Day 11: Paleo Lake Sediments 'n' stuff

9/16/2011 Day 11 (Guidebook Day 14 – led by Ellen)

First thing this morning we trekked up to the Lamayuru Monestary.

View from the deck

Prayer wheels.

These rocks have spiritual messages on them.

Paleo Lucastrine sediments

Failing road.

Some nice layering.

We’ve only been camping a couple nights now, but I can already see a layer of filth covering the back of my hands. That may have something to do with the fact that we’ve been constantly climbing up hillsides and handling rocks, though… We’ll be in Leh tonight which that means a hot shower is in my near future!

After tonight, we will be camping again for another 3-4 nights.

Today we drove from Layamuru to Leh.

Day 10: Sed Stuff Galore

9/15/2011 Day 10 (Guidebook Day 13 – led by Adam)

“You haven’t lived until you’ve tasted a rock.” – Adam

Today was a rock heavy day.  This is for you Theresa (and all you other sed folk).

Ripples (although they’re hard to capture in photographs)

This whole surface was covered in them.

The way this stream has carved into the rock here is neat.

Check out that mountain. Cooooool.

Nice examples of some rudists.

Cobbbbbles.

Check out that folding.

Nice example of cross-beds.

Ripples/crossbeds

mini fault

Favorite one of the day

We stopped at the beach.

Also, this has been the most lush camping experience of my life. There is a cooking crew that goes ahead of us and meets us at our camp site with a dining tent already set up. They serve us a three-course dinner every evening with soup, the main meal, and a dessert. Then, in the morning they make us breakfast with chai and pack us boxed lunches. You can’t even really call this camping.

Today we went from Chilling to Lamayuru.

Day 9: Quartz and a Cool Ladakhi Man

9/14/2011 Day 9 (Guidebook Day 12 – led by Jacob)

Today’s highlight was definitely the hike we took at Hemis National Park. Our goal was to hike 2 km up the side of a mountain to a temple. We never did find the temple but instead we stumbled upon a cottage where an older Ladakh man invited us in for chai. They only spoke Ladakhi, so our communication was limited to pointing and gesturing.

First he brought all twelve of us cups of chai and passed around a platter of cookie biscuits and crackers. Later he brought out a handkerchief full of quartz pieces. Some were pure quartz while others had impurities that made them green. At first we were unsure if he was just showing us his collection, or if was selling them. Finally, I just held up a piece I thought was cool and he said “one fifty”. The majority of us bought quartz pieces from him ranging from 70 to 150 rupees.  At one point, Marianne showed him how to use a hand lens to look at the minerals.

We decided that we wanted to give this man (and his wife) a gift for his hospitality, so we gave him the hand lens. What else would have a group of geologists give him? Haha.

The whole thing was kind of surreal.

Here is their house.

A bunch of us crammed in the room.

Chai drinkin’! (He insisted that Fraser take a second cup.)

Out comes the quartz.

I asked (through gestures) if I could take a picture of him with us. He obliged. He was so cool.

Here Adam is giving him the hand lens.

As we were leaving, his wife knocked some apples down from a tree for us to take with us.

Epic.

Here you can get an idea of the trail we took

The other thing we did today was check out the confluence of the Zanskar and Indus Rivers.

And I ended my day by getting my super hair stuck in the zipper of my bag. Me being me, my first reaction wasn’t to try to wrestle it out, but instead to yell for someone to get my camera to take a picture of my stupidity.

Today we went from Leh to Chilling.

Day 8: Scarves and a Giant Golden Buddha

9/13/2011 Day 8 (Guidebook Day 11 – led by Fraser)

Today we spent the entire day in Leh. I spent the first part of the day scarf shopping with Maria. Because she knows Hindi, she was able to barter much better than this I-don’t-speak-anything-but-English gal. They also seemed kind of surprised to hear Hindi coming out of Maria.

Most of the scarves have different colors on one side vs the other side. The sellers liked to demonstrate this by showing you one side, saying “Sunday”, showing you the other side, and saying “Monday”. Sunday, Monday, Sunday, Monday….

Later in the day I made my way to the Shanti Stupa, located at the top of a mountain. While some opted to walk up to the stupa, Kyle and I took a cab up and back. Way more time-efficient and way less tiring.

The rest of the day was filled with wandering about the city and shopping. It was a nice break.

While walking around we passed by “Paintball Yard: the world’s highest paintball destination”. There were also these great signs that all started with “No Parking on Changspa Road”. And then after that, each one had a public service announcement type message like “Tobacco causes cancer”, “Don’t litter”, “Don’t use polythene”, or “Save water”. 

This amused me.

Shanti Stupa!

The Floppy Hat Club: