Ladakh Day 3, Pangong Lake

 Pangong Lake trip
 Admired for the different blues and greens the lake displays while nestled in the stark hills/mountains.
Romila was not able to join us today as she probably is having altitude problems. She stayed in bed all day, I felt sad for her that she couldn't join us. We started the day at 5 am. Packed lunch to eat at the lake. The drive took about 5 hours to reach the Lake. 

The drive to Pangong might have been more exciting and adventurous than the lake itself. The drive is 167 km and should take about 5 hours. The driving is slow, even though some of the roads are paved, they are narrow and large trucks travel the same roads.


We are slowly climbing into the hills, all of a sudden the driver,Yontun, turns right up this dirt path that went straight up a hill. Looked more like a hiking trail than a road.     
We climb up and up along switchbacks there were some large boulders that look ready to go, very scary! The driver makes the trip about 2X per week. I felt very safe with him. The paved road turned to dirt and gravel for the remainder of the trip.  The vehicles are not 4 wheel drive but probably all wheel drive similar to a Toyota 4runner. The road was all switched backs until we came to another paved road. We were told that it was a short cut and saves about 15 minutes.

We crossed a Chang La pass at 17,348 feet. The third highest motorable pass in the world. Tomorrow we will go over what they claim is the highest motorable pass in the world. Very cold up top they said it was -6C at 8 am. Saw this man attending to his Yak. He was more than happy to have us take a picture with him, for a small price. His Yak looked better kept than he did. Had a nice cup of hot Chai tea. Going down was quite a challenge.

Other obstacles we encountered were flooded roads that are piled with rocks so the vehicles can make it through.  

We passed one landslide area that was very difficult to pass, can't imagine doing this on motorcycle. Traveling these mountain roads is a highlight for many bikers. A real spirit of adventure is needed to ride the (often)  single lane road with other trucks, blind curves and road obstacles. The landslide happened two weeks ago during the day. All traffic was stopped. People were stranded at the Lake and had to wait 2 days before the road was reopened. That's a bummer as many of the tourists only travel to Pangong Lake as a day trip and might not be prepared to stay overnight, Oh well.

Blind curves are plentiful.  You are supposed to honk as you enter the single lane turn. More than on one occasion we rounded a bend and another car was approaching - Yikes!

The military put dips in the road to slow you down. There isn't any warning so if you don't know the road.... I can just imagine a motorcyclist hitting one of them.

Over the pass we go down and down passing two valleys. In the first one we saw cows, yaks, horses, and sheep. Looked nice.


Pangong lake has only become a tourist attraction within the last two years, no wonder the road is very primitive. Only one truck, at least that we saw had fallen off the road. That surprises me as I felt that we would at times.

Arrived safely to Pangong lake. The lake is nestled amongst many mountains/hills, nice. Some of the hills were different colors, brown, beige, whitish which gave the lake lots of character. We only came for the day, good thing as the shops and accommodations were very minimal.

We bought lunch to eat but were told that we could not eat it by the lake as there are many establishments selling food and they want tourist to buy from them.
It is a nice long lake that runs into China. Sun was high with some clouds which took away from some of the deep blues that we would see at sunrise. Made it back to Leh around 5pm which gave time to relax. My patience at the end of the day was wearing thin as the bumpy car ride was not good for my body.

Dinner is included In the room. It's a buffet with good variety and tasty food. Bed early