Friday 24 February 2012

Skiing in Kashmir


So after a 8 days in Jaisalmer we boarded a bus back to Delhi (18hr trip) before catching a flight to Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir. The flight itself was without a doubt one of the most senic flights I have ever been on. You start out in Delhi and fly over desert and flatlands that slowly turn into rolling hills before you are greeted with the massive heights of the Himalaya. From there you fly over the mountains, overlooking small snow covered villages before decending into the massive Srinagar valley. Before we even landed I knew that I loved Kashmir. 

Driving through Srinagar on the way to Gulmarg (~1.5 hrs) it was as if we had arrived in a completely different country. Gone were the bright colors, meandering cows, and heat of Rajasthan. Everything from the clothes, houses, streets, language, climate, people, and religion were different. One of the biggest changes was the large military presence everywhere. During the 90s Kashmir was fought over between Pakistan and India, so India maintains a large military in the area in case tension flairs up again. That being said, the entire time we spent in Kashmir we felt just as safe as anywhere else we had travelled in India

Back in Nepal, our climbing guide and friend Luke, told us that while visiting India we had to check out the amazing terrain of India's best ski hill, Gulmarg. Now, this just isn't any ski hill.The gondola, which is the world's highest, tops out at 3950m and gives you access to 360 degrees of backcountry terrain. If you are willing to hike up the skiers left of the gondola it is possible to climb to 4200m before decending into your choice of the many powder filled bowls. The actual inbounds area is tiny, so if you really want to experience this place properly it is essential to explore the backcountry. For those of you back on the island, Gulmarg is kind of like an extremely large version of Mt. Cain.

Mt. Affarwat in the morning. The area under the Gondola is inbounds, everything else is backcountry terrain.

The top of the gondi
Kiersten and I ended up staying at an awesome little cabin called the Rosewood with a bunch of other foreign skiers and snowboarders. People came and went while we stayed there but two super nice Austrailian brothers, Bon and Kel, were there the whole time (they are staying for 4 months) and we ended up skiing and hanging out with them the most. They had already been there for a while so it was good to have people to explain to us where the pow was at and the weird ins and outs of the place. Those boys were also fun to party with.

Gulmarg doesn't operate like ski hills in Canada. First of all the gondola is split into two stages, both of which you have to buy tickets for if you want to ride. You pay by the ride rather than for a whole day and you can't buy tickets for both stages at once. You have to buy tickets for the first stage at the bottom and tickets for the second stage at the mid-station. It makes for a lot of lines if the place is busy. The first stage cost $3 Cdn to ride while the second stage cost $5. We were extremely lucky when we arrived because the top section of the gonola was open after being closed for over a week. The ski patrol was relying on the military for explosives for avalanche control and due to a disagreement the army wasn't providing them. Fortunately that was sorted out and we got to go to the top on our first two days.Those days were spent exploring some of the bowls close to the gondola. The second day was probably best of the two because we hiked to the top and dropped into a relatively untouched bowl before skiing down to an army base and school of high altitude warfare.

Kiersten on the hike to the top of Mt. Affarwat

Our crew on day two

Bowl ripped apart

The shop were we rented our gear including touring skis and backcountry safety gear
On the evening of day two the snow came down hard and the gondola closed for a few days. The awesome thing is you can still have tons of good skiing on Gulmarg when the gondola is closed. All you have to do is rent a taxi to shuttle you up and down the amazing tree runs that surround the town. The runs include a 10km decent down to the town of Tangmarg, and my personal favorite: the steep Babereshi tree runs which had tons of light fluffy snow. Most taxi drivers were great and knew exactly where on the road you to pick you up after you dropped in.

Kel, Bon, and I after skiing down to Tangmarg

This guy lit up his oil filter to defrost something under the car. Weird thing to do in Canada, but in India everything is possible.

Locals checking out Kiersten

Home

Kiersten skiing powder in the Babereshi trees


Trash eating snow monkey

Me carving through Babereshi

At the top
When the gondola opened back up Kiersten and I hired a local guide (Willey) to take us further into the backcountry. The first few runs with him were great but the last one was a bit of a disaster. On our last run we wanted him to take us down a run that ended in the small town of Drung. Just after we dropped the clouds moved in fast and were stuck in a white out. We waited a little while the clouds to clear but they just got denser so we decided to go for it. Willey took a wrong turn and the next thing you know were skiing down an avalanche chute that had slid a day or two before. We skiied through massive chunks of ice and snow before arriving at a classic gulley terrain trap. We got the hell out of that as fast as we could and began the long trek home. We were with Bon and Kel who were on snowboards so Kiersten and I hadn't bothered to bring skins with us making the journey home longer than it may have been. Our guide didn't seem to know where we were, but after crossing a couple rivers and climbing out of another gulley we fortunately came across a military outpost. The soldiers told us that we would only have to walk for another 30min before being able to catch a taxi back up to Gulmarg. Four long hours later we were finally in the town of Drung (our original destination) and found a cab back up to Gulmarg. We were all extremely tired and thristy (we had only 1 liter between Kiersten and I) so seeing the cab was a big relief. This is the first time I have ever gotten blisters from walking in ski boots. It was quite the experience. The entire run took 6 hours.

Kiersten and Willey

"Where the fuck are we????!!" - fortunately the military guys could direct us home but it was a long slog from here

Traditional Kashmiri ski suit

Gulmarg from the market

The gulmarg version of the rickshaw. You'll see people pulling hundreds of Indian tourist around town on these things. They weren't popular with the foreigners though.

Doing our part to defend Kashmir

Javid and Mirage, the amazing helpers that worked at our cabin.

Hot water in Gulmarg Step 1: stick exposed wire into old burnt socket

Step 2: Stick electrical plug in water... yes I did electricute myself

Javid and I just before leaving
Overall, our trip to Gulmarg was amazing and everyone who loves the mountains should go. I can't really do justice to this place on the blog, you really have to go there to experience it. I think we skiied for about 10 days but it flew by way too fast.

Here's a little video we put together of trip.

Wednesday 8 February 2012

Jaisalmer and the Thar desert

From Pushkar we caught yet another bus to fort city of Jaisalmer, located on the edge of the Thar desert. So what to say about Jaisalmer... I guess its smaller and has a more laid back vibe than Jodhpur, less touristy than Pushkar, and looks similar to cities in the middle east. We spent a total of 8 days in the area around Jaisalmer. We didn`t initially plan on spending so much time there, but it just kind of happened. We were originally thinking about heading up to Bikaner than to Amristar before heading back to Delhi to catch a flight to Srinigar but decided against it because it would have meant too much travelling. Jaisalmer also hosted a desert festival on Feb 5th-7th that we wanted to attend.

I thought the town of Jaisalmer was much more interesting than the it`s fort. The fort (where roughly a quarter of the town still lives) is very much geared towards tourists. The little stone roads and alleyways, which would otherwise be very fun to wander around, are lined with overpriced shops trying to sell you the same goods you`ll find all over Rajasthan. That being said, the architecture is amazing and the sheer size of the fort impressive. It would have just been nicer and improved the ambiance if it wasn`t full of aggressive shopkeepers. The streets of the city, however, were a wonderful maze of narrow alleyways with intricately carved buildings on every block, without the commercialism of the fort.

Kiersten in Jaisalmer fort

The fort gate

In the fort just past the main gate

A haveli turned into a hotel

A impromtu arm-wrestling match (I lost)

Sleepy cow


Kiersten in a Jaisalmer alleyway


Jaisalmer
On our third day in Jaisalmer, we left the city and went out on a one night camel safari. Jaisalmer is well known for its camel safaris and there are millions of companies offering them. We ended up going with Dan the camel man. Dan has been camel driver since he was teenager and spends most nights of the year sleeping under the stars. Dan also was a great cook and made us nice spicy vegetarian dishes throughout the safari. One of the best things about our camel safari was the fact that they didn`t bring tents so we were forced to sleep out in the open. We spent the night sleepy on a comfy sand dune in the middle of the desert. That night definitely had some of the best stars I`ve seen in my life.

The camels themselves were interesting creatures. Kiersten camel, Mr. Rangoli, was apparently ``love-sick `` and spent most of the trip foaming at the mouth. Initially I thought camels were more comfortable than horses to ride but after an hour or so I realized that I was severely mistaken. The width of the camels force you to take take a very wide stance and puts some serious stress on the groin muscles. In the looks department, the camels reminded me of giant furry dinosaurs, partly because of their abnormally long necks (I guess normal for a camel). They were also surprisingly fast.







One of us was riding the mother of the baby camel following us on the left





Our camp




The day after we returned from the camel safari, Kiersten and I decided to rent scooters to further explore the desert surrounding Jaisalmer. At the rental shop I decided to see if the owner would rent me a motorcycle even though I had zero experience. This being India, he said ``no problem``, and gave me a 5 minute tutorial before sending us on our way. Riding a motorcycle was actually pretty damn easy, and I am pumped that I learned because now I am totally going to rent a Royal Enfield in Goa and explore the shit out their beaches in a few weeks from now. Kiersten and I put 100km or so on the bikes and went out to explore Sam Sand Dunes and bunch of random temples (none of which were noteworthy enough to write about).

Me on the dunes

First time on a bike

The helmet was just for show, that thing would broke even if I crashed on the sand at 2 kph




Camels deliver everything.

Cows often impede progress through alleyways
There was a glorious sunset that we watched from the fort on one of days (all days blended together). Enjoy the following gratuitous sunset shots.






We found a nice little spot in the fort to read and drink tea

There was a dirty ol`lake in Jaisalmer as well. Probably most memorable as the place where we met the creepiest person either of us has met so far in India. (probably the creepiest person I have ever met)



Our last two days in Jaisalmer was spent enjoying the annual Desert Festival. There were numerous events and competitions to watch including: camel polo, camel beauty contest, camel race, turban tying competition,  mustache competition etc. The festival kicked off with a giant parade featuring uncountable camels.


Part of the parade




It is brave to walk the streets of Jaisalmer barefoot


Turban tying competition


Can you spot the typo


Camel polo playing heading to the field





The polo champions