Day 3 – Narkanda to Sangla
Woke up to one the best views I have ever had from a room. Clear skies, snow capped mountains in the distance and forests around. It doesn’t get better than this for a city dweller. After soaking in the view for a while, got ready and headed down to breakfast as we had a departure time of 8 am. Post breakfast everyone was handed a set of prayer flags for their respective vehicles. While the Scorpios displayed them on the insides of the rear windshield, I could proudly flaunt them on the front grille of my Thar. Today we were driving a distance of 182 km to Sangla. As we set off, we were all handed apples to munch on the way.
Our first stop was at Rampur where we refuelled and also had a tea break. Rampur is situated on the banks of the Satluj river which we would driving along for quite some part of the day. After the Rampur pitstop we took a detour to head towards Sarahan where got the first taste of what treacherous roads, or the lack of them felt like. The climb to was steep with 4×4 low coming into play. After an hour and half of broken road driving we reached Sarahan where we paid a visit to the famous Bhima Kali temple and followed that up with lunch.
Post lunch we went down the same road and started driving along side the Satluj river heading to Sangla. The roads were at their worst and a hydro electric power plant stood out like a sore thumb in the scenery. All along, Hari kept us entertained with trivia of the area we were passing through on our radios. His knowledge of the region is impeccable. After crossing Kancham, we entered Sangla Valley with the Baspa river flowing by our side. We crossed Sangla to reach the Basteri Village after sunset where our abode for the next 2 nights was Banjara Camps. The actual camps were located few metres away from where we parked the cars. Rooms and tents were allotted to everyone and I got a tent for my stay. The tent was nicely done up with simple decor and super comfy beds along with a fully attached bathroom. Since it was already dark outside, I had no clue to how beautiful the camp surroundings were. The weather was chilly and we gathered around bonfire to bond over drinks, barbeque and dinner. The site manager’s friendly puppy dog also gave us good company. I retired to my tent after dinner knowing that the next day was going to be a bit easy since we staying put in Sangla. As I lay down on my bed, the sound of the flowing Baspa river was like a lullaby that put me to sleep.
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