TGT : Day 3 -- 04/09/07 -- Darcha - Pang

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Date : 04/09/07
Starting Point : Shack at Darcha just before the bridge
Destination : Pang but only after a lot of debate whether trying to make it to Leh is one insane idea!
Start Time : 8.00am
Distance Covered : (11811.8 - 11650.1) = 161.7 kms
Itinerary: Darcha - Patsio - Zingzingbar - Baralaccha - Bharatpur - Sarchu - Gata Loops - Naki La - Lachung La - Pang
Fuel : What ever you already got in the tank and jerry cans.
Connectivity : No cellular network & no STD booth.
Road Conditions : Mix of rough, smooth and no roads. But great roads from Sarchu onwarnds. Baralaccha is no longer the 18kms of a slushy-rocky mess it used to be. A breeze now where most riders will almost miss the solitary board indicating that you are at Baralaccha.
Food & Shelter : Mostly tents only for extremely basic food & accomodation beyond Rohtang. Maggi & eggs is staple diet. Lucky if you get rice-dal/rajma & sabji (mostly cabbage with carrots). Lots of different kinds of tea though. Accomodation is basic again. Tents with beds. Extremely cheap in late august & september.
Daily Expenses : Food + Water - Rs.65 + Stay @ Darcha - Rs.125/person
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The previous days ride had very very clearly outlined the limitations of a Bullet 350 in carrying a pillion. And Dharam (Bless you for being so good!) had made enquiries about alternate means to reach Leh. So he hopped on to the 6am bus while i was not-so-merrily contemplating on dipping my hands in the cold water and brushing my teeth. It was such a quick parting that I don't even remember saying niceties like 'take care. wear sweater. blah blah'. Thankfully he escaped any signs of AMS through out the trip in/on any means of transport he used.
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With the luggage "firmly" in place on the bike wrapped nicely in a blue sheet of tarpaulin, off we rode at around 8am. 14kms from Darcha is "Deepak Taal", a quaint little lake that made me stop and click a few pictures. The bike had literally huffed and puffed this distance so a few pics later, i decided to check out the issue. A loose end of tarpaulin finally led me to a piece of rope entangled in the rear sprocket. Throwing all the caution to the winds (damn i think i was excited that i finally had some serious issue to resolve in my Ladakh trip!), i started taking the tarpaulin and then the rope, off the bike with gusto! And all the enthusiasm led to an extremely tiring ordeal for the next 30mins. By the time I had managed to remove the rope from the sprocket, try and tighten the now-very-loose chain, fold the tarpaulin and start the bike again, i was feeling as if i had towed a truck all the way with my bare hands! Started only after a good 45mins at Deepak Taal.
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What followed was another smallish lake - Vishaal Taal. It was here than Major Vishaal laid down his life in a chopper crash hence the name. Further down just before we hit Sarchu was a extremely scenic valley. Click click and more click followed by a lunch break at Sarchu. Now this lunch was special. There are always eternal optimists in any group and we had a fair share of them too. Then there are eternal lazy a$$es like me who outnumber them by dozens. Which again held true for our group. So basically Yogesh was outnumbered by the rest and his plan of pushing to Leh from Darcha was vetoed vocally by Eric, Manik etc and not-so-vocally by simply nodding to Eric's statements by me and a lot of others. Pang finally was the chosen destination after considering others like Bharatpur etc that got ruled out due to the altitude.
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From Sarchu, most of the roads were good, if not great except for a few patches. At one particularly bad patch, the bike tilted to the left resting on the saddlebags and crash guards. I just couldn't get it up till i got off the bike and mustered all the strength possible, and some more, to get it up again! Phew...the skids were actually taking a heavy toll on the energy reserves but the real fun would only be tomorrow! One passed through scenic roads (they are all over ladakh so get used to this sentence!) crossing "Gata Loops", "Naki La" & "Lachung La" on the way. Now Gata Loops is a mystery to me cause you see a sign board indicating the start but none indicating the end. And not one shot could i click that captured all the 21 loops that are to be existing. But the Gata Loops were one place where all 12 bikes fell in line for a group ride cause Yogesh was recording a video. But yeh, the awsome loops after Gata were far far better with superb views of mountains and roads snaking over them. Naki La & Lachung La were mere blips in the journey i guess. We finally made it to Pang at about 5.30pm.
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The camps at pang were again rows of tents. Me & Suyash were in a different tent than the rest of the gang sharing it with 3 guys from RTMC, Karthik, Anant & Vodka urf Harish. Well it can't be termed exactly as love at first sight kinda feeling but it sure was pretty comfortable from the word go. Harish was doing a cycling trip from Manali to challenge himself as if doing it on motorcyle wasn't challenging enough. But later he said that he had already done so twice, once on RD & then again on a Bull. Guess he must have missed all the views so wanted to make sure he doesn't exceed the 25kmph speed necessary to soak in all of it this time! The other note worthy thing is that the term "Motocrapper" was born this very day. Karthik still owes it to Vodka for this one! :) There were lots of conversations on better photography, motocrapping, tents buring down due to gasoline stoves etc etc. But since all that would require a separate blog, lets just the lights off on the day!