India Film Expedition - Week 2

So after 5 long days in Dharamshala, we were itching to get back on the road and head deeper into the Himalayas. We had planned plenty of time for us to get what we needed here and we ended up getting it all covered around day 3, so now we had two extra days to just kinda wait. Which was ok because it was around this time that Jet lag hit. And it hit HARD. I tried hard to fight through it and stay awake until bed time but I just couldn’t do it. So I went to sleep at 6pm and woke up at 6am. A nice solid 12 hour sleep and I felt great! Which is just what I needed because now it was time to head out and overland for the next 4 days.

The Sach Pass

Our destination is Keylong, from here Gerry will head out to the put-in of the Tserap Chu and start his 4 day solo kayak trip, and I will continue on to Leh, Ladakh. But first we have to make it over the Sach Pass.
Deemed “The world’s most dangerous road”, it lives up to its reputation. Though I might don it a second title, “the world’s most beautiful road” because the sights are absolutely stunning for the entire drive. I was continually amazed and surprised around every corner. Just when you think it couldn’t get any more stunning or bigger, you drive a little farther and see a bigger mountain or a more beautiful waterfall. And it seemed to go on forever.
I felt like a kid again, enraptured in wonder of this world we live in, reminded yet again how small I am while surrounded by these ginormous, looming mountains that seem to just shoot straight up for miles. And yet they are so small themselves when compared to the planet, and the planet to the universe.

As I look around from the back seat, being thrashed about on the rough road, praying that the cliff side doesn’t give out sending us plummeting down 1,000 feet to the river below, or that the mountain side above doesn’t give way delivering a ton of rock on top of us, or that a bus doesn’t round the next corner too fast crashing into us, I am overwhelmed and filled with gratitude that I just get to be here right now, I get to experience this moment, here on this life-risking expedition deep in the Himalayas.
I suppose it is when we near the edges of life that we begin to appreciate it all the more.

It’s also during this time, these 4 days off the grid, that I really start to feel the ache in my heart for my family. The distance is really felt when you aren’t even allowed a simple text message to say hi. They say that distance makes the heart grow fonder, and I guess that’s because we want what we can’t have. Needless to say, this long trip away has grown in me a deeper appreciation and love for my family.
We tend to take for granted the things that we have access to so easily, don’t we? Like electricity, internet, clean bathrooms, paved roads, and our beloved...