Self Driving in the Himalayan Range

It’s not the first thing you think of when you think – India. In fact, it may not even be amongst the first ten things you think of. And yet, there are those who love it and devotedly look forward to it in India. No, we’re not talking about snowfall! We’re talking about self-driving across the subcontinent.

Not the American way – with trailers and a thousand miles of black road, shimmering in the sun! Here, we take SUVs and pack off across several kinds of roads – the dirt, the stony, and the wet and yes, the shimmering strip of metalled black. To give you a short glimpse into what we’re talking about, we decided to write about our last self-driving trip that began at Shimla and meandered its way through Spiti valley to finally culminate in Leh, the nerve centre of Ladakh.

Self-driving is an extremely rare indulgence in India owing to the technicalities involved – in today’s travel industry, we remain a leading customised service provider for this form of leisure travel. Here’s what it takes for a visitor to take a car and explore the country on their own – a specific vehicle that’s either a 4x4 or a 4x2, depending on road conditions, that comes with an exclusive 1N – yellow tinted number plate. We add several other features to the setup – for starters, a state of the art walkie-talkie communicator for driving in regions without telecommunications access, backpacks fitted with oxygen cylinders for extremely high altitudes (especially necessary if one leaves the vehicles at a certain point and chooses to trek or ride a bike for some distance), and a substitute driver from our company who can step in for you in case the fatigue seeps in. Before beginning, however, there are several mandatory procedures that need completing – since cars have certain components which are non-insurable (e.g. headlamps), a set of pictures of the car are attested to by all parties at the time that the cars are handed over which is then followed by a complementary demonstration on driving ethics and rules in India.

After we had put all these things out of the way, the bunch of driving enthusiasts decided to step on it. Driving for about 6 hours every day, the set of six vehicles reached the banks of the Sutlej, after passing through Narkanda and a mandatory halt at Reckong Peo, and stopped for two nights at Kalpa – at a lodge nestled within sprawling apple orchards. The mythological cosmos of the town is humbling – while many would suggest waiting to watch the tip of the Kinnaur Kailash (a mountain in the Kinnaur hills that resembles the Mt. Kailash) change colour with the ebb of sunlight, others would find deep meaning in sitting with the chanting monks in the evening. In ways both visible and imperceptible, both Hindu and Buddhist thought have arrived at a confluence of sorts in Kalpa.

Our next stop was at Nako monastery in the tiny town of Nako – another small but symbolically relevant stop in this part of the Himalayas. At Nako, beyond the soaring willows, lies the mystic Nako Lake – believed to be a site where the Guru Padmasambhava pronounced several principles of Tibetan Buddhist faith. For Buddhists, the site remains one of mystery and belief – even the caves in the hills surrounding the lake are believed to be places where great penance and meditation gave way to great knowledge. The road from here went further up the altitude towards Kaza – a route that is lined with famous monasteries like the Tabo monastery and the Dhankar Gompa.

At Kaza, for the first time perhaps, can one find comfortable lodgings – given the nature of the terrain and the niche popularity of self-driving and biking in the subcontinent, most lodges in region provide bare minimum services which are a far cry from the comfort of more popular tourist destinations. To travel here, and especially to drive in these mountains, the discerning traveller must look to both love the excitement of the terrain as well as persevere with it.

The Banjara Retreat at Kaza gave our eager drivers some time to unwind – hot water bags found their way into beds and time seemed to slow down with the hot shower baths. With some fresh dinner, everyone took to the night since the next morning was going to be another long day of driving. The road to Jispa goes through the Kunzum pass – the mouth of the beauteous Spiti Valley –which means that the highest altitude along the road could go up to 4555 meters before descending to about 3142 meters at Jispa. There is the option of taking a slight detour to Chandra Tal – the celebrated lake, famous for its still reflections of the moon on a full moon night, which rises out of water from a hidden underground source and lends its banks to campers every year, from all parts of the world.

The Padma Lodge at Jispa has both tents and buildings to house its guests – with the Bhaga River flowing right by it, we decided to take a day off to simply soak our feet in the river, walk on the river bed and try and catch some fish. We followed this up with taking a walk through the town and the nearby villages in order to get a sense of what life is like here – with scarce supplies of many essential goods and a lack of diverse vegetation. Taking to the road once again, this time we headed straight for Leh via Sarchu, with drivers taking turns at the wheel.

Leh brings to memory everything cold – its climate marks it out as one of the rarest such terrains in the world. Our driving enthusiasts, after a couple of days of acclimatisation, decided to ride higher up into the Himalayas, on our Royal Enfield bikes, to the picturesque Nubra valley. After stocking up sufficient water and food, we took the Khardung La pass, riding along the banks of the Shyok River, to enjoy the cosmic splendour of a silent desert at 10,000 feet above sea level. A visit to the looming Maitreya Buddha statue was followed by some more mountain biking. The Nubra Valley is home to one of the rarest animals on earth – the Bactrian camel – and we even managed to arrange a ride atop these unruffled beasts.

Once back in Leh, part of the group decided to take the route south to Sokar village – tucked away inside Rajauri, this village is gradually gaining a reputation for being a great camping spot. We provided tents to the campers – what followed was a couple of nights of revelry with no one but ourselves around. This journey opened up, for us, a number of stimulating ideas – self driving allows a degree of freedom that other forms of travel don’t. Enthused into making more creative itineraries using unexplored cultural destinations along these routes, our team is now on the prowl.

Since regulations on self-driving in India require specific marked vehicles which are only available in Delhi, Bombay and Bangalore, we’ve decided to open up all these regions to exciting self-drive options. In the coming weeks, we’ll be taking the road from Jaipur to Jaisalmer in Rajasthan and the scenic Konkan route from Bombay to Goa and onwards to the Nilgiri hills. So, if your heart’s racing already, you know where to find us.