Leh, Ladakh - Feb 20, 2025
Tibetan Buddhist influence, 50% of the population is Buddhist.
This post and the ones following in the next few days have all been written retrospectively since for most of the time since our arrival we have been off-grid, with no cell or internet service.
We arrived in Delhi late in the evening of Sunday February 16 after a lucky escape from the weather in Toronto, a snowstorm that had begun in the early afternoon of February 15 and which was piling up heavy snow on roads and runways.
We have not been in Delhi for about 12 years and so had forgotten the insanity of Delhi traffic. Let me not be judgmental…Indian drivers are a very creative lot. They add one more lane to the designated design of any road, so an eastbound stretch of road that was designed with 2 lanes magically contains 3 lanes of cars, as well as buses and motorcycles. It’s not that there is room for 3 lanes but rather that every inch of road is utilised as drivers squeeze in and out of lanes, slide by each other and tuck into any slight opening. Delhi drivers default position on any road or highway is straddling the lane markers, thus doubling their options and magically creating one more lane than the road was designed for. The net effect is of a giant mobile jigsaw, mosaic or Tetris game moving at speed and all the pieces in the design being constantly shifted and re-arranged, not for the faint of heart. Seen from above it would appear to be a perfectly packed array with cars in every available inch of space and with mere inches between cars. All of this moving at 30/40 kph while being serenaded by the continual braying of car horns. Delhi divers do not use their brakes, they use their horns.
Spent the next two days getting over our 16 hour flight and preparing for the journey ahead. Delhi temperatures were in the mid 20’s during the day so very pleasant and will be in stark contrast to the minus teens that we will be dealing with once at our destination.
Leh (3800 metres) with the Himalayan Zanskar Range (6000 metres) in the far background
We departed from Delhi in the early morning hours of Wednesday Feb 19 and flew to Leh, the capital of Ladakh for the start of our snow leopard journey. Ladakh, formerly the Kingdom of Ladakh is now and has been since 2019 a state of India. Until the recent past it was part of Kashmir and Jammu, both now belonging to Pakistan. The new state is bordered on the west by Pakistan and on the north and east by Tibet and China. Arising from this, one of the most striking features of the area around Leh are the large number of military camps that surround the city and penetrate into the valleys leading up to the borders. Paratroop regiments, various army regiments, military police, military hospitals and air force bases. In fact the airport that services Leh is an air force base and security is very tight. For instance, owning or carrying a drone or a satellite phone is a jailable offence.
As is the case for all the countries in this region, there is a very long, rich and complex history, the area having been overrun at various times going back to the time of Alexander the Great and continuing through the Mongol hordes, the Moghul invasions, Russian incursions as they sought access to an ocean port in India, the British Raj and in more recent times threats from China and Pakistan. Overlaying all these were centuries of more local cultural, religious, political and territorial wars and conflicts.
Leh countryside
Leh is situated between two Himalayan ranges on the banks of the Indus River, one of the world’s great rivers, the river also lending its name to the country of India. It’s mind-boggling to think that Alexander the Great crossed the Indus River in 325 BC after having marched his army from Macedonia and conquered his way across Asia into present day Pakistan. In fact, tradition has it and now borne out by genetics, that one of the settler groups in this region were remnants of Alexander’s army who preferred to stay and settle rather than fight their way back to the Aegean. The north-west of Ladakh is populated by a lighter-skinned, blue-eyed peoples.
Interestingly, Leh was also a key cross road on the Silk Road and Ladakh has very close ties of culture, religion and tradition to Tibet. In fact the Dali Lama maintains a summer residence in Leh, as close to Tibet as he is able to get.
Our biggest obstacle to date has been acclimatizing to the altitude. Leh is at roughly 4,000 metres and the protocol requires that we spend two nights in Leh before we travel to our final destination, the Rumbak Valley at about 4,500m. The intent of the protocol is to insure that one does not over-exert and so bring on altitude problems but rather remains quiet and at rest. This theory was quickly cast aside on the afternoon of the day we arrived. But that’s a story for another day….
More to come !
Leh Monastery
