Ambala to Solang Valley

Day 1 - 4th July

We left Ambala at 8 AM and headed for Chandigarh. The road was superb and it didn't take more than 40 min. to reach there. We were searching for a place to have breakfast. We crossed many sectors of Chandigarh but couldn't find any market which was open. The irony was that liquor shops were all open in the morning. I don't know if Mohali was in the route, but we finally had Parathas in Mohali. After a good breakfast, we left for Ropar. The roads were good. A few km after crossing Ropar, roads were never straight. We had entered the mountains. I had never driven on curvy roads before. It was fun to drive up and down the hills. We were also stopping for pics. In the below pic i had difficulty in focusing on Nikhil :)
We crossed Bilaspur and stopped at Sundernagar for lunch. The route after Sundernagar was beautiful. All the time a river was flowing with us.
There was also a 5-6 km long tunnel between Kullu and Manali. We reached Manali at 6 PM. I filled my tank there and couldn't believe that my bike had given a mileage of 45. Manali seemed a very crowded place to me, flooded with tourists. Our plan was to spend night with our colleagues in Solang Valley, which was 10 km away from Manali, on the way to Rohtang Pass. We took some shots before starting the ascent.
The ascent from Manali to Solang valley was very steep. It was around 7 pm and we were the only ones who were going in that direction, whereas everyone else was returning from Rohtang. After ~10 km, there was a left turn to Solang valley. We reached there and enjoyed campfire with our friends. The scenery in night from the valley was spectacular. I captured some good shots in the night.
Day summary: Ambala - Ropar - Bilaspur - Kullu - Manali - Solang Valley, 11 hrs, 370 km

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Solang Valley to Darcha

Day 2 - 5th July

We started very late from Solang Valley at ~ 10 am. The road to Rohtang was in very bad shape. There was a traffic jam also, because BRO (Border Roads Organization) was repairing the roads.
From Solang, Rohtang was only 40 km, but it took 2 hrs to reach there. We stopped at Rohtang for half an hour. It was filled with SUVs, horses and people selling long black boots.
Rohtang is the last place to visit for most of the tourists. They generally spend half of the day there and come back to Manali. After crossing Rohtang, we were going down hill and the roads started to deteriorate further. We had to stop at couple of places for directions. I remember a signboard on which there was no sign. After asking BRO people, we took the left turn from there. The right one was going to Chandertal.

On our way to Keylong we saw an oil tanker almost completely submerged in water. We don't know how it got there.
We reached Tandi and filled our tanks. This time mileage was 33. Tandi is the last petrol pump before Leh, which was still 380 km ahead. Despite of all advice we decided not to carry extra fuel with us. It was a right decision. Even if my bike would have given a mileage of 30 till Leh, i wouldn't need extra fuel. Doing mileage calculations on the way proved useful for us.

We reached Keylong at 3 pm and had our lunch. After Keylong roads were in pathetic condition for most of the time. We had planned to stay at Jispa. 2-3 km before Jispa, i saw some guest houses, but i was waiting for the 0 km milestone, which never appeared. Finally we stopped, a few hundred meters after Jispa. There were no accomodation sort of things available there. We didn't want to go back, so we proceeded for Darcha, 6 km away from Jispa.

We reached Darcha at 6 pm and easily got a room. When i asked for the toilets, people started smiling. Pointing their fingers towards the river, they said, it's all yours. We had the fun next morning :)

Darcha is a very small place surrounded by mountains from all sides. I took some pictures of the moon and the mountains.Day summary: Solang valley - Rohtang pass - Keylong - Darcha, 8 hrs, 140 km

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