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BHPian Join Date: Jul 2022 Location: Gurugram/Solan
Posts: 49
Thanked: 136 Times
| Great road-trip experience with the Scorpio-N 4x4 in snowy Lahaul & Spiti Hi All, I am merging two roadtrips (one is from Lahual valley and other from Spiti valley) that I did in recent past in this post! Also, this is my first Travelogue, feedbacks are highly appreciated! TLDR; I had fun driving Scorpio N on snow roads and black ice, the car did great job! Trip 1: Dec 24 to Dec 28 2024 Gurgaon - Solang - Sissu - Keylong - Sissu - Gurgaon Total passengers - 5(all adults); Last seat removed to keep bags, kitchen stuff (stove, utensils, food, etc), and chairs and table! Dec 24: We started around 8 PM from GGN, managed a good speed and reached Solang Valley check post around 8 AM! Dec 25: Road was slippery and opened only for local 4x4 vehicles/4x2 snow chain vehicles. We waited patiently till noon and were allowed to cross Atal tunnel to reach Lahaul! Spent a day in Koksar(right of Atal tunnel), made tea in sub zero temperature! Did some stargazing! The roads was slipper was we had to walk, couldnt drive to a no light spot! Dec 26: Shifted to Sissu, went on a short drive to Tandi and Keylong! Collected wood near the chandra and bhaga river's sangam and ignited our own fire, had thupka and momos in Keylong! It was a fun day! At night, we found a dark spot between Sissu and Khangsar and did stargazing - spotted planets, stars, milkyway and constellations! Dec 27: Spend some time at the Sissu helipad, no crowed at all ![]() In noon, it started snowing. Police came to our hotel, in fact all hotels and suggested guests to leave or they will be stuck for a couple of days! We started right away! It was snowing, snow on roads, and we managed to cross Atal Tunnel! The real fun started after that, we observed a few cars losing control and hitting other cars! It was a bit scary but we kept slow pace in 4 low and managed to reach solang valley to get stuck in 11-12 hours because there were a lot of cars and the road was slippery too! Dec 28: Managed to reach Manali around 3 AM! After that the ride was smooth, reach Gurgaon around 5 PM! ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() A few highlights about the car:
Trip 2: Jan 4 to Jan 12 Rohtak - Solan - Hatu Peak - Kalpa - Kaza - Chicham - Tabo - IndoTibet border (Lepcha) - Solan - Rohtak Total passengers - 7(all adults); all three rows up! 2 in front, 4 in middle and one in last with a lot of stuff; installed Mahindra's integrated carrier and managed to fit 6 big bags in a waterproof cover that I ordered from Amazon Jan 04: Foggy drive from Rohtak to Solan - almost zero visibility. I used yellow film to make the white lights work in fog! Jan 05 and 06: Our actual trip started from Solan on Jan 5th, first stop was Hatu peak, due to snow the road was not open all the way up so we had to walk for 3 KMs(each side); The walk was totally worthy! Same day we reached Kalpa, spent 2 nights there, explored the town, drove and walked in narrow streets and waited for snowfall - but no luck! Jan 07: We started from Kalpa, took many road side stops, the beauty was forcing us to stop again and again! We reached SUMDO around sunset and that's when we picked the pace, it was getting cold and the road between Tabo and Kaza was very slippery so we had to be fast and cautious. We reached Kaza around 8, waited for the moon to go down and around 12:40 AM (Jan 8) we went to stargaze- again spotted planets like Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, Uranus, etc; spotted milky way (it was light); constellation, stars, etc. Jan 08: Went to sightseeing, the road was slippery so we were slow and used 4L at many stretches specially downhills and sharp curves - avoid any risks! the 4L nob is for a purpose. We were slow so only covered Langza, Komic and Hikkim. Went to Kaza market and had great local food - thenthuk and momo at Poonam dhaba. Jan 09: Started with Chicham Bridge, there were no snow leapord spotings so we didn't wait and proceed towards or headed back to Key Monastery. Around noon, we started towards Tabo. We drove on the pin valley road(towards Mudh village) but there was 3-4 inches snow on the road and the car was slipping a lot so we took a U turn after driving for 2-3 KMs. We explored the Lingti waterfall, it is so beautiful, I will keep it at the top of the places we explored on this trip! Then we went to Dhankar Monastery, again a beautiful spot, after the sunset, we saw many colors of the sky including orange, blue, purple, pink, it was a great sight! Rested at Tabo! Jan 10: We started early, got out permits from ITBP for Indo-Tibet border visit! Made to the zero point! It was an experience, we enjoyed talking to our soldiers, they showed us around and answered our questions very patiently. Google Map was thinking that we are in China - in fact some phones were showing China time! Headed back and drove all the way to Solan, I guess we reached home around 12:30 AM! Jan 11 and 12: Mostly rested and went to Bhurshing Mahadev in Sirmour district! It was cloudy and we again hopped for snow! It rained but the temp didnt drop and ![]() Headed back to Rohtak on Jan 12th! A few highlights about the car:
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The following 19 BHPians Thank unpopulrxplorer for this useful post: | AdityaDeane, Ani0404, anilp, Auto Enthusiast, Buzzard_storme, Credited_Siren, digitalnirvana, Goku_YNWA, GTO, haisaikat, katoom, Mustang Sammy, Red Liner, Samfromindia, sanjayrozario, SRISRI_90, SteeringStar, W.S.T.R., YanTra Makto |
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BHPian Join Date: Jul 2022 Location: Gurugram/Solan
Posts: 49
Thanked: 136 Times
| re: Great road-trip experience with the Scorpio-N 4x4 in snowy Lahaul & Spiti |
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The following 31 BHPians Thank unpopulrxplorer for this useful post: | AdityaDeane, Alpha Defender, Ani0404, Ashdel, Auto Enthusiast, Buzzard_storme, catchjyoti, Credited_Siren, digitalnirvana, DragonHawk, GTO, Guru_Shikhar, haisaikat, Kashi053, katoom, LowRpmHighTorq, Mustang Sammy, nimishlalwani, NomadSK, prajosh, Red Liner, RennSport, S.Vats, sanjayrozario, sgmuser, SteeringStar, supertinu, Venkygupta, W.S.T.R., xsrahul, YanTra Makto |
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