05/09/2017 Sarchu – Pang
This proved to be a
very tough day indeed. The undulating but mostly down hill road to Brandy Nalah
and the start of the Gata Loops was great. We had made another early start
which is most unusual for us but it was beautiful in the morning sun. Then came
the 21 Gata Loops. It's amazing how easy it is to loose count. On the whole
they weren't too bad but the 10 km uphill which followed were pretty
awful. Malc and I have an agreement that
we stop after every 200 meters height gain. I know that sounds ridiculous. At
home or in Europe on our road bikes we easily climb 600 meters per hour but
during this holiday on our heavy bikes and at altitude I can barely manage 200
meters per hour. When you have a 900 meter climb or so ahead of you I really
need to break it up into chunks otherwise it seems overwhelming.
The downhill
from the Nakeela La was horrendously rough and I was beginning to realise this
was going to be a 'character building'
kind of day. Whisky Nalah despite it's appealing name was cold and miserable
and we didn't even stop other than to agree that we would stop every 100 meters
on the way up to the Lachulung La at 5077. Road works, convoys of Tata trucks
which had been commandeered by the army, dreadful road surface, it all
conspired against me and I really struggled to get to the top and down the other side. We were rewarded
though with the most incredible scenery of wind blasted turrets, spires and
flutes before bumping totally exhausted into Pang.
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| A few of the gata loops |
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| And more loops |
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| You can just work out where the road goes |
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| NAkeela L (4937m) and then down hill to Whisky Nalah ( Don't be fooled. No Whiskey here. Just a desolate cold and windy place) |
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| And then uphill again to the top of Lachulung La ( 5077) |
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| The scenery was amazing though. |
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