Pardesi Pahadi: The frozen, lost paths to Bali Pass
Swargarohini from the top of the Bali Pass - Photo: Zachary Conrad
‘It was late October, too late for shepherds, and we had the mountains to ourselves.’ Read Zachary Conrad’s vivid narrative of another perilous and rewarding hike in the Himalaya.
Author’s Note: The Himalayas are my favorite mountain range. I know that must sound obvious and banal, like being a Yankees fan, or being really into the Beatles. But they’re more than just the tallest mountains in the world. For the seven years that I lived in Landour, Mussoorie, these mountains were a constant presence, a beckoning horizon I could always look up to, and disappear to whenever I had the chance. These trips into the Himalayas were the best part of my life in India and how I connected with its people and its culture. These mountains are like nowhere on Earth, and I hope to share them with you.
Will, Andres, and Nyima had peeled off their boots and were basking their toes in the late morning sun. Nathan lay napping with his ankles crossed and his hat tipped over his eyes, in a way that made it clear that he was the Texan. Ady and Ian were with me, having a look around.
Yamunotri Dam in the shadow of the mountains. Photo: Zachary Conrad
We'd hiked since dawn, climbing nearly 1,200 feet under ancient towering oak and yew trees at first, and then, rhododendrons as we gained height. Now, several hours in, we were well above the tree line at a vacant shepherds' camp. We planned to stay at one of these dehras for the night, but it was clear this one wasn't it. The mountain still rose steeply before us, and it was clear we weren't high enough to make the pass the following day. The creek bed—a bright mountain stream in wetter seasons—had dried up. Knowing that something that’s too good to be true usually is, we took a few more minutes to enjoy the sun before continuing our climb.
Our objective was to make it to the top of Bali Pass, a 4,800 m shepherding route connecting the Tons valley in the north to Yamunotri. It was late October, too late for shepherds, and we had the mountains to ourselves. We owed our outing to Dusshera falling on a Friday, giving us three days of freedom. All of us worked at a school in Mussoorie. Andres, from Spain, and Ian and I, Americans, were teachers. Nathan, also American, headed up the outdoor education programme. Adi, from Lucknow , worked in the dormitories, and Nyima and Will, both British (Nyima grew up in Almora), worked in administration. All of us felt that, despite residing in the Himalayan foothills, work and other responsibilities kept us from scaling higher up the mountains much more than we liked. It was a relief to finally be moving upwards in the crisp mountain air.
We continued upward a few hundred yards before the path steepened, crisscrossing the hillside in rumpled switchbacks. Then, a few more hundred yards later, the path disappeared. It's common for paths on less-travelled routes in the Himalaya to be faint and poorly marked. Usually, it's pretty easy to guess where these paths end up, but this one was a puzzle. We had followed the route into a jumble of small ledges and cliffs. Easy enough to navigate if you are a sheep or a goat, but formidable for people carrying large, unwieldy backpacks.
Ian and I dropped our packs and went to have a look ahead, hoping to find our lost path again. Now, these scouting missions are always a tricky affair, balancing optimism with reality, being thorough, and ensuring not to take too long. We scrambled quickly over the ledges, taking the most direct route possible to the top of this rise. From there, we were able to regain the trail, and followed its longer, more reasonable trajectory back to our friends. After this steeper section, the path switched to ‘here again-gone again’ antics as we continued our hike, meandering through boulder fields, climbing ever upward.
Photo: Zachary Conrad
Before embarking, I had asked Akshay-ji, a true expert of the Himalaya who had recently trekked this way, for details about our route. He had left me pretty confident with the knowledge that there was a good, flat campsite with running water about a thousand feet below the pass.
After Akshay shared his information with me, he also pressed me to hire a local guide. "You'll never make it, baba!" he had warned.
This peak, abruptly rising 2,000 m above the Ruinsara valley below, is said to be the path the Pandavas took to heaven at the conclusion of the Mahabharata, though only Yudhishthira and a dog completed the journey. This claim is shared with a glacier of the same name rising far to the east above Badrinath, but these details don't matter much. People have been going into the Himalaya for salvation since there has been a civilisation to escape from.
Now, late in the day, we were all having our doubts. The slope flattened as we climbed, making it impossible to see ahead. As our shadows lengthened, I wondered if he was right.
I put my pack down. We had run out of water and it was starting to get cold. Nobody wanted to endure one of those suffer bivouacs that mountaineers sometimes brag about after it's over. So, we decided, since this was mostly my dumb idea anyway, that I would go on ahead to see if we were close to a potential campsite. If we didn't find something soon, it would be smarter to turn around and make it back to the camp we crossed earlier that morning, or a forest camp even lower down that still had a water source.
I continued ahead quickly, trying to enjoy the solitude and stay patient as I wished with each step for our intended campsite to come into view. Though we were traveling on easy terrain here, the substantial elevation (around 4,500 m) made it hard to maintain my hurried pace. I focused on long deep breaths as I continued uphill. Soon, I could make out a few jumbled stones in a flat area. As I got closer, I saw some of the rocks were arranged into a crude chulha. I could hear the faint song of a nearby stream.
I had found it!
Looking back from camp. Photo: Zachary Conrad
I sat on my pack for a minute to catch my breath and gaze at the imposing west flanks of Bandarpunch. Then, I let out a long, loud "Hoooooooooooo!", with a wave to let the others know it was here, just a little further. I couldn't pitch our tent since we had divided it up for carrying, but to be useful, I collected some water and started to set up the kitchen.
The mood was very much improved as everyone trickled into camp and we celebrated our arrival with sandwiches made of home-baked bread, tomatoes, and jamón Andres had brought back from Spain. We all donned jackets as the temperature dropped, reminiscing over the glorious hot springs in Yamunotri from the previous night.
Over a quick dinner we planned for the day ahead. We would need to continue route finding to make it to the top of the pass, then all the way down to Janki Chatti to meet our jeep driver by late afternoon. If we left too early, we might not make it back in time. Too soon could have us lost in the dark, cold and waiting for the sun to come up and light our way. Considering this, we opted to rise at 4:30 am, so we could start walking at dawn. To be more efficient we did all we could to get ready before heading into our sleeping bags, including filling our water bottles.
"Turn your water bottles upside down," Nathan told us. "Water freezes down." As a former NOLS [National Outdoor Leadership School] instructor and our school's head of outdoor education, Nathan was our expert. We listened.
We shivered ourselves to sleep, and then woke up early the next morning tired and frozen in the dark. My headlamp illuminated my stiff and icy boots, and I could see Ian making his way back from the ridge above camp. He put the pot of water he was carrying onto the stove and started making us chai.
"Dude, I got lost!" he told me. "It was really dark. After I got the water, I just couldn't get back to camp. I had to wait until you guys got up so I could follow your lights. It's so cold!"
Western peak of Bandarpunch at first light. Photo: Zachary Conrad
"We had water here though, ri-"
Then, he laughed, and showed me a water bottle, frozen solid.
On top of the pass, I was untroubled and content, fully in the moment. Getting to this physical place wasn't really important, but this mental place was the whole point of the trip. Since starting our hike at Janki Chatti, I hadn't thought about my emails, the lessons to plan, the papers to grade. Mountains overwhelm with their challenges and their beauty, leaving little attention for anything else.
"Dude, check this out!" he said. "They're all like that!" He laughed again. "We're gonna be thirsty!"
Nathan declined to join our summit push, saying he felt poorly due to altitude. Will, who had soldiered on despite a bad head cold turned back shortly after we made the ridge. The remaining five of us continued upward, finding a bit of a path here and there, but mostly we just went up. Soon we were finding powdery snow behind every boulder, and the ground was frozen and hard. As we continued upwards, the landscape changed again, from brown, frozen grass to fields of jagged and broken talus. Once again, I could hear Akshay’s advice in my head.
It's worth mentioning that navigating the Himalaya with map and compass it a lot different than it is in other places, mostly because detailed maps don't really exist for these regions, at least for recreational use. Local people don't need them, and most trekkers and mountaineers rely on the help of the locals to get around. I use a combination of Google Earth, asking around, and a 1:150000 scaled topo with 100m contours to get the big picture. Often, the features are big enough, and the paths well-travelled enough, for this to suffice.
Here, we were surrounded by jagged rocks steepening to a ridge above us. The pass was one of the low points on this ridge. How to get up there efficiently and safely was the challenge. Scrambling over loose talus is exhausting. A misstep might mean a twisted ankle, or a fall. Or maybe you dislodge a large stone onto you or your friends. Ian pointed out a rampart of broken boulders that seemed to be the simplest and safest way to proceed. And still, we all doubted this was the ‘normal’ route.
A rampart of broken boulders seemed the safest way to proceed - Photo: Zachary Conrad
It was slow going, but the exertion of the climbing meant we weren't feeling cold anymore. Bit by bit, we made our way up the jagged rocks, and were soon looking into the Ruinsara Valley thousands of feet below. We had made the top of the ridge, but not the pass.
At our feet was a precipitous drop fell away, covered in ice. We looked over at Bandarpunch, still towering above us, and wondered how Will and Nathan were getting on, or if they were even out of bed yet! There isn't much to do on a mountain top; soon we were ready to go down.
"We know the pass is over that way." Ian said pointing along the narrow ridge. "Want to go find it?"
Ady on the way down. Photo: Zachary Conrad
Andres and Ady declined. Nyima took one more puff of his cigarette before saying "No, I'm quite happy with this. Good enough for me."
So, finally, it was just Ian and I making our way carefully along the knife ridge, sometimes on the northern side, sometimes the south, using broken rocks, frozen gravel, or ice chunks for steps. We moved slowly, testing each step before committing our weight to it.
Walking the ridge soon gave way to scrambling over some steeper rock, and Ian helped pull me onto the prow of a larger boulder. A bit more scrambling brought us onto a path again, and we raced up to the real Bali Pass, marked with Tibetan prayer flags, rough stone pillars, and coconut husks from the pujas of previous travellers.
I broke a frozen snickers bar into three pieces as a sort of prasad and fixed my gaze up at the rocky spires of Swargarohini. This peak, abruptly rising 2,000 m above the Ruinsara valley below, is said to be the path the Pandavas took to heaven at the conclusion of the Mahabharata, though only Yudhishthira and a dog completed the journey. This claim is shared with a glacier of the same name rising far to the east above Badrinath, but these details don't matter much. People have been going into the Himalaya for salvation since there has been a civilisation to escape from. And I know it works.
On top of the pass, I was untroubled and content, fully in the moment. Getting to this physical place wasn't really important, but this mental place was the whole point of the trip. Since starting our hike at Janki Chatti, I hadn't thought about my emails, the lessons to plan, the papers to grade. Mountains overwhelm with their challenges and their beauty, leaving little attention for anything else.
Our friends had already descended into the rocky bowl below us, and reluctantly, we went down to join them. It warmed as we moved down the mountainside, and I felt the oxygen returning to the air. I love high places, but I cannot stay there for long. We broke camp quickly and continued down, down, down, pausing only to adjust a pack strap or drink water (it had finally started to melt). Will and Nathan were nowhere to be found, and we wondered if they returned to the hot springs for another soak, laughing at those of us that opted to suffer in the cold.
At the forest's edge, I heard the hawk-like call of a monal pheasant, but I didn't see it. This song can only be heard high in the Himalayas. As we made our way down through the forest, I promised myself to hear that song again.
***
Zachary Conrad is a teacher, hiker and climber. Raised in the woods of Vermont, Zachary spent 8 years in the Himalayan foothills of Landour, Mussoorie. He is now based in Guiyang, China. You can follow him on Instagram: @zachonrad
