from next month, this was the ideal time to go. And what better than taking a 1200 km ride to Chuitkul, which stands in the valley surrounded by Kinner Kailash himalayan range and is the last indian village on old hindustan - tibet trade road. I dont know whether it is possible to describe this trip in words or not but none the less the shot has been taken.

Day 1, Friday 26 May, Delhi to Rampur

The plan was to start on friday at around 12 midnight from delhi and ride all the way till rampur which is 500 kms plus. The plan though somehow changed when i went to chandigarh on thursday to persuade another friend to come along but unfortunately he couldn't. I started off from chandigarh next morning to meet hitanshu enroute`at panchkula. There i found his, getting started on his home packed food. Yum.
After a decent breakfast we started to our destination. Soon after hitanshu fell victim to bike problems. His bike just wasnt picking up. Well you cant certainly expect a 100cc Bajaj caliber to reach a 100 up hill but it wasnt reaching a 5000 rpm either. So we made a unplanned stop for around 2 hours at solan to get the his clutch plates changed. In the meantime i went down to the the only tyre shop there to see if i can get a spare rear tube for my michelin M45's. The owner had a million questions about tyres, me, trip etc etc. Whew. Well, nevermind, i said to myself, they are just curious. Got back to hitanshu, finished his home packed meals and finally moved along. Wanting to spare going through simla, we took the splendid road to chail from Kandaghat. The uncommercialised beauty and curvy roads were a riding pleasure. A narrow crossing bridge provided a way down towards an awesome water stream. It was hardly knee deep, clean and not too cold. That was enough for us to monkey around in it for some time when suddenly a tata somu came crossing over in the stream. We stopped and got to know there is a way to bring down our bikes too. Still deciding on what to do, a tractor came from the opposite side and hurray, we got ourselves a ride up to the road and man, it was great. The tractor managed to pull, three of us, including driver and a trailor full of sand up a steep 25 degree inclined stone laid trail with ease. After thanking him and a couple of pics later, we were again on our bikes tackling the narrow bends and steep climbs on this road. Reaching chail in sometime, we saw the road towards the highest cricket ground in the world and it was STEEP. Way to steep for us wanting to climb it so took the wise consensus of moving forward. Reached Kufri in about an hours time. By now it has started getting a bit cold. Though it was a relief to know that roads from now will be wider and smoother. Moving a relatively slow pace we headed towards fagu. Now i must stress that roads fagu seems to be an idea of a race track engineer. The roads are smooth, High, with fast curves and wide enough for a bus to take U-turn. While doing 70 through fagu i saw children with school bags waving. The ones who didnt wave, i think they dont like to go to school. The next town in sight was Theog, from where we topped our tanks and and started for narkanda. Hitanshu's bike even with new clutch plates has been losing torque. At narkanda we stopped at a mechanic who insisted in remving bike's filter as the bike want getting enough air to compress. With his evil eye overlooking the mechanic, hitanshu gave it a try. And to say the least, it worked, rather splendidly. With a better bike performance and rejuvinated mood, we launched ourselves as fast as we could towards. While crossing Kumarsain the sun has started setting in. We were still approx. 80 kms from rampur and it was getting dark. The roads were deteriorating from bad to worse to ugly. Not losing hope we moved together keeping it to the inner side of the mountain roads. Trucks and mahindra jeeps are only things you would encounter there. With roads slain with stones it was a diffcult for us to maintain a constant speed but we were riding safe and slow and took our time to reach the road that leads to rampur. This road is next to terrifying and freezing satluj river flow which creates class 4 and class 5 rapids. Road has either caved in or just washed out. Avoiding this road at night isnt a bad idea at all. We though had to move to reach rampur. Situated on the banks river satluj, rampur is a major town. Though having been washed out twice already in recent times by flash floods in satluj that can be upto 50 feet in one minute, rampur endeavours to serve its surrounding villages. Suddenly hitanshu stopped just a few metres ahead of me to show that the road has gone from two lane to one lane and our side of lane was in satluj somwhere. Driving very cautiously because both of us had almost been taken out by trucks and jeeps atleast twice today. Finally reaching Rampur, we thanked the biking gods for letting us reach here. We straightaway headed from the PWD guest house. After pleading with the keeper, we were let a room which could very well bring a 4 star room to shame. With hot water and food served in no time, we were at heaven already.

Day 2, Friday 27 May, Rampur to Chitkul and back

5 AM, the cellphone alarm went off. I kicked started Hitanshu to the bathroom and then got up. Within a few minutes, we were packing and getting ready for the tough day ahead. After properly securing the bags with bungee ropes, we moved up the steep PWD guest house driveway. Drive from Rampur to jeori was pleasant with jawdropping views. Imagine standing high on mountains curves surrounded with snow covered peaks and you can hear a river hurtling down almost 2 kms straight down. It must have taken an eternity for that stone that i threw to reach the ground. After some posing for shutterbug, testing my michelins on curves we moved forwarded. With only military trucks paralleling with us most of the time, the roads would offer scenic views and the moment you indulge into the beauty, some one would honk to let you know, "If you wanna enjoy the view, then STOP and enjoy". For a few kms the roads from rampur were less pain on butts. After a decent meal, which included aloo paranthas and a couple of samosas, we found overselves tackling the worst roads of our trip....yet. I reckon the roads were bad because of the ongoing construction of numerous dams and reservoirs happening all along the river satluj. Some serious butt aching kms later we reached Wangtu, which to not much surprise had worst roads. I cant even say if they qualify of being called Roads. They were ugly, very steep, with slippery, slimy mud, potholes, stones and what not. All along the way were signs that said, "Caution : Stones can fall anytime". Much encouraging. We marched forward, taking photos of dams, mountains, roads, us~ and just enjoying the ride. The roads from Wangtu to Karcham is at times pleasurable due to Military presence in the area. Attaining 70-80 on speedo is possible with ease. Though one has to be very cautions because.............yeah, the stones can fall anytime(REMEMBER). Oh boy, is what is said, when climbing those extra steep trails with stone laiden. The truckers would though let us overtake. Children along the way would wave back. Young people would help you with directions asking questions in return. All fun if you ask me. After some really mindbogling riding and acute climb we reached Sangla. It was taken straight out of fairy tales. The valley is surrounded with some of the highest peaks in kinner kailash himalayan range. The Baspa river flows like a voluptous female showing of her moves. The houses, the fields, the school, the shops all on the banks river Baspa. Heavenly. Just...heavenly. Though our final destination was still far. About 26 kms from sangla is Chitkul - The last indian village on old hindustan tibet trade route. Now was our final battle with the roads. Mani, the other freebird had told me that that 26 kms would take 2 hours. Well, we'll see about that i said to myself and throttled forward. The initial roads seems ok. Soon though i realized how wrong i was. Conditions of roads dropped immesely. Altitude though constantly rising. The small wooden planked bridges that we crossed and the wild water crossing on roads, made it up for the other pains we endured.The climb was indeed dangerous. The car and bus drivers were looking at us in a manner of what might state "WHAT THE FCUK, NOT ON BIKES". HaHa. Take that you four wheel riding looney. Anyhow, we were in the last few kms when the weather took a turn and the temperature dropped. It felt good though. Nice, fresh, cool air, calming your mind, your body and your engine. What else would you need. After enduring 26 kms of stones, dust, icy cold water streams (which all made to the pleasure) we reached Chitkul. It was 30 billion times bigger and better than anything that i ever read or heard about it. We parked our bikes in shade. Got some water and headed straight for the Banks of Baspa river. Took off shoes and went in the water, only say "FCUK" its freezing. Idiot were we, the glaciers melt only a few kms away to make this river. This was the best place i had been to till now. Sitting on baspa's bay, it was time to chew some odd paranthas and samosas. "Time to try out the body's white cells" hitanshu said. Ate the food, stayed there for some time and took some once in the life time photos. Im personally very afraid of running water like in a river but at this time, watching baspa flow at its full current causing class 4-5 rapids only 20 metres away from where i was sitting didnt scare me at all. I guess the beauty around it was pacifying me, my fear. Once again, clock was showing its time to move. We somehow climbed back to where we had parked our bikes. I just wasnt ready to start back yet. Ordered a couple of coffees. Waited and enjoyed the delay for the order, for the first time in life. Feets up on the table, coffee in hands, Kinner Kailash and Tibet Border to look at. Now for the record, you cant beat that. Anyhow, time was a liberty i wish we had. Got ready, kick started bikes and started the rigorous journey back. We started at around 2 PM and stopped regularly for photo breaks and butt breaks. I remember this one guy, who was following us in his car, we opened his mouth in awe when he read my number plate. DL-8SX. Yeah, we're from delhi, i told him. Stunned, he was. We crossed some very fast streams, fastest being the one just near to the Police Check Post. For the shutterbug, i crossed it thrice. Stopped next at this amazing point where you can see the whole sangla valley with baspa serpenting through. Clicked 21 shots for the panorama. Time was running a bit fast on us and we didnt want to night drive in these mountains. We rushed back to sangla and without stopping over kept riding. As we were about the reach wangtu, me and hitanshu was a notion of avoiding those really dangerous curves that if missed will send us in Satluj hurtling down with great force. We were looking for a detour when a driver guided us to a very nice road, smooth as cheese, and gave us a positive about that road. Well, what better we said and throlled forward. Just as we to join the main route from the detour we had taken, it turned out that it was blocked with 1 ton girders without space not even enough for a bike to cross. Me and hitanshu tried level best to move one but couldnt even roll one over, forget about turning one. We were too tired to lift the bike and cross the girders. Suddenly as a blessing from god, one girders moved on this axis with some little thrust. Enough for bikes to cross. "Thank god." I heard myself saying. We were only too happy that we had conquered something extraordinary when another stoppage. A traffic jam in the high mountains. It turned out that they were blasting the mountains to create virgin roads. After watching the bull-dozers moving in a precision of a balle dancer for 15 mins, the road was cleared for us to move on. Next stop was Rampur without any stop, for the simple reason was it was getting dark and it can get real scary in that part of the country. No soul in site for great distance. The What if questions start coming to your mind. What if i have a puncture. What if there's a ghost round the corner. What if Hitanshu starts walking in the air. EEEEEks. Turned on the headlights early and to know that someone is following you when you check your sideviews. Though nothing awkward happened. We reached the amply lit city of Rampur at about 9 PM and straighaway went to the same guest house. Pleaded with the guy again and again got the room. This was like begging. Bhaiyya ji pleej, humme ek kamra dedo. Hum door se aaye hain. The good man served us dinner and we were off to bed in no time. Tomorrow was going to be another long ride back home.

Day 3, Sunday 28 May, Rampur to Delhi

The day began with a respectable kick on hitanshu's arse. Checked out at 6:00 AMsharp and were on move at 6:15 AM. This time taking the otherway out of guest house, the way that takes me back home. We were planning to cover as much as possible in the morning coldness before it got humid and hot. We reached nirath and got my bike scrwed up; it had lost a bolt from the foot rest and moving a lot. After that, we marched on and drove very very carefully because the whole god damn road was covered with small round stones. It seemed as if they had fallen or got loose from the heavy rains last night. Slowly and steadily we moved ahead, and reached Narkanda. Perfect place to have breakfast which again comprised of samose and paranthas. Lovely chai though. Nice little place. Started moving forward, and covered the distance to shimla rather quickly. We could have skipped Shimla but we did otherwise and went straight into the shithole. Stuck in the slow moving traffic for about an hour and kept riding further down. Reached solan at 1:30 PM and had lunch at the (in)famous Giani da Dhaba. Didnt enjoy the wait as well as the food. Managed to first aid a stupid CBZian riding furiously and hitting a car on a blind right hander while overtaking a bus, without wearing a helmet. Moved a lot more cautiosly after this incident and reached Punchkula at 4 PM. Hitanshu decided to meet his friend in Chandigarh and he decided to hit the Delhi Highway. Tired and sleepy, shoulders hurting, i bid farewell to hitanshu and rode full throttle towards delhi. I took a half hour break sitting road side just watching the world go by. People looking back at me and giving a stare. I remember the unexpectedly wheelie in panipat and the daewoo cielo filled with 3 twenty yr old something girls giving me a wave while riding on side to me. After a relatively eventless ride back i reached delhi at 9:30. Slept as soon as i reached home. Dead tired, but none the less mesmorized and awestruck for life.

Pics

Site Concept, Design by Chanderjeet Rai