Kaza and around

As so often I follow a short cut. Often to avoid km to km in loops, as today from Komic on 4500 m to Kaza on 3.600m. But this time the short cut, which is even mentioned in ‚maps.me‘ is just … what?. It’s steep and lose stony down. No sign of a path at all. Suddenly a way crosses. But it leads to a kind of cliff. I follow in the hope to find a better way into Kaza. This way is done to build a small water pipe route to Kaza. A bit adventurous. All the time I say to myself ‚ok, to the next corner…‘ …. witnessing that the path gets smaller and smaller, but closer and closer to Kaza, steep down on the right side, the left side steep up…the houses of the small town are already kind of under me…. after the 8th or 10th time ‚around only the next corner…‘ it’s just to straight down (the cliff) and my foot just fits on the edge ( and I had to remove a stone to have a ‚good‘ grip) …. Even though the town is so close, I decide to go back to the lose stone ’short cut‘. Somehow after a while I am down….

Again, the x-time again, I feel in a kind of time laps. Since about 2 weeks I arrive all the time so early at day, even having left late?…. so today I am at 3.30pm at my day goal….????

The monastery in Kaza is happy to invite me for 3 nights in a luxury room. Warm water again. Shaving time. The monks are busy singing. They have layed a huge sand mandala as a celebration towards Vesak festival at full moon. Also they have a spring ceremony at my last day there on the terasse and stairs at the great temple… with blessing seeds and a huge fire overviewing the whole Spiti valley. I am invited to sit with them during the ceremony on the podium and I witness some funny situations. … the ‚head crowns‘ are sitting not good at all. They have four parts and some of the monks look like American Indians. All the time one of the 16 monks have to rearrange his ‚head set‘. One monk does all the time selfies of his decoration, which suits him really fantastic. Onother monk falls all the time to sleep, sitting in the front….. last days ceremonies have taken easily 8 hours a day…. so the drummer with his long drum stick is heading out drumming on his back to wake him up….
Also the second temple is busy with drumming and chanting,  to ceremonies to the same time…..

Sol cafe is given to me as a adress of good and fair informations. I have to let go of my idea to take one of the two short cuts to Ladakh. One needs a guide or at least a tent – ten days no houses -, for the other I have to cross 3 rivers…. and because it’s spring time there maid be to much melting water….. so I have to take the 150km way around a mountain range….
Sol cafe is also a special adress, because it’s the home of ‚ecophere‘ a NGO with lots of volunteers, which impulses a lot of good in the area. For example founding the idea of ‚homestay‘ which went around as a best success for more income in all Ladakh and Spiti…. Ecophere supports a elderly home,  castration and feeding the countless street dogs, supported the lots of mud green houses in the area and making consciousness work for solar energy solutions in mind and fact…. really making a difference in the area….. and more…. really respect to Ecophere …..

Sandals repaired. With the help of a shoe maker from Punjab. The sandals got repaired. Some stitching. And a new sole.

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