Ladakh Diaries: Flight through the mountains and acclimatisation

One word for Leh... “Breathtaking”...  literally and figuratively. At 11500 feet above sea level, the oxygen is thin and requires acclimatisation. But on the other end the view is so breathtaking that it literally takes your breath away.

The flight was mostly uneventful till the mountain range appeared. Majestic, powerful, magnificent, few adjectives I can think for them. They were so fascinating that people could stare at those snow capped ranges forever. And they looked even more beautiful when the sunlight fell on them. The only thing being we were on the opposite side of the sunrise.

Landing at Leh airport didn’t feel like any other airport, cause this wasn’t like any other airport, this was a military base. Though you were instructed to not to click any pic, you clicked pictures with your, mind, pictures etched on the walls of your memories. The cold breeze, the bare mountains that felt like dunes in the dessert, the skies filled with cloud with the sunlight trying to burst through them. 

It was strange and amusing to see your name on a placard of a person waiting to pick you up. On the way to the guesthouse you saw groups of runners getting their running feet, resulting in a growing temptation to go out and run. 

The guesthouse Santo Green is beautiful and quaint, full of flowers in blooms, and apple trees laden with apples, dang had never seen one before, a beautiful vegetable patch filled with cabbages and tomatoes and spring onions and cauliflowers (huge ones) and potatoes. Apricot tree too were there, but were unburdened off their fruits. Flowers were in full bloom, and full of colour and beauty. You could easily view the snow capped mountains from the porch.

Mum took in everything with a childlike glee, totally in awe with the place, fascinated by its beauty, thankful for the opportunity, feeling blessed to see the beauty that lay before her. She was grateful to see Jaj and Pooja and Prerna and meet Prerna’s hubby and Sanjay and Sameer (on the flight).

So yes we needed to rest and acclimatise ourselves, and we did sleep, wrapped in our blankets, but then sleep doesn’t always come when you want. So we sat on porch, clicked pics, took deep breath and let the cold air flow through every part of our being. Plucked apricots and devoured them, plucked some really ripe tomatoes and spent time in the garden enjoying nature, the mountains and the cold evening hair, with the sounds of the wind rustling through the trees providing a melodious background score with the trees , while mountains and trees glistening in the sunlight providing a beautiful backdrop.

So although the day may not yet been over, it has been fascinating, it has been breathtaking, not exactly eventful but memorable. Now it’s left to see what evening has in store, especially since Pooja is cooking. So here’s to the beginning of a brand new adventure.