Day 25: Dead and Alive

After a difficult but immensely picturesque day of cycling, we are in the relative comfort of a homestay in Zangla. It was tough getting here, we got turned away from all the other homestays for some reason, and instead of taking the main road into town we entered through a small side path and pushed our bikes up a dizzying array of small streets and pushed over little muddy creeks and other fun obstacles that aren’t so fun after a full day of cycling, and the second we got here the host woman ran away and left us with her batshit insane grandma who keeps giving us random stuff that we don’t want. First we got a thermos of hot water when we asked for tea. That’s it, just plain hot water. And she keeps poking her head in and speaking to us in her language as if we understood every word and then shaking her head and continuing when we remind her we are English speakers. She left and came back with last weeks stale bread and an enormous bowl of curd. I like curd and I could eat a lot of curd, but this can’t possibly be dinner. I have to wait for the lady to come back, surely she’s going to whip up something more wholesome. But I’m hungry. Unfortunately I was so famished I stuffed my face with the curd and bread. The younger woman came back in some time with a lovely meal and I still managed to cram it down my gullet. The best thing about cycling all day is getting to enjoy an adolescent appetite again, it’s reason enough to stay in this business as long as possible. Anyway, today was nothing short of insane. Our adventure took us through several different worlds it feels. We started in that little town high up in the mountains whose name I learned but can’t recall. I didn’t sleep so well. It was cold and perhaps the altitude made it difficult, but also my brain was racing. I’m 92% finished with Crime and Punishment so that may have something to do with it. What a book. I feel like it has a dark hold over me. Not that I want to go kill some random pawnshop lady, but so many of the themes are relevant to my life and my struggles and the idea of Raskolnikov's character coming to terms with the reality that he is not great, well that’s the hard pill that me and many other millennials are still trying to shove down our throats. I’m glad I wasn’t forced to read it in high school, it all would’ve gone right over my head. I probably would have Spark Noted it. 

After a very delicious breakfast of bread and stew and fresh goat cheese we begrudgingly got ourselves out of the literal hole that we had biked down into for shelter. We decided to push the bikes up the switchbacks and I’m glad we did because we needed our strength for what lay ahead. It’s nice to walk a little to change things up anyway. My knee hurt as it was morning time, but I got through it okay. It was very tiresome though, sometimes pushing a bike uphill takes more out of you than cycling up. But at least there wasn’t the stinging pain of my saddle sores to contend with. The first leg of the day was spent on a fairly challenging and unexpected uphill. The road was cut into the steep edge of the mountain and continued traversing the high alpine country. It was just as beautiful as yesterday, snowcapped mountain vistas, red and orange brush coloring the hill sides, everything you’d ever want. After some minimally painful climbing, we finally got to the good stuff. The descent was nonsense and ecstasy, danger and delight, and it lasted forever. The road started off okay with a reasonable gradient, we were able to go pretty fast. We passed the off ramp to Lingshed and I was glad we hadn’t stayed there as it was in an even deeper hole than what we crawled out of this morning. On the road that continued it was sheer downhill madness. A steep snaking crumbling road of death. This thing would not pass any road safety guideline in America, of that I am certain. In retrospect, I think if we had understood what it was we may have sought to avoid it. It would have been impossible to climb this road from the other side on our loaded bikes and barely possible on unloaded bikes, some of the grades felt like straight drops. We had to ride the brakes for a lot of it, you could smell them burning. If our brakes had somehow malfunctioned at any point we would’ve quite easily fallen off the edge of the narrow winding road and plummeted to our deaths. The road itself was all types of messed up. There were deep ruts and landslide residue and rock gardens carelessly splayed about everywhere. This was like one of those roller coasters that you’re definitely enjoying but you’re also wondering when it’s going to end. And it sure took its sweet time ending. But all in all, it was gorgeous and exhilarating and anything anyone could ever ask for in a downhill. I even fell once, embarrassingly, when my wheel got stuck in one of the ruts. Luckily I wasn’t going fast as I’d just snapped a photo of Adam and was getting back on. I landed smack on my left hand, which I had injured the same exact way previously and it took months and months to get better. By the endless mercy of God’s grace myself and my bike were uninjured and I hopped right back on. Finally the thing ended and dumped us into a gorgeous desert canyon with a pure untouched stream running through it, I could’ve been in Zion. And we had all of this, by the way, the entire time, to ourselves. We saw no one else. This may be the most remote road in all of India, it certainly could be the most beautiful. After a pretty deep river crossing that was fun to race through we were on a smoother angled descent through the canyon. This canyon road finally dumped us into… the Zanskar river valley! And if we had just been in Zion, the Zanskar River valley was like the Grand Canyon, but better, if I may say so. It was just gorgeous. Here, we went against the flow so it was an average uphill grade but the road itself gave us the perfect mix of up and down and I can’t stress enough how lovely it was to behold. The uphills were short and we didn’t lose our general speed so it was just continuous unhindered fun, really the ideal conditions for cycling. This was the highlight of the day for sure. Just pure mountain biking nirvana. We stopped at a tea stall, the first sign of civilization, and lunched on the bread and goat cheese that the homestay had provided us with. We mixed that with some of the spicy pickle sauce from the tea stall and it was a gastronomic epiphanic delight. We had around 30 more kilometers to get to Zangla, even though it already felt like we’d put in a full day, so we saddled back up and kept going. After relishing this dream road, we entered the nightmare of construction, where BRO was widening and flattening it out. This whole valley is slowly being turned into a two way tarmac road by BRO and the military, so the remoteness Adam and I enjoyed will be virtually gone in several years, replaced with the predictable motorcycle tourists and Punjabi Dhaba stands, but hey, it’ll still be jaw-droppingly gorgeous and a lot easier to ride a bike on. After battling huge clouds of dust from the construction we finally got onto some tarmac. An odd sensation to be back on the smooth after so much rough, but our gooches rejoiced. The valley continued to be outstanding and we enjoyed some more carefree downhill, slightly tainted by a persistent head wind that I dread we will be dealing with the entire way to Manali but hopefully I’m wrong. 

Anyway, Adam and I are now totally spent. We’re hoping to get to Padum tomorrow, which doesn’t stand so far down the road, and make an easy day of it, treat ourselves to a hotel and shower and laundry, the works!