Ladakh – Leaving Manali
We waited at Manali’s bus station, reluctantly taking one of the grimy seats for lack of better options. We were planning to be at Keylong that evening, stopping for a few days on our way to Leh. We only knew that Keylong is going to be our next stop, but had not taken the trouble to plan how long. After Keylong, we would just hop to the next place we would feel like staying at. It could be Sarchu, Pang or any other lone parachute tented hamlet on the long road across the Himalayas.
Bhaga River Valley at Keylong. To the right of the valley is the road we took to Keylong.
Keylong is one of the major towns across Rohtang Pass and is the district headquarters of Lahaul. Manali happens to be a tourist hub and the gateway to further north. We took it for granted that there will be many buses linking the two. Bad thinking! The 10am bus had left Manali fully loaded a little before we got to the bus stop. The next bus would arrive only at 2pm and it was likely to run full too. The grimy seat at the bus stand was going to be our associate for longer than we wished for.
A few inquiries for alternate transport resulted in the obvious suggestion – hire a taxi. We did not want a cab for ourselves and there were no shared taxis heading to Keylong. A few people waited along with us, looking for a faster way to get to Keylong. In an hour or so, one of them came back with a good news – there was Tata Sumo heading towards Keyong.
The driver of the Sumo was a young boy, probably in early twenties. He thought for a while when we asked him for two seats. He had to calculate the tourist rate by assessing our clothes, the manner of speech and then guessing the depth of our pockets. After a pause of few seconds, the premium on our seats was set at Rs.50 above the price quoted for the rest. But I knew what the others were paying, which made negotiating easy. We agreed to pay a premium of Rs.25 and bargained for the best seats at the front in return. We were ushered into the Sumo, and I expected to get going in a few minutes, heading out of Manali towards the mountains with five figure altitudes.
It turned out I was wrong. Filling up rest of the seats in the Sumo took more than an hour’s work. In fact, while the driver went around in search of passengers, a few who were already in the jeep went away, tired of waiting. The vacated seats prolonged our wait but thankfully it did not result in a chain reaction. When we finally left, we had just 30 minutes lead time from the 2pm bus.
The journey was a breeze once we took off. In the next two hours, we climbed up Rohtang pass and got down to Chandra Valley, stopping at Khoksar Village for a break. It was just after sunset when we arrived at Keylong, and all that was left to do was to find a place to stay and rest for the night. It turned out to be a job not as simple as it seemed to be.