HumbLeh’d

sj_koova · 30th September 2009, 09:59

Few more pics from the first three days.

Ramky met us at Ahmedabad to wish us.
HVK, Raghu, Saji, Glenn, Ramky, Sudhir, Ganesh (where did Lalu run away!)

It wasn't easy to convince HVK for a tea break. Idea of group photo proposal worked.
Tea break with four convoys (HVK, AB, GF, DM)

We reached Patnitop very late in the evening for a night halt. Had absolutely no idea how the place looks until we were welcomed with this beautiful sunrise in the morning.

Sun rise at Patnitop

Sun rise at Patnitop

Sun rise at Patnitop

On the way to Jawahar tunnel

Lalu has been narrating the story so well, so I just need to support him with my pics.

sj_koova · 30th September 2009, 10:08

Few from Dal lake and around Srinagar

Dal Lake

Dal Lake

Dal Lake

Dal Lake

Srinagar

Srinagar-Sonamarg

Srinagar-Sonamarg

Srinagar-Sonamarg

Srinagar-Sonamarg

MileCruncher · 30th September 2009, 10:20

Absolutely Awesome pictures Saji!!!

Somehow through the pictures the trip looks even more wonderful!

sj_koova · 30th September 2009, 10:20

Sonamarg

Zojila pass

Drass

Glenn's and HVK's Scoprio at Tiger hill

Tiger hill zoom in

Lalu, Glenn and Ganesh at Tiger Hill

Drass through the car window

sj_koova · 30th September 2009, 10:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by kesri

@sj_koova: Wow! ... really amazing panoramas!!

Thak You sir. Your pics on Flickr were wonderful too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by prince_pervez

Aah! The Dal lake. Brings fond memories. Nice pictures. Waiting for more.

Thank You. Dal lake has mesmerizing beauty

Quote:

Originally Posted by MileCruncher

Absolutely Awesome pictures Saji!!!

Somehow through the pictures the trip looks even more wonderful!

Thank you AB. I have to work on more 1500 pictures!

StarVegabond · 30th September 2009, 10:43

Hi Saji,

You have mesmerized me with your amazing photographs
thanks for sharing

sj_koova · 30th September 2009, 12:25

Here is the map of our day-4 expedition.

Road to Padum was the worst of all.
The only way to reach Padum is from Kargil, and it is more than 250km from Kargil, towards the Himachal border.
We had hardly 500m of tar road on the entire 250+kms of almost non-existing stretch.
Heard that BRO is building a new road to Leh from Padum. May be after 4-5 years, you can take a sedan here. Right now it is only for the tough built and brave-hearted.

Waiting for Lalu's story before I can bombard with my pics.

laluks · 30th September 2009, 13:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by sj_koova

Waiting for Lalu's story before I can bombard with my pics.

Back to work

Updates will be only in the evenings.

Saji wonderful pictures - but Nikon blue is still cheating

tsk1979 · 30th September 2009, 13:15

@sj_koova, 500m of Tar road? Well we also got 500m of Tar road while going, but while coming back, we got 5kms of Tar road. There is an unmarked dirt trail which takes you to the other side of the river near Panikhar. That is tarred. On return there were taxis in front of us, thats how we discovered that!

laluks · 30th September 2009, 13:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by tsk1979

@sj_koova, 500m of Tar road? Well we also got 500m of Tar road while going, but while coming back, we got 5kms of Tar road. There is an unmarked dirt trail which takes you to the other side of the river near Panikhar. That is tarred. On return there were taxis in front of us, thats how we discovered that!

Yes, you are right. We entered into padhum after crossing the bridge and turning left. This did not have any roads!
On return we had crossed the river earlier and till we reached the bridge we crossed last night we had good roads. 500m or 5Km in such a horrendenous stretch is always welcome

hvkumar · 30th September 2009, 13:31

If you avoid Panikkar, you get some wonderful tar roads for 10 kms on the RHS bank, which is what we also did when we returned to Kargil from Padum.

MileCruncher · 30th September 2009, 13:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by laluks

Yes, you are right. We entered into padhum after crossing the bridge and turning left. This did not have any roads!
On return we had crossed the river earlier and till we reached the bridge we crossed last night we had good roads. 500m or 5Km in such a horrendenous stretch is always welcome

I think the worst stretch of the entire trip was the tarred road spanning about 15-20 Kms between Debring and Sumdo. Even though it was freshly laid tar, the undulations made it impossible to go over 20kmph without throwing all your luggage from the back.

kaiserketkar · 30th September 2009, 13:49

fabulous pics saji! keep 'em coming

khan_sultan · 30th September 2009, 13:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by sj_koova

... Ramky met us at Ahmedabad to wish us.
...
Attachment 199743

This hotel in Amd is the same where we met Ramky during the GQ drive in December. Brings back memories ;-)

Quote:

It wasn't easy to convince HVK for a tea break. Idea of group photo proposal worked.

. I can imagine. Nice one

hvkumar · 30th September 2009, 14:02

Preparations for the Trip

While the Lalu/Saji bandwagon rolls on, let me share with you some of the aspects of the trip preparation.

The trip was originally conceived as a Joint Venture between me and Ramkya in 2008, but that year both of us had wrk-related problems and we had to call off teh trip.

For me, this was my 3rd trip, and I was determined to do the drives to Zanskar, Nubra and TsoMNoriri this time. UNlike the last 2 trips, this one was a North-South (Srinagar-Leh-Manali) drive.

The Route Plan was first made, keeping in view the following aspects:

- The run from the palins to the hills (nearly 2,500 kms of it, ex-Bombay) had to be fast and not consume more than 4 days either way

- We chose the month of September, knowing it to be off-season and season of best roads in Ladakh

- We had to bear in mind the (then) time restrictions in Jawahar Tunnel and Zoji La

The route plan that was drafted is linked below:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?k...1EV1E&hl=en_GB

The brief onward journey plan was as follows:
Bombay-Udaipur-Jaipur-Delhi-Pathankot-Srinagar-Sonmarg-Kargil

We planned to visit Zanskar V, Nubra V, Chumthang V and exit Ladakh via the Lahaul, Spiti and Kinnaur V.

Since it is not easy to understand a detailed Route Plan, there were some who said that their wives can't understand what they were up to. So, a PowerPoint presentation was made on the same Route Plan. That is linked below:

ladakh

Slowly, the team started building up and Ramkya kickstarted the mailing group that reached out to every potential team member - the mailing list was at times over 35 names long and we exchanged views and info for nearly 2.5 months, on some days the mails peaking at 35-50! We have lost track of how many 100s of mails were exchanged in the days running up to Zero Day.

We put a team list together, discussed who will bring his car, and how erach car will be filled up to optimise on costs and vacancies.

It was quite a task since the team was converging from different cities in India - 6 in the final count.

We froze the dates of travel 3 months in advance so that each member of the team could plan his work schedules and arrange his affairs for the trip.

Next stage, we went into intensive preparation on the things we needed to carry, how we should prepare ourselves mentally and physically, what medicines to have, etc. THisa was checklisted in the following link:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?k...dTaEE&hl=en_GB

Then came the most important part, preparing the cars. Since all the cars were M&M (all Scorpio, except the Bolero.....and later the Pajero), we checklisted the things to be done to get the cars ship-shape and 150% reliable. This is the checklist we used:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?k...RkVFE&hl=en_GB

The team started swelling up and at one point of time we had over 40 probables and nearly 10 cars in the line-up. There were several drop-outs, the most disappointing ones being those of Ramkya and Guderian. At one point in time, our oldest team member was 67 years old. We collected details of each person. Most of the team were either friends or drawn from Mahindra Scorpio Yahoo Group, team-bhp, bcmtouring or indiahighways Yahoo Group. Very few of us had even seen each other before and it was really quite a penpal gathering!

As the preparations were on, the team came up with some bright ideas for T-Shirts, Slogans and Stickers. So, after lots of consultations, the designs were chosen and we ended up with a Team Slogan, white team T-Shirts and Sticker for each car. (Lalu, can you upload the images of the T-Shirts and Stickers?)

30th September 2009, 09:59	#61
sj_koova BHPian Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Bangalore Posts: 673 Thanked: 620 Times View My Garage	Few more pics from the first three days. Ramky met us at Ahmedabad to wish us. HVK, Raghu, Saji, Glenn, Ramky, Sudhir, Ganesh (where did Lalu run away!) It wasn't easy to convince HVK for a tea break. Idea of group photo proposal worked. Tea break with four convoys (HVK, AB, GF, DM) We reached Patnitop very late in the evening for a night halt. Had absolutely no idea how the place looks until we were welcomed with this beautiful sunrise in the morning. Sun rise at Patnitop Sun rise at Patnitop Sun rise at Patnitop On the way to Jawahar tunnel Lalu has been narrating the story so well, so I just need to support him with my pics.
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 10:08	#62
sj_koova BHPian Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Bangalore Posts: 673 Thanked: 620 Times View My Garage	Few from Dal lake and around Srinagar Dal Lake Dal Lake Dal Lake Dal Lake Srinagar Srinagar Srinagar-Sonamarg Srinagar-Sonamarg Srinagar-Sonamarg Srinagar-Sonamarg
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 10:20	#63
MileCruncher Senior - BHPian Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: MH01 Posts: 4,235 Thanked: 589 Times View My Garage	Absolutely Awesome pictures Saji!!! Somehow through the pictures the trip looks even more wonderful!
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 10:20	#64
sj_koova BHPian Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Bangalore Posts: 673 Thanked: 620 Times View My Garage	Sonamarg Sonamarg Zojila pass Drass Glenn's and HVK's Scoprio at Tiger hill Tiger hill zoom in Lalu, Glenn and Ganesh at Tiger Hill Drass through the car window
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 10:43	#66
StarVegabond Senior - BHPian Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Bangalore Posts: 1,891 Thanked: 42 Times	Hi Saji, You have mesmerized me with your amazing photographs thanks for sharing
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 12:25	#67
sj_koova BHPian Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Bangalore Posts: 673 Thanked: 620 Times View My Garage	Day4 - Kargil - Padum (Zanskar Valley) Here is the map of our day-4 expedition. Road to Padum was the worst of all. The only way to reach Padum is from Kargil, and it is more than 250km from Kargil, towards the Himachal border. We had hardly 500m of tar road on the entire 250+kms of almost non-existing stretch. Heard that BRO is building a new road to Leh from Padum. May be after 4-5 years, you can take a sedan here. Right now it is only for the tough built and brave-hearted. Waiting for Lalu's story before I can bombard with my pics.
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 13:15	#69
tsk1979 Team-BHP Support Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: San Jose, CA Posts: 23,717 Thanked: 22,820 Times View My Garage	@sj_koova, 500m of Tar road? Well we also got 500m of Tar road while going, but while coming back, we got 5kms of Tar road. There is an unmarked dirt trail which takes you to the other side of the river near Panikhar. That is tarred. On return there were taxis in front of us, thats how we discovered that!
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 13:31	#71
hvkumar Senior - BHPian Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Mumbai Posts: 7,369 Thanked: 3,454 Times	If you avoid Panikkar, you get some wonderful tar roads for 10 kms on the RHS bank, which is what we also did when we returned to Kargil from Padum.
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 13:49	#73
kaiserketkar BHPian Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: Pune Posts: 182 Thanked: 82 Times	fabulous pics saji! keep 'em coming
	() Thanks

30th September 2009, 14:02	#75
hvkumar Senior - BHPian Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Mumbai Posts: 7,369 Thanked: 3,454 Times	Preparations for the Trip While the Lalu/Saji bandwagon rolls on, let me share with you some of the aspects of the trip preparation. The trip was originally conceived as a Joint Venture between me and Ramkya in 2008, but that year both of us had wrk-related problems and we had to call off teh trip. For me, this was my 3rd trip, and I was determined to do the drives to Zanskar, Nubra and TsoMNoriri this time. UNlike the last 2 trips, this one was a North-South (Srinagar-Leh-Manali) drive. The Route Plan was first made, keeping in view the following aspects: - The run from the palins to the hills (nearly 2,500 kms of it, ex-Bombay) had to be fast and not consume more than 4 days either way - We chose the month of September, knowing it to be off-season and season of best roads in Ladakh - We had to bear in mind the (then) time restrictions in Jawahar Tunnel and Zoji La The route plan that was drafted is linked below: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?k...1EV1E&hl=en_GB The brief onward journey plan was as follows: Bombay-Udaipur-Jaipur-Delhi-Pathankot-Srinagar-Sonmarg-Kargil We planned to visit Zanskar V, Nubra V, Chumthang V and exit Ladakh via the Lahaul, Spiti and Kinnaur V. Since it is not easy to understand a detailed Route Plan, there were some who said that their wives can't understand what they were up to. So, a PowerPoint presentation was made on the same Route Plan. That is linked below: ladakh Slowly, the team started building up and Ramkya kickstarted the mailing group that reached out to every potential team member - the mailing list was at times over 35 names long and we exchanged views and info for nearly 2.5 months, on some days the mails peaking at 35-50! We have lost track of how many 100s of mails were exchanged in the days running up to Zero Day. We put a team list together, discussed who will bring his car, and how erach car will be filled up to optimise on costs and vacancies. It was quite a task since the team was converging from different cities in India - 6 in the final count. We froze the dates of travel 3 months in advance so that each member of the team could plan his work schedules and arrange his affairs for the trip. Next stage, we went into intensive preparation on the things we needed to carry, how we should prepare ourselves mentally and physically, what medicines to have, etc. THisa was checklisted in the following link: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?k...dTaEE&hl=en_GB Then came the most important part, preparing the cars. Since all the cars were M&M (all Scorpio, except the Bolero.....and later the Pajero), we checklisted the things to be done to get the cars ship-shape and 150% reliable. This is the checklist we used: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?k...RkVFE&hl=en_GB The team started swelling up and at one point of time we had over 40 probables and nearly 10 cars in the line-up. There were several drop-outs, the most disappointing ones being those of Ramkya and Guderian. At one point in time, our oldest team member was 67 years old. We collected details of each person. Most of the team were either friends or drawn from Mahindra Scorpio Yahoo Group, team-bhp, bcmtouring or indiahighways Yahoo Group. Very few of us had even seen each other before and it was really quite a penpal gathering! As the preparations were on, the team came up with some bright ideas for T-Shirts, Slogans and Stickers. So, after lots of consultations, the designs were chosen and we ended up with a Team Slogan, white team T-Shirts and Sticker for each car. (Lalu, can you upload the images of the T-Shirts and Stickers?) Last edited by hvkumar : 30th September 2009 at 14:17.
	() Thanks