Kashmir - The Journey Up the Mountain

As we pulled out of the airport into the streets of Srinagar, I knew this was going to be a long ride.  Traffic in the city center was precarious and my young driver clearly wanted to make this trip as quickly as possible.  As we weaved in and out of the slushy streets, I began to get used to the cadence, eased my death grip on the handle above the door and began to take in the scenery.

Srinagar is not what you would call a modern city.  The streets are lined with indiscernible buildings that could have been built in the 1760s or the 1960s.  Every intersection had a military post with an Indian soldier barricaded behind sandbags and barbed wire. Small helmeted faces looked out from behind these mini-fortresses down the barrel of a large, mounted machine gun ever vigilant for the out-of-the-ordinary.  The city generally had a gray, late autumn, wet feel to it without the holiday spirit.  

As we drive, the density of buildings began to loosen and the countryside emerged.  This is when you could really get a sense of Kashmir.  Although still hazy with snowfall, I could now begin to make out the outline of the Himalayas in the distance.  As well, the landscape began to change into large fields dotted with the occasion clump of buildings selling the necessary wares for life in the Kashmiri countryside.  This was the real Kashmir - no politics, no militancy, no uprisings -  just people living their lives.

Every so often, we would happen upon a town in which the generally speedy traffic would grind to a halt and vehicular pandemonium would break loose. It would begin innocuously enough with one car trying to make a turn or pushing its way into traffic, but then one impatient move would lead to another and in a matter of seconds, the whole flow of a traffic solidifies into one large, apoplectic mass. The more gridlocked the road became, the more cars would try to circumvent the chaos creating a sort of automotive Rubik's Cube. Lane direction became a memory as cars faced each other head on with no room for maneuvering.  The driver took all of this in stride and as quickly as it appeared, the gridlock dissolved as if a large log had been removed from a stream.  The flow was restored and we were off again.  

Village Traffic - better than a Disney ride! 

When we passed through the larger towns, my feeling of remoteness was reinforced.  As we sat in traffic, men dressed in their pheran's stared into the SUV as if memorized by my strange skin color and facial features.  Apparently, and with good reason, not a lot of Westerns pass this way.  The staring was less threatening, than it was unsettling.  I felt like a new species in a zoo.  A friend of mine said that the Muslims in Iraq did the same thing, but a 50cal machine gun apparently is incentive to overt one's gaze. I did not have one handy, so I endured as the new traveling curiosity.       

The locals as we passed through a village

The road had opened up and was becoming slightly more inclined.  Feeling as if we were finally making progress toward the mountain, I began to feel more relaxed.  We had been on the road for a little over an hour and I was starting to get to the point in the trip where you nod off.  Remember, I had flown half way around the world, slept 5 hours and then had been on full alert for the last 8 hours.  I was exhausted.  Just as I began to drift into blissful sleep, I felt the car stop.  

I opened my eyes to find we had stopped in a small village at the base of the mountain.  It was dusk and the snow was really coming down.  The village consisted of a few exposed brick and concrete buildings surrounding a parking lot full of idling, slightly rusting, Indian-made, Tata jeeps.  The driver, in his broken English, grunted and gestured that he can go no further due to the snow and not having chains.  Motioning like a pecking bird, he pointed to the 5 or 6 Jeeps in the parking lot that had chains encouraging me to get out.  I sat there and stared in disbelief.  He, then, hopped out of the vehicle and began unloading my stuff.  Before I could say anything, he was gone.  Are you freak'n kidding me!!!  It was like a well-planned hostage dump.  I stood for a moment in the middle of this makeshift parking lot dumbfounded and, to be honest, a little concerned.  At least in Srinagar, people spoke English, but out here the prevalent languages are Urdu and Kashmiri.  Not too many university classes in Urdu these days.  

Once again, I quickly took stock of the situation and realize that I needed to get up the mountain.  There were several jeeps parked in a line.  Some had passengers and some were empty with just a driver.  I approached the first driver and in my best Urdu accent said "Gulmarg?"  He shook his head no.  The second was the same.  As I approached the third, I heard a voice in English call out.  It came from the backseat of a packed jeep that just pulling out.  I approach the SUV and the gentleman in the back asked if I was looking for transport to Gulmarg.  Without hesitation, I climbed into the front seat, paid my 100 rupees and we pulled out away from the place where I was sure I was going to be "last seen."   

The first few miles were uneventful and I began to take stock of my fellow travelers.  In the seat behind me there were three Sikhs including the gentleman who had called out.  They all spoke perfect English.  I soon discovered that they were businessmen from Jammu who had been in Srinagar for business.  Having never seen snow, they though they would take this opportunity to go to Gulmarg and see winter.  Behind them, in the third row, two local Kashmiris had wedged themselves in the small seat.  They were dressed in the traditional pheran and did not utter a word.  

The sun was going down and snow was falling on the surprisingly well-maintained road.  It was a narrow, mountain road for sure, but the pavement was sound and the usually prevalent potholes of the Indian roads were absent.  As we progressed, the hairpins turns increases and you could feel a slight slid in the rear as we navigated each switchback. About 20 minutes out, we came around a turn and although the driver turned the wheel, the jeep did not.  We slid off the road, onto the shoulder and came to an abrupt stop against a large boulder.  It was all in slow motion.  

The jeep came to rest slightly askew as the shoulder sloped away from the road at about a 30 degree angle.  I scrambled out of the car and took stock of the situation.  The jeep was resting on a stone about the size of a dinning room table.  Luckily, we were not going too fast and the rock was enough to stop the momentum.  This was good, because behind the stone, the was about 3 feet of shoulder and then a 50 foot drop-off through some lovely Kashmiri pine trees and then on to the rocky basin below.  The two local guys scurried out of the back door and after seeing the situation, buggered off down the road.  Apparently, they knew something we did not.  

The driver removed some old nylon rope from the back and we, the remaining 4 passengers, pulled the jeep off the rock while our driver piloted the beast back on to the road.  It was the first time I had a chance to really look at the vehicle.  It was dark blue and the wheel-wells were slightly rusted.  The tires were jeep tires, but the tread had been well used, albeit not completely gone.  The vehicle had chains on the tires, but the damn things were way too small for the truck tires and were held on by a bungee cord and some twine.   

Now a normal, rational person would have assessed the situation, deduced that the road will only get more treacherous the higher we go and bailed like my two Muslim friends.  I was neither normal, nor rational at this point.   My logic was I did not fly around the world, jet through India and drive this far to be turned back by the very likely potential of death at the hands of a 20 year old, inexperienced Kashmiri driver and a 30 year old, poorly maintained, 2/3rd chained jeep!  In all honesty, the logic really did seem sound at the time.  I convinced everyone to get back in the car and we would complete the journey - albeit at a much slower pace.  The second half of the trip took well over 3 hours, but was without incident.  

We finally arrived in Gulmarg in what seemed like the middle of the night.  It was pitch black and the snow was coming down in earnest.  We stopped in a large clearing which reminded me of a ski lodge parking lot minus the ski lodge or any signs of life.  My new Sikh friends asked the driver where the Highland Inn was and the driver pointed to dim beacon across a huge expanse of black.  I guestimated it was about a half mile trek.  I was wrong!