DHARAMKOT

24th - 29th April 2015

By half six our little Jugaadus ensemble was packed up and ready for our journey to the mountains. Our private mini bus, named the 'Party Bus', had arrived out front and Sanjay was already talking about where we could get beers. I guess back in the UK it was the end of people's nights out so I could almost justify a beer. Luckily we held off on the drinks too early and made an impromptu stop at Sanjay's parents home in the village he grew up in for breakfast.

His little village was lovely and his parents were really nice. They didn't speak a word of English but with Sanjay translating and a lot of smiling and nodding I think we all got on swimmingly. For breakfast we drank some chai and ate Kulcha (chapati stuffed with cauliflower and potato). After even more chai and a family photo we were back on the winding roads north east. We eventually found some booze and soon were all singing our way through the hills of Dharamasala. I would like to sound cool and say the highlight was singing Rolling Stones - Paint it Black, however if I'm truthful it was the Lighthouse Family - Forever.

We rolled into McLeod Ganj mid afternoon and had some traditional food at Hotel Tibet. McLeod Ganj is where the Dalai Lama along with the Tibetan government claimed asylum after China's brutal invasion in 1949. Still today slogans such as Free Tibet are stencilled on walls and written on flags and t-shirts around the town. The small streets were busy and there were a lot of red robed monks going about their day to day lives. We decided we would stay in a nearby town just up the hillside called Dharamkot. It is much smaller and more peaceful than McLeod Ganj.

After a short hike up the hillside we checked into a quaint, pastel green and purple guest house with a private balcony and valley view. Not bad for £4 per night. We were pretty knackered from the last few weeks and decided to do nothing for a couple of days in our hillside retreat. Everywhere you looked pastel coloured buildings poked out from the woodland that covered the valley. It was nice to do nothing. One morning we went for a really long breakfast in a little cafe overlooking the valley, the breakfast was so long a storm rolled in from the mountains forcing us to have lunch as well. It was at this point the cafe owner who had been frantically on the phone all morning told us about Nepal. He said a massive earthquake had just hit and the country was in turmoil. We checked the news on the wifi but not much info was being broadcast at that time. He said his family was okay but their home was destroyed and there was no way for him to get back there to help as roads had been blocked and the airport was damaged. We felt terrible for him and then started to worry about all the people we had met there. We spent some time writing emails and messages and managed to account for everyone bar one person. We are still waiting to hear if Phil Power, the Kiwi we hiked with is okay. We also spoke with Ranjan from Hotel Silver Home in Kathmandu. Apparently they are all okay, but his family home had been destroyed. It was terrible news, we felt so hopeless. Later on that day images of the destruction to Kathmandu started to filter in. The beautiful temples of Durba square where we had celebrated Holi was now a mass of brick and rubble. It was hard to look at and we both felt quite emotional. All we could do was send our love and support to those we know that are over there.

After a couple of days of doing nothing we decided we needed to do something. I went for a swim with James and Leona in a Hindu temple complete with a sacred pool fed by a fresh Himalayan spring water. It was fucking cold and I stupidly agreed to stay in for twenty minutes. I was pretty useless for quite a while after, I didn't even trust my shaky self to hold a cup of chai. The following day we did some yoga on a small rooftop overlooking the village. It was a very peaceful spot. The instructor was Tibetan and filled us in on some of the problems facing the Tibetans exhaled in India. They have it pretty hard, for some reason even-though many are born in India they don't have Indian passports, and it's dangerous to travel back to Tibet. So they are stuck in a kind of limbo.

The yoga session was really relaxing and stretched out all those bumps and strains from crazy bus and tuk tuk journeys. We decided to sign up for the following morning. After a lot of bending, stretching and balancing we decided to hike up to Triund. Triund is a 2900m ridge that towers above Dharamakot. As we hiked up dark clouds warped themselves around the top of the ridge and thunder rumbled around the hillside. It was really atmospheric. Luckily the rain didn't come until we were safely drinking tea and eating noodles in a little tumble down shack about half way up, made of tarpaulin, corrugated metal and assorted bits of wood. We waited it out for about an hour before continuing up on to the ridge. When we reached the top our eyes were greeted with a wall of snowy mountains stretching off to the east and west marking the start of the Himalayas. It was a great feeling to be back up amongst the snowy peaks. The remains of a smaller storm was still loitering around throwing the odd snowy shower our way, but eventually it got bored and sauntered off to bother somebody else. 

We rented a tent and pitched it inside a half finished building incase anymore storms dropped by in the night. The dusk sky against the mountains was beautiful and soon the moon was illuminating the peaks almost as clear as day. We dozed off watching a lightning storm flashing away in the distance.

We were up at half five to see the sunrise. The sky was already on the turn and not lying down on the wooden floor anymore was truly lovely. We were the only people about on the ridge until one of the little tumbledown shacks started rustling and a little man popped out and offered us tea. It was cold, we said yes! 

We walked along the ridge a little way and found a big rock to perch on. The mountains were crystal clear and there wasn't another person insight. It was a lovely way to start the day. Slowly the sun rose above the icy ridge throwing the whole hillside into warm sunshine. It transported us back to our Himalayan lifestyle in Annapurna. 

After the sun had fully emerged and the day was in full swing we started our long walk back down to the village. But not before a picturesque Nutella and banana pancake.

We arrived back at our guest house round 10 ish to find that Vanessa and Rowan had made the executive decision that we were not going to return from the mountain and had taken our room. This suited us perfectly as we didn't need to pay for an empty room. We gathered our stuff, paid up and headed away from Dharamkot down towards McLeod Ganj. 

It is a quaint little place, bigger and busier than Dharamkot but still pretty small compared to other places we have passed through. It too is spread over a massive pine covered hillside and like some of the villages up in Annapurna, is like a mini Tibet. 

We spent the afternoon wondering the small lanes of Tibetan shops and cafes. These slowly lead us to the Dalai Lama Temple Complex. There is a massive gold buddha in the centre which was partly rescued and smuggled across the Himalayas when the Chinese had a so called 'Cultural Revolution', destroying 90 percent of irreplaceable Buddhist scriptures and smashing temples and statues across Tibet. There is also a statue of a skinny Buddha. This I think is to remind people of Buddhas path to enlightenment when he fasted in search of the truth. We liked it because unlike the other statues, people leave packets of biscuits and other snacks at this feet in case he gets hungry. 

After pottering about for a while and prayer wheel spinning we went to a little monk run cafe down a small alleyway behind the temple. Out back it had a great view of the forest covered foothills which was a nice surprise. We ordered some traditional Tibetan dishes, veg Momo and veg Thukpa. They were both super tasty however some meat would have been a nice addition. We we're informed no meat was allowed on Wednesdays. Shame. 

Just as we were leaving the cafe, a group of monks came in and gathered round an unusual wooden game. They invited us to join and offered us some chai. The game seemed like a cross between air hockey, pool and the wired game me and my brother used to play where you flicked coins at each other across a table. Dan if you're reading this I think we have a new game to master! 

After a little more wondering around we bought some street food ready for the night bus and headed for the station.