Features: Magazine | Literary Review | Life | Metro Plus | Open Page | Education Plus | Book Review | Business | SciTech | Entertainment | Young World | Property Plus | Quest | Folio |

The heights of beauty

Tal, La, Gompa and Innova -- more words from our intrepid traveller's journey

Rejuvenated after a chilly, overnight camp-out at the Chandra Tal in Himachal Pradesh, we packed our bags, dumped everything into the cavernous boot of the Innova and started off towards Kaza.

Prayer and a pass

The crowning glory of the Spiti district is the Kunzum La, standing tall at 4,250 metres. It is this pass that decides till when Kaza remains hidden from the rest of the civilized world. This year round, the pass had opened in late July and a month later we could still see huge slabs of ice hanging precariously over the cliffs that border the prayer stones built to commemorate Kunzum Devi, the deity of the pass.

We stopped there and paid our respects and hurried back because the old priest was ringing the bells with so much enthusiasm that I thought that the entire glacier would come tumbling down. We continued down the other side of Kunzum La, taking in fantastic mountain-scapes and meandering rivers. Here and there would be patches of green and then, sudden blocks of ice that seemed to have forgotten to melt. The best way to describe the journey through this land would be to compare it to the ending sequence of Mackenna's Gold, when they finally find the lost canyon.

Momos and gompas

Kaza, the district headquarters of Spiti, is a bustling town with backpackers, budget hotels and restaurants that proclaim through large billboards the best momos in town. The first day there, we went exploring north of Kaza, and this yielded the dramatic Ki Gompa and the high amphitheatre-like Kibber village.

Kibber was, till recently, the highest road-connected village in the world, but now the road and the honour has been extended to Tashi Gang, 30 km away and 100 meters higher. The Ki Gompa is the most important gompa of the region and has a most dramatic setting on the summit of a hill. It looks straight out of a fairy tale and even has a winding road leading up to its ornamented gateway.

South of Kaza, on the way to Tabo is the Dankar Gompa whose setting is quite frankly, frightening. It's built on stalagmite-like structures, high on a hill which has been eroded by the forces of nature. The entire Gompa is standing on a thin base and looks very precariously perched, but then since it has been hanging on for 1,300 years, I guess a visit was safe enough. The views from here are, of course, phenomenal, and by now I was out of adjectives to describe what I had been seeing since I'd driven into Spiti.

Our drive back along the same road back to Manali was slow, thanks to the road but then that's the real delight of taking this route. The slower we went, the more we savoured the place did someone say something about the journey being the destination?

RISHAD SAAM MEHTA

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail