It was barely dawn when we drove from Leh. The mountains reveled in the golden light. The sky was fast changing colours as the clouds showed up in the horizon. It was bright and sunny within a few hours. The weather, I realized in Ladakh is downright moody. I went there expecting some snow and all I got was some harsh sunlight burning my skin.
The journey however was a dream. Our jeep was packed with our tents and we had a new travel companion, our personal cook who brought in some hot steaming momos. We stopped by a mountain stream amidst the mountains and out came tiny chairs and a dining table. It was breakfast time.
The landscape changed drastically as we gained altitude. We crossed Changla Pass at 17590 feet and stopped for tea .and then plunged a few feet downhill to about 14270 feet. We saw the marmots and had a close encounter with a pair of black necked cranes on the way. But there were no roads. The mountains circled us. And then we saw it! A thin sheet of blue, almost like a mirage, appearing out of the various shades of greys and browns. It was the first view of the lake.
Pangong is one massive stretch of blue, except that one can see various shades of blue. The colours kept changing by the minute. We were there rather early and had the lake to ourselves for a while, until the tourists finally arrived. We drove down, looking for a place to pitch our tents as we crossed Spangmik, the smallest settlement and possibly one of the last Indian villages which housed less than ten families. It was like almost being on the edge of the world for the Line of Control does pass through the lake itself. In fact locals told me that only one third of the saline lake lies in India and the remaining in Tibet.
Dorjee decided to pitch a tent in a small enclosure, located right on the banks of the lake. I looked around and saw some fields in the distance and a small house further away. And the tents came up – there were four of them, one for the bedroom, another for the dining, third for the kitchen and the last for the dry toilet. It was our private piece of paradise. The sky was clear as we walked along. A soldier with a prayer wheel guarded the border at the further end. The villagers brought their precious pashmina goats home. The stars came up as the lake was bathed in moonlight, the mountains beaming with a glow. A sumptuous meal was waiting for us, as we tucked into our sleeping bags for the night.
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