Day 7 : YHAI National Himalayan Mountain Biking Leh

YHAI National Himalayan Mountain Biking Leh

Day 7 - Ride from Haniskot to Lamayuru via Fotu La pass & back to Leh base camp

We woke up to a chilled morning. There was dew all around. And now we had the dreadful task of pumping water from the famous hand pump. This pump would probably be second most popular behind the one uprooted by Sunny Deol in Gadar :)

Ready to leave from Haniskot

We had breakfast and got ready to leave. As mentioned earlier since ours was the last batch means we got some benefits. Since YHAI volunteers were packing up the camp and they had a pick up to take their belongings to Lamayuru; we also got the privilege of sending our ruck sacks with them. We didn’t need to load them on our bikes. We packed up our ruck sacks and handed them over the YHAI volunteers. Posed for some group photographs and off we were.

From Haniskot

The plan for the first half of the day was pretty much set. Scale Fotu La pass and then cycle downhill till Lamayuru for lunch and leave for Leh by 3 PM. We left from Haniskot and started cycling towards Fotu La pass. The uphill soon started taking its toll on us. The ride was pretty much punctuated by small breaks which seem to be getting very frequent as we move ahead closer to Fotu La pass.

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

We left from here and our next target was to reach Rakesh tea stall. This was Sumit’s regular halt while he keeps cycling on this route. We cycled for about 30 minutes and reached the tea stall. We parked our bikes and sat down to have tea. We made the most of time we spent here since our stop would be directly at Fotu La. As usual the break was full of jokes and laughter. We finally left from there we had to catch on time. 

Tea break from Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

Rest time from Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

The frequent breaks were obviously used as an opportunity for group photographs. Since this was pretty much the last day we would be cycling along as a group we tried to make the most of it. There was one particular patch on the highway where we could see the moon even at 9:30 am.

We stand united :)

From Haniskot towards Fotu La Pass

We cycled and fought the altitude to finally see Fotu La in sight. The final stretch gave us glimpses of snow clad mountains and the icing on the cake was a milestone clearly mentioning “BRO: Fotu La Top HT-13479 Ft Highest Point The Srinagar Leh Road”. This is what we were cycling all this while for the last 5 days. We had finally made it. Akhilesh & I hugged each other in joy of having accomplished the mountain biking expedition. All the things that happened prior to us coming here and all the obstacles that we had to cross just seemed insignificant. This was it; we have completed our second mountain biking expedition in 2 straight years; something that we didn’t envisage at the start of 2013 when we hardly had any outings.

Akhilesh @ Fotu La Pass

Near Fotu La Pass

Near Fotu La Pass

Akhilesh & Me @ Fotu La Pass

Akhilesh & Me @ Fotu La Pass

Me @ Fotu La Pass

Akhilesh celebrating @ Fotu La Pass

Our camp leader at Leh had challenged us to get a group photograph at Fotu La ensuring that all members were present at the same time. This seems a challenge since it is not recommended to spend more than 30 minutes at Fotu La (and frankly it becomes difficult to spend more time here because of the strong winds). Since some of our fellow participants had already crossed Fotu La and made their way towards Lamayuru; we at least made it a point to have the group photograph with all the available group members.

LMB16 @ Fotu La Pass

Fotu La Pass conquered

It was a joyous moment for all of us since none were regular cyclists but we all made the efforts to accomplish something outside our comfort zones. We clicked as many photographs as we could and since it was getting late we decided to leave and descend towards Lamayuru.

LMB16 @ Fotu La Pass

LMB16 @ Fotu La Pass

Akhilesh & Me @ Fotu La Pass

From Fotu La Pass towards Lamayuru

We soaked in all the memories and with a heavy heart started pedaling towards Lamayuru. Frankly pedalling was really an exaggeration since the entire route from here till Lamayuru was total downhill. We zoomed past the next 10 km in no time and crossed the same route that we had our trial bike ride on the first day. The locals here were busy in their daily chores and one just activity we saw was milling of wheat.

From Fotu La Pass towards Lamayuru

@ Lamayuru

We finally reached the base camp at Lamayuru. We returned our bikes with Mr. Tiwari and proceeded to have lunch. After lunch we bid adieu to Chetan & all the volunteers at Lamayuru. Our bus was ready and we being the last ones to board the bus were again on the staircase :)

Akhilesh with Chetan Joshi (Ext L) & Tiwar Ji (Ext R) @ Lamayuru

After about 3 hours we finally reached Leh and as per the schedule the next day was supposed to be a rest day while we had to check out on the day after tomorrow. But since we were already done with the cycling expedition and we wanted to make the most of the time we had in Ladakh; we decided to check out as soon as we reached the camp at Leh. We checked out from YHAI and collected our certificates. We booked a room in the nearby Tara guest house and went to the Leh market for dinner. We closed the trip with joint dinner; it was me, Akhilesh, Hamza, Meet, Vinod and Yogesh. While returning back we booked the cab for our Pangong trip the next day. 

This finally bought the curtains down on the best trip that I had till date. Ladakh will always have a special place in my heart. Signing off ; “Juley”

Many more memoirs to share .... Sachin

Other escapades in Ladakh:

Pangong Lake
Khardungla Pass
Nubra Valley
Places to visit in Leh
BRO signboards in Ladakh