Day 80 Delhi

10:22 am. Cafe Barista. Lavazza coffee - what a treat to get good quality coffee; chicken calzone (with cheese), almond muffin. Good service too (unlike Cafe Day across the road).

8:29 pm. All packed - spent most of the day trying to buy a new bag for all my junk. Some last postcards. The one I got in Manali failed - zip broke. Problem is in Delhi either the bags are far too cheap or far too expensive. Went for the latter. Taxi booked to IGI airport at 9 pm - but I'll believe that when I see it actually turn up at the hotel.

10:30 pm. Indira Gandhi International airport- after much hassle extricating myself from the hotel. Based on a sample of five hotels, the Indian hotels seem pretty disorganised. Subway sandwich, coke, crisps with my final rupees. A lot of hanging around until my flight. A comic moment when some USA dude puts ketchup on his chocolate cake, thinking the former was some sort of chocolate sauce (despite red colour!). Will be glad to get rid of the bags. Usual airport dilemma: do I go through security and find there's no food the other side, or stay here where at least there's a Subway? Apart from a few English signs, could be anywhere in the world. And a squashed grasshopper thing on the floor.

On the plane: 4186 miles to LHR. BA0142 departing 2:10 am. 8 hours and 32 minutes to go. Seems funny to have got here by road from Istanbul...

Day 79 Delhi

1:55 pm. Barista cafe, New Delhi (Connaught Place); difficult to find by myself. Basically walked around at random. Finding India a bit annoying: typified thus: 6:50 am and someone was trying to get into my hotel room, then buzzed the door buzzer on the room - why? Later today the rickshaw driver wants to take me to his brother's shop - I go along, not too much else to do - but the place is predictably expensive - I mean silly expensive like $40 for some Earl Grey tea - more expensive than Fortnum and Masons. I tell the truth and eventually get to where I wanted to go (Connaught Place).

Day 78 Delhi

10:40 pm. Text this morning at 10:30 am from T saying she's at the Turtle Cafe having coffee with Mel; quick shower then went across in a rickshaw - cafe is in the Khan Market district, and is really nice. Good cakes and good coffee in a bookshop on three floors. Spent the rest of the day shopping for jeans(!). Interspersed with coffee and tea stops etc. The thing about buying jeans here is that they are all sold in a long size - labour is cheap enough here to have the jeans tailored to fit one's leg length. Tut tut back to the hotel; said my goodbyes and goodlucks to T and Mel. Now back in the Mohan International hotel.

Day 77 Delhi

Hotel lobby - it's 6:31 am, after a (pointless) night spent on the Hot Rock bus. Mosquito net deployed last night. Delhi station is as busy at 2 am as it is at 2 pm - just no difference in the number of people or what they seem to be doing. But there's no truck security during the day. Anyway, I'm here in the lobby, waiting with the keen newbies. The plan is to go climbing at the Old / New rocks here in Delhi. Hopefully might get some breakfast at some point too.

11 am. Bouldering at New Rocks, located in the Garden of the Five Senses at Said-ul-Ajaib. Still not much of a fan of bouldering - just did a couple of problems.

6:50 pm. Moved to my new hotel, the imposingly named Mohan International; in reality a bit crappy but better than the last place. Good climbing to day - New Rocks bouldering - okay but not my cup of tea; thence (after ice cream and Pepsi - whoops there goes my food budget!) we went to Old Rocks at Lado Sarai in Delhi. Very short sandstone cliffs - the sort of thing which looks a lot better in the guidebook than it perhaps is in real life. But it's climbing nonetheless. Climbed the arete - a couple of nice moves near the top. Owen led the arete further right at an impressive E4 6a or so - run out to the first friends (small) at 15 feet. Then the monsoon rains started at 3 pm. I had to scramble back up to retrieve the gear I'd left for a top rope problem. Scary enough trying to scramble back up - but even worse trying to get down - slippery sandstone covered in a flood of hot running water.

Hope to go out tonight to a good food place - called the Big Chill, with T, Mel and a few of the other nice people.

Day 76 Delhi

My last day on Hot Rock today - hooray! Sadly decided to forego the climbing this morning - too ill, although now (it's 9:50 am) don't feel quite so fragile / revoluted. I think that's the first day's climbing I've ever missed due to illness. On truck security tonight - interestingly I am told that it starts at midnight - but my time on Hot Rock ends at midnight.

9 pm and back at the hotel. A good day doing a dot to dot thing in Delhi (the nice bit); where for 'dot' read coffee / tea / cake shop. Avoided the coffee though. Bought some T shirts and cheap shoes. Truck duty awaits - needless to say the idea of spending my last night with Hot Rock sleeping on a bus in Delhi train station lacks appeal. At least it is my last night with Hot Rock.

Day 75 Delhi

Friday I think. 11:20 am. Found a great coffee shop in Delhi - in Connaught place, called Barista - one of a chain I think. Serves proper Lavazza; almond muffins. Very happy now. Especially after yesterday's climbing.

6 pm. Back at the hotel - after a great day with T, Mel, and Geoff; but should keep off the coffee - cannot handle it - I guess since (amongst other things) is probably 3 or 4 weeks since my last (strong) coffee. Saw a lot of kite flying near India Gate. There's talk of climbing tomorrow - at the Old / New Rocks in Delhi (not far away this time, also called Lado Sarai I think). Would be awesome - if the weather is good - it was okay today.

8:10 pm and we are at the Maa Bhagwat resturant. Urine smelling large cupboard would be a more accurate description of the place. T has made further comments about the food quality on Hot Rock - she has explained to Duncan that the budget is not enough. People who are sick (and there are 4 or 5 now in the group), need rice, chicken, clean water: one simply cannot buy this for the allotted 50 rupees a day. Those of us who can / want to, supplement our diets. To put the money in perspective, 50 rupees will get about 2 litres of bottled water. If I survive tonight's meal, I'll be up at 6:30 am for climbing at Old / New Rocks.

Day 74 Delhi

7:20 am. Hotel lobby. Good night's sleep, though not enough. Have ordered breakfast: two poached eggs, buttered toast, and tea no sugar. I guess today is Thursday - one week until I fly out. I like Delhi - not nearly as 'busy' as I imagined it would be. But then I've not seen that much of the place as yet. The sport's plan for today is to go by bus to Dhauj crags, two hours' drive south of Delhi, in a region called Haryana, at least according to the little photo-copied map I've got. From the guidebook, looks like an excellent crag. 9:40 am and we are sat on a bus (not Hot Rock one). And we are not going anywhere. Apparently, the driver will not go out of Delhi, unless we give him an extra 8000 rps. Trouble with this extortion is that it is a daily occurence. They won't get the extra money and we won't get to the crag. 12:50 pm. At last we have made some progress - as far as I can tell we've gone about fifteen miles if that - and now we need more petrol: we have stopped at services - massive queues for fuel; meanwhile we are in a Subway sandwich shop. The bus originally supplied has been replaced with two Bedford Rascals or somesuch. One of those journeys in which it is pointless getting stressed - clearly at this rate we are unlikely to get to the crag until it's dark.

8:35 pm and we're back at the hotel. (We are now staying in the no-star Peace Point hotel - across the road from the Stay Well and not nearly as good - unless you like the study of insects of the order of Blattaria - i.e. roaches). I assume that this hotel is simply cheaper than the Stay Well. Anyway, in the event we did get to the crag, at 3 pm. Climbed two really good routes with Sophie; she led the first on the Prow - called Aries, 5.6, a good route, and at this point no rain - but skies obviously fully laden and ready to go. I quickly got on to and led up Gemini, 5.6 again. The book said something like follow the prominent gully, over overhangs, over chockstone and up. Last twenty feet and the heavens opened. Just finished the route before I couldn't get any wetter: like climbing with a (hot) fire hose on you. Sophie did the complete thing in the monsoon rain. The rock is some sort of quartzite - very solid and very good gear placements. Everything totally soaked. Since we couldn't get any wetter I argued we should stay (Sophie was keen) and do some more climbing - but the others wanted to get back to Delhi. Pity - it was real fun to climb at Dhauj - memorable.

Day 73 Delhi

2:40 am, hotel Stay Well, New Delhi. Very late. The usual thing finding someplace to stay, but for once, we have shipped up someplace quite nice. With air conditioning. Delhi smells pretty bad - that was my first impression when we got off the bus at the train station carpark a few hours ago. After getting to the hotel a few of us thought it'd be a fine idea to go off and find a pizza place - but we found nothing much except some scary dogs roaming the streets at night.

9:44 am. Hotel lobby. A few people actually want to go climbing! But will have to suffer some faffing first - breakfast (I've had two already - not much else to do whilst waiting); seems impossible to get drinkable coffee here at all: even if I state NO SUGAR they kindly add about a pound of the stuff. Need to get my kit off the truck. The plan is to go climbing in central Delhi, a place called Ramjas rocks - sandstone outcrop about fifty feet high, we think.

11:55 pm. An awesome day's climbing, at Ramjas rocks. Began by getting my kit off the bus at the train station; torrential rain and pedal powered rickshaw back to hotel. Difficult to find in rickshaw, but worth it, despite the monsoon rains. Because of the rain we had to hang about in a local street food place - had lunch. Rain stopped after about an hour, but rock wet and slippery. Began by soloing up a couple of easy routes, K8 was one I recall on the lower set of slabs. As the day went on, things dried up quite reasonably. Led an old peg route up the back slabs (14), damp. About 6a French, one lovely, lovely move...Sophie led sloping slab number 21, then I led R14, easy but worth doing. All these numbers etc were painted on the rocks. Led right hand variant of 14 (arete), got stung by something - maybe an ant? or possibly the leaves of the bush growing out of the corner on the route. Got rickshaw back. Celebrated at TGI's Friday - burger, chips etc for supper - having managed to escape some of the other Hot Rockers...

Day 72 en route to Delhi

8:30 am and we've stopped at a roadside 'diner' - well a shack plus guy who is cooking some sort of Indian flatbreads. We have already driven past numerous places which looked good; then wound up here - sadly no eggs on the menu here. Still on the crazy cook duty thing; totally bugging me. Pointless. Plus I'll end up [and did end up] paying for a load of other people's breakfasts...

Day 71 en route to Mandi

8:16 am and definitely feel a lot better. The others came back from their camping trip yesterday - mixed reports - glad I didn't go up there. By the way, yesterday I went down to the Aleo region, a twenty minute (downhill so easy, even in my current state) walk from here; did a tiny bit of bouldering, but too scared to climb up anything significant - some good slabs...would like to go back today - I'll see if I can get a belayer - probably not given the overall lack of keenness!

Interestingly - or maybe not surprisingly, some Hot Rockers have come back from the camping quite disillusioned. A bit of discussion last night - mainly about the general lack of professionalism; one Hot Rocker walked out in a defensive huff.

2:40 pm. We were to depart at 2 pm precisely, so of course we are still here. Not sure exactly what we are waiting for. 3:05 pm and still here. This bus is totally disgusting - cold box full of some stinking water / Kingfisher beer / juice cartons - all rotting away.

5:40 pm and we are en route to Mandi, at last. Actually at the moment we are stopped because 'something doesn't feel right with the bus'. Something of an understatement. This is Hot Rock. Lots of fiddling of wheel nuts.

8:50 pm arrived at Hotel Moon in Mandi, just off the Manali highway, near a place called Pandoh; and I've just completed another total waste of time cook duty a la Hot Rock. No actual cooking: I take everybody's order, after determining from the waiter what is available. Then I give the order to the waiter. Why? A pointless layer of bureaucracy. After the meal I have to collect all the monies and field the change. I hate this. Also we only covered about 70 km today. Haven't even made it to Mandi. We travel about 25 km every hour, with still about 400 km to Delhi. Also, while I am moaning about Hot Rock, why do they insist on putting three people into a two-bed room? - of course to save money, but this is India for goodness sake, not central London.

At least my headache has gone. For the time being anyhow. Also, decided that I am getting very bored with most of the people on the bus, with of course a few exceptions.

Day 70 Vashisht

9:10 am. On balcony at Basho restaurant (breakfast); better weather today, plus - I think - I definitely feel better. Slept okay for once, but woke with bad headache (front right still); continuing with the metronidazole and two paracetamol. Funny, I'd hoped to do more climbing and less self-medicating: text from Elisa - she's doing more darn climbing than me - so jealous - I mean I should have stayed in the UK or spent a few weeks in Switzerland! Still hopeful about climbing in Delhi.

A pleasant walk down the road to Manali, following the river Beas some of the way. Nice to get out of the hotel and move about a bit.

Day 69 Vashisht

11:59 am. Flagyl 250 mg at 3 am this morning.

Day 68 Vashisht

9:40 am. Feel better but still bad headache; sort of moved about in my head and now it's behind my right eye - or at least right side of my head. A damp day outside. I am at the moment sat on the balcony of the Basho restaurant - at about the same level as the cloud base; lots of green; drip-drip from white painted wooden rails of the balcony. Roar of river in background. Awaiting toast and cheese omlette and hot chocolate. 70 rupees. Miss climbing. Wondering why travelling people travel. What's the purpose of travelling? Do they travel around Surrey? Do they travel to Greenland / Scandanavian type places?

4:23 pm. After breakfast returned to bed; spent half the time asleep. Bad headache right handside - Ibruprofin 200 mg helped a bit; drinking bottled mango juice and water; damn noise of chopping from the kitchen. Sounds like enough onions or whatever to feed several thousand.

Day 67 Vashisht

It's 7:49 am and I have quite an appalling headache - sort of dominating the lower half of my head, about below the eye line. Think that my chest infection seems to be heading up through my head.

Day 66 Vashisht

7:30 am. Been awake about an hour. Appalling cough, wheezing, realy tired. Just lying here. View of greeness through the window; apple trees. Bed very hard - like a bit of board. Will try and get up and buy some mango juice perhaps. Just ten days left of Hot Rock trip.

1:20 pm. In bed, reading Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov. Trying to make some notes.

Wendy has turned up unexpectedly - she's had enough and she's going to Delhi by bus this afternoon, en route to Glasgow...think Carolyn will abandon Hot Rock today also. From what Wendy says it sounds like the climbing's a bit crap up in Chattru - glad I didn't attempt the trip.

2:50 pm. Sat on hotel sun terrace / balcony; sunshine and lemon tea. Spoilt by electro music - I'd prefer the river sounds from a few hundred feet below in the valley. Things I can see:

• women about 40ish, with very white rabbit - she sits with the rabbit on various walls here in Vashisht; not sure why


• gap-year budhist monk types, complete with sunglasses and smoking


• piles of logs - not sure purpose, but very neatly done


• tut tut taxis bringing yet more kids from someplace like Godalming, most with flight-tags still attached to brand new rucksacks


• lots and lots of beautiful green trees - pines etc; the occasional one poking well above its neighbours


• prayer flags - spanning the river down towards Manali


• blue sky and clouds

I suspect Vashisht is the first point of call for the gap year kids - since they look pretty clean; I think it takes some time to get dreadlocks going. Cannot help wondering if they are dissapointed being so not alone here!

Day 65 Vashisht

5 pm. I seem to have reached some sort of zero-energy point. All I can manage to do is to lie down on the bed in the hotel. A real trial to get up off the bed, and out to go and eat. No lunch, but managed revoluted eggs for breakfast and toast.

Day 64 Vashisht

8:32 am. Think I feel better a bit - still big cough and very tired. Task today is to find another hotel to stay in for the next week, until the 11th. Been fidling about with the little shortwave radio - mostly Chinese station (in English), about the Olympics. Heard that eleven climbers died on K2.

9:25 am. That was easy: found a room in Hotel Valley View for 250 rupees a night (about six dollars) - told them I'd stay for about eight nights. A nice room - apple trees outside the window, complete with apples.

Day 63 Vashisht

9:30 am. Here at Lhasa Food Corner, at the top end of Vashisht; hot chocolate and lemon and sugar pancake ordered. This place is full of Brits - feels very fake to me. Reinhold Messner lookalikes; students straight out of Covent Garden in London, do not understand why they are all here - for that matter, I don't understand why I am here. Feel crap again - did not sleep at all well last night - perhaps because of the coffee I had at yesterday's breakfast. My fault. Stubbon cough, overriding lack of energy, headache, fed up etc. I'd be happy as anything if I had a crag to climb on. Miss climbing with ole partner.

8:50 pm. Feel quite ill - I had to abanodon that breakfast I was describing above! Sudden nausea and had to leave some rupees on the table and go back to the hotel, before any food arrived. Went to bed. Felt better around noon and went down to Manali with T and Carolyn - probably should have stayed in bed. But did have a couple of banana lassis to drink. Back here around 2 pm and slept for the remainder of the day. Managed to eat an omlette just now: had to eat something else my antimalarials would make me sick, I am quite sure. Have decided to stay here for a week until the others are back down from the mountains; I want to try and make sure I am well enough for Delhi.

Day 62 Vashisht

Saturday. 7:40 am and 22 degrees. Misty and damp outside - almost foggy. Nineteen days to go until I fly out of Delhi. Getting very stressed to do with anything about Hot Rock; I think I'd be fine if there was a little more rock climbing. Apparently the truck is out of the paddy field - thanks to two 'huge' army cranes. They lifted the thing out yesterday and so it should be down to Manali today. T and I will go down to the truck if and when it gets here and retrieve all our stuff, so we can then head up north, maybe tomorrow, to Chattru in the Kullu valley.

7:20 pm and I have retrieved my stuff from the truck. A lot of my stuff is in a bit of a mess - it's all damp or actually wet - thanks to rice paddy water. A lot of it is pretty much written off. Spent much of the afternoon washing stuff and trying to dry it out on the hotel balcony. We cannot reasonably travel to Chattru tomorrow. Will have to wait until the day after. Had a long chat with Carolyn: she's totally fed up with Hot Rock and is thinking of abandoning the trip here and going to Delhi direct by bus. I am tempted to follow suit - I have obtained a rock-climbing guide for Delhi - looks good. Carolyn pointed out an interesting (yet obvious) fact that Lianna likes / wants us to trek and camp - because that's cheap. The last thing Lianna wants is for us to have to stay in hotels, even cheap hotels. (She has said on at least three occasions that she'd be happy for us to sleep in the gutter.) Yet they can afford a couple of thousand dollars to extricate the truck from a paddy field. Apparently Lianna wants to talk to T and myself 'over a couple of beers' - scary huh! We will see.

10:19 pm and back in the hotel room. Nice food for supper. Lianna did turn up at supper for her chat with T and I - but I couldn't here a thing she was saying because we were in the restaurant with the big TV and were watching Forrest Gump. Sort of restaurant where one sits on large cushions on the floor - uncomfortable, but I think the gap year kids like this sort of thing. Now it appears that we go up north on Monday - but I am very dubious about the quality of climbing there. Mainly because Lianna goes on and on about how awesome it is, and how it's just like Yosemite. I've heard all this before: Ultar Meadows for example. Would rather cook up a scheme to go to Delhi and climb there.

Day 61 Vashisht

Up as requested for breakfast meeting with Lianna - but of course half the people were not there in any case. Morale is very low in the group. My problem is that the main issues - issues which are important to me - are not being addressed by the leaders; there's a lot of head in the sand going on. A pity since it wouldn't be difficult to sort stuff out better. Looks like T and I will wait here in Vashisht 'till the truck turns up (maybe Monday), then we can get gear off the truck and head up north in a taxi. Others going sooner than this, but (a) I am ill and (b) all my gear (boots, tent, mat etc) is still on the truck. Lianna seems not to recognise this latter fact which is a bit annoying; she thinks it'd be acceptable to nip down to Manali and buy new gear.

5:17 pm. Well it turned out to be a great day, despite the pointless breakfast meeting. Now back at the hotel. I got to the meeting at 7:30 am (as requested); most of the rest arrived at 7:50 am and then we had to wait two hours to get any breakfast at all! It's much better to go off by oneself - or maybe with one or two like-minded people...

T and I got a rickshaw down to the Indian Mountaineering Federation office in Manali - a strange complex of mostly deserted buildings - rather unoccupied buildings; we could wander about - e.g. into the director's office. Walked across the road to a crag called Aleo. Led an awesome route called The First 6a; very spaced bolts and a nice long pitch, same sort of rock as yesterday. Reminiscent of British gritstone climbing. Difficult start. Sounds silly, but really pleased to have done a second climb in India. Interestingly, unlike so many bolted routes, this one is memorable - perhaps because of the long run outs.

Still ill - headache and a lot of lethargy. I guess a result of lots of factors - stress, poor food (in the past - I am eating considerably better here: this is a good thing about these 'gap year' towns - you can get plenty of basic foods like revoluted eggs on toast and so on - good if you are ill), lack of sleep, poor hygiene (Pakistan) etc. Have decided to wait here in Vashisht until Monday - or whenever the truck makes it to Manali, then I might head up north for some supposedly better climbing opportunities. By the way, weather has been good today. Started misty, but this cleared up and now it's quite warm. T and I found another good coffee shop in Manali - called the German Cafe; lassi (yogurt drink) and plate of fries.

Day 60 Vashisht

9:05 am. Raining. Really clagged in like Scotland [clag = low cloud, smog or fog, clagged = to encumber, e.g. As when the orchard boughes are clag'd with fruite]. Headache. Cold a bit better, but definitely still there. Good news: only three weeks left - I fly out Delhi on Thursday 21st August. Think I'll have a couple of asprin then have a wander about - we are actually in a town 3 km up the road from Manali proper, called Vashisht. Laid out along a single main street, lots of hotels, guesthouses, internet cafes, lots of shops selling either food or things like brass sounding bowls for gap year students. Posters advertising yoga. No point trying to climb in this weather. (Yesterday the weather was overcast, but okay - no rain really most of the day, so I have some hope. The trouble is we should expect monsoonal rains here really, I think.)

5:24 pm and the good news is that I've managed to go climbing in India. A small crag up the left hand side (5 minutes' walk from road), about 15 minutes' walk down from the Himalayan Extreme Centre in Vashisht. Climbed a 6a, called Krishna, thuggish pitch, about 15 or 20 metres. Some sort of black gritstone or maybe a basalt. Bolted, though a bit spaced. Situated amongst lush green vegetation - including lots of British things like nepeta (cat mint) and apple trees (with fruit). Light drizzle on and off. A big palarver trying to climb here at all...(a) we couldn't find the crag to start with, (b) went back to the Himalayan Extreme Centre to ask directions (c) they just said that you are not allowed to climb on the crag at all, although (oddly) they did say where the crag was which was helpful; (d) we got there and roped up - then some kid from the shop came along to tell us that we mustn't climb there unless we paid money. We tried to negotiate - there were a few of us - but I didn't really have a clue what he wanted - during all of this I was trying to get up the route - whilst saying things like "I'll pay you 500 rupees for this route", and "can you get the money out of my rucksack?"; I'd come prepared to pay something to climb. Then the kid said he wasn't interested in the money, but he wanted 5000 rupees. We sort of agreed that Lianna would pay this the next day - so long as everybody on Hot Rock could do the two routes on the crag. During all of this I was mainly trying not to fall of the route - thought that'd make me look a bit silly.

Needless to say Lianna (when we met her that evening) was very unhappy about all of this - but - as I said to T, it's only a result of their negligence in the first place...they chose to have a newbie drive the truck on a too-narrow road back by the paddy field.

The latest plan from Hot Rock is for us to go to Chattru and camp and do climbing, a few hundred km north of here. Great, except we do not have enough gear - it's stuck on the truck which is not here: all I have is a pair of flip flops for my feat - and I do not think the crampons would fit properly. Don't even have any socks here. Of course, according to Lianna, it's all our fault - not their's.

By the way I feel pretty ill indeed. Nauseous and persistent headache, which I am unable to shift with asprin. Think I am running a temperature too. Perhaps it's all down to stress.

9:43 pm. Have had supper. In a place with a big TV / DVD and gap year students discovering themselves: watched Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Difficult to follow the plot - missed the start and then there were several power cuts along the way.

Day 59 McLeod Ganj

5:55 am. Green hotel. I have a cold. Not a bad one (at the moment at least), hopefully it'll get better. Anyway, the plan is to get a taxi back to the truck, thence on to Manali. Geoff and T have organised this originally, and the plan has been adopted by Duncan et al. It's obvious (at least to me) that this is the best solution. Apparently a crane was obtained yesterday - but it was too small, and then another crane, also too small. To me you need a 20 tonne crane - in part because the truck is stuck in the mud. Also the road the thing is on is like a minor road back in the UK, so I'd imagine access would be difficult for a big enough crane.

10:15 am. En route to the hill town of Manali, in the Himalayan mountains of Himachal Pradesh province. Sat in the back of a 4 x 4 jeep like vehicle. We went via the truck to recover our stuff. Pulled out most of my important stuff - well at least all the climbing stuff. A bit short on the warm clothing front. Breakfast stop at Davnt Restaurant in Tharu Paprola; omlette and coffee - very black.

3:16 pm and just had lunch at a roadside place about 50 or 60 km short of Manali. The rock hereabouts looks better - I can see some nice climable slabs for example. But travelling in the back of the jeep thing it's difficult to see much. Particularly since we go so fast. Weather seems better too - we have left behind the mist and rain in the Tibet-esque parts. Plan is to get to either the Mountaineering Council or perhaps just a climbing shop in Manali. Rumors of a hotel near a crag. No further news about the truck. Just seen my first elephant (Indian I assume); lot of monkeys.

10:20 pm. Latest news: arrived Manali (1900 metres); Lianna has arrived. As usual, T sorted out an awesome hotel, a completely brand new non-skanky hotel. Good job T did this before the B group led by Lianna arrived! Eating in a tiny eating place - pretty much just a room with long table and chairs; the food seems to be cooked someplace on the opposite side of Manali's high street and the service is really quite slow, but food really quite good. I am having rice and garlic. Much discussion about Hot Rock - especially ways to avoid getting lost (e.g. maps). My suggestion of hiring a local man on a moped to lead the way was met from Lianna with "the problem with that is that we'd have to leave on time", the logic of which I do not follow. Anyhow the truck is still stuck; latest efforts are to include the Indian army - hope they blow the thing up.

Day 58 McLeod Ganj, Dharamshala

6:55 am. Spent the night in a town called Sihunta; plan was to stay in some sort of guest house. In reality we had to camp just outside the guest house in tents, on the concrete pavement. Apparently some sort of mess up (by the guest house) - when we got here the place was already full - despite Hot Rock having booked it up. Something along those lines anyhow. Anyway, at least I got to sleep somewhere flat for once, even if it was concrete.

Today, I hope, we get closer to Manali i.e. closer (but probably not reaching) some climbing. Rain has stopped, leaving a distinct dampness in the air.

1:35 pm. McLeod Ganj - as you can see we have failed to reach Manali, as predicted. Briefly, the truck is stuck in a paddy field, a result of front nearside wheel coming off the paved road, a perfectly good road by the way. Got out of the truck - it was clear in an instant that the only way out would be a vertical lift - and that would need a big crane. Given that there wasn't a big crane a few of us more sensible types wandered off to find some sort of breakfast, rather than fiddle about with an impossible task of trying to push several tons of scrap out of a rice paddy. A short way up the road and we indeed came across tea and omlettes - the latter so good we (Geoff, T and I) had two each.

Back at the truck - still stuck of course - we got what gear we could - not easy given the positioning of the vehicle: when I opened the side locker all my junk wanted to slide out into the field. T had real trouble getting at her stuff. Got a taxi to take us to McLeod Ganj. Now we are in the Green hotel at McLeod Ganj; further food: hot chocolate and coffee and walnut cake. McLeod Ganj, the upper part of Dharamshala is the residence of the Dalai Lama; Tibetan culture; backpacker hotels, gap year students and yoga. Light drizzle on and off.

7 pm. Green hotel reception area / restaurant. Plate of chips and a bottle of Pepsi. Chatting with the other renegades about how crap Hot Rock is...decided we need to get some control of this crazy trip; looks like we'll make our own way to Manali (and climbing). At this rate we are literally going nowhere.

Day 57 Himachal Pradesh

7:50 am. Just settled the bill for Mrs Bhandari's Guesthouse - paying for the room and a few dozen bottles of coke, fanta derivatives etc. Glad to report I had a fantastic night's sleep in air conditioned comfort. Worth every rupee: it's become very clear that we need good sleep and good food on this trip, else we get ill. And several people are pretty ill.

8:56 pm and we are somewhat short of where we should be, despite several hours' driving. But mostly this was in the wrong direction; one bridge was way too low also (it was called the Dehri Khad bridge); 30 km detour. We have stopped up at some small village and are in the process of trying to get some supper. My diet is appalling: today I have had two slices of bread; two ice creams; a Pepsi; some cheese snack puff things, and a few biscuits. Scenery changed to very green; hills and red sandstone outcrops; heavy rain started at 7 pm - making the more distant mountains misty. Not certain exactly where we are, but I think it's not far from the town of Sihunta in the Himachal Pradesh region.

Day 56 Amritsar, India

3:20 am; cannot sleep; the air is extremely humid. We are staying within the grounds of Mrs. Bhandari's Guest House, in Amritsar, Punjab, India; beautiful mature gardens; colonial buildings; swimming pool. The problem is that we are not actually staying in any of the buildings - rather we are camping, and the problem with that is that it's simply too hot and humid. Put my tent up on one of the lawns (about midnight) - but pointless - quickly ended up laying on a sleeping bag saturated with sweat; you could just ring it out. Mosquitoes - I have a net but not sure where it is on the truck. The best solution to this seemed to be the most obvious - get in the swimming pool - which I did, the problem being this was about half past midnight: a tedious waiting game for dawn and tomorrow to start. A few of us in the pool and the bats flying overhead. I have baseball cap with built in net: the rest of me is under water.

It's now 3:20 am and I've got out to write my diary. I am going to be tired tomorrow. Mrs. Bhandari's Guest House is an unusual place for Hot Rock to stay at:- it has charm. A sort of colonial charm. Apparently very little has changed here since the 1930s - the main building, a late-Raj family residence, surrounded by an English garden with brick paths, pergolas and arches, the whole being screened off from the outside world by mature trees. There is guest accommodation in various wings off the main house, and bungalows in the grounds. Given the impossibility of camping I'll investigate the option of staying in a guest house room tomorrow night, complete with air conditioning.

Earlier today we drove in the truck from Lahore to Amritsar via the Wagah border crossing. Border crossing straightforward, apart from having to take everything off the truck, take it through the customs hall and put it all back on the truck. Initial impression of India is one of greenness and also it looks cleaner than Pakistan. And one can buy beer.

Think I'll return to the pool now.

8:10 am. Well, at 4:30 am I felt a bit cooler and abandoned the pool to sleep on my foam mat in my tent. Did eventually get some sleep. Sleeping bag drying out on the swing.

7:22 pm. Have ordered macaroni cheese from the guest house kitchens (magnificent kitchens indeed: high ceilings, copper pans, the works); Geoff, T, Mel and I have sorted out a huge colonial room - the air conditioning is on maximum. Geoff, T, Mel are pretty ill in various ways; but at least they've got a chance of recovering.

Earlier today T and I went into Amritsar - a short rickshaw ride away; started off with coffee and internet. We visited two important sites in Amritsar.

The site of the infamous Amritsar massacre also known as Jallianwala Bagh massacre, named after the Jallianwala Bagh Garden in Amritsar, where, on April 13, 1919, British Indian Army soldiers opened fire on an unarmed gathering of men, women and children. Bullet holes are preserved in the brick walls. Official sources place the casualties at 379. At least 120 people died trying to escape the death by jumping into a deep well.

Walking five hundred metres to the south, via street cafe lunch stop, took us to the Harmandir Sahib, Hari Mandir or Golden Temple of Amritsar. Visitors leave their shoes at near the entrance, cover their heads (baseball cap is okay), and wade through a shallow pool (to wash feet) before entering. I guess the most famous (and sacred) part of the Golden Temple complex is the Hari Mandir (Divine Temple) or Darbar Sahib (Court of the Lord), which is the central golden structure in the lake of water. Large numbers of people around the temple complex: there seemed to be a great deal of 'hidden' organisation - some people filling buckets with lake water, some different people passing buckets to some further different people who emptied the buckets, onto the pavements.



8:25 pm. Have had the macaroni cheese and a rather nice pumpkin soup, plenty of pepper. Plus buttered toast. All served to us on a table set up (complete with pressed table cloth), in our Raj room, by Raj waiter: British Raj at its erstwhile finest. (Of course I tried to help the waiter by holding the door open for him and his trays, but he would have none of it!) Poor T and Geoff pretty ill.

Day 55 Lahore

7:20 am. Hot, the hotel room remains at a steady 35 degrees. There is a ceiling fan, but that just moves the hot air about. Breakfast at 9 am, then we are due to set off for the Wagah border and hence into India.

Day 54 Lahore

10:14 am. Coffee and two pain chocolates in Hotel Pearl Continetal - clearly a five star establishment: here with T, on the recommendation of her friend back in Ireland. We were determined to get a decent cup of coffee somewhere in Pakistan - and we've found it. Used the internet at the hotel - complete with its own mini-office, costing 580 rupees for the hour's privilege, that's about 7 dollars and worth every penny. Later on we found some fantastic and cheap street food for lunch; deep fried food: I always think this should be good to eat. Disapointed by Lahore's 'botanic garden' (or at least I think we found the botanic garden) - it's not so much a garden but rather a (nice) park; locals playing cricket, with piles of bricks for stumps. Visited the Old Fort, Shahi Qila, in northwestern Lahore, in the older walled part of the city. Huge, red sandstone structure, very hot to walk on (bare feet); carpets were spread here and there and soaked in water - these were okay to walk on though. The fort is a UNESCO World Heritage Site visited by large numbers of locals, who get a preferential rate at the gate (this is common in Pakistan - there's a tourist rate and a local rate). Rickshaw back to the hotel. 5:00 pm and it's very hot and humid in the hotel room: the temperature is an absolutely constant 35 degrees - night and day. Feels like 90% humidity. Dripping all the time.

The Wagah Border is the only road border crossing between India and Pakistan, and this is the way we'll travel into the next country, probably tomorrow. Today however we got a rickshaw (or rather, a couple of rickshaws) to take us from the hotel to the border and back again - it's a fair way (25 km maybe) and the rickshaw drivers were dubious - but then there's lots of rickshaws and it's very easy to negotiate - just say "sorry, I don't want your rickshaw", and move onto the next guy with his rickshaw. Basically I think that the drivers couldn't understand why we'd want to go 25 km in a rickshaw, rather than a taxi. In the end 1000 rupees (which got split six ways) got us the return trip - and the driver quickly entered into the spirit of the thing - ending up with the two rickshaws racing each other.

Border closing ceremony: seems to basically comprise Pakistan vs. India trying to outdo each other with a Monty Python ministry of silly walks afair: the Pakistani guards march right up to the Indian guards, until their noses are touching just about. The two sides must pick their tallest to be in the parade: I'd say we're talking 6 foot eight inches or thereabouts. The Indian guards wear khaki, and the ones wearing black are Pakistani (here the Pakistani's have the edge - the khaki tends to show much sweat, quite unsightly). Lots of loud shouting and stamping of heavily booted feet and 'rave' music and cheering. The latter cannot be good for the feet I feel.

Flags are lowered. Rickshaw ride back to the hotel. Uneventful apart from the driver crashing into the back of a bus, he seemed okay, but I think the headlamp no longer worked, and he kept looking at the front wheel.

Day 53 Lahore

8:44 am and we are stopped at a service station en route to Lahore from Islamabad. M2 motorway. Services are sort of western, but a bit crap at the edges. Almond Magnum ice cream for breakfast. Hot last night (30 degrees in my tent); still hot at 4 am when we set of this morning.

5:20 pm Lahore. Staying at the Parkway hotel, near the station. Just got back from visiting the main mosque up town, to see the Sufi dancers. In fact not so much whirling dance as just music - characterised by complicated rhythms combined with a (droning) pedal note which seemed to emanate from a wobble board, involving some sort of squeeze box instrument (with keyboard). Observations:

• walking barefoot on pavement is almost unbearable - burning my feet


• strong segregation of men and women
  

(Geoff and I sort of got drawn into the 3 pm prayer call: stood then sat at the back of the mosque; massive prayer room - 20 deep x 50 or 60 wide in terms of people. A lot of sweat.)

• back to the music (which was in a basement beneath the mosque / prayer rooms): seemed to be something of a battle of the bands going on...


• usual poseurs in the audience: here it was a couple of witch doctor types


• few dancers; just one old guy doing some sort of trance thing; another (younger) guy whirling around a bit - eventually falling over.

Got a motorcycle rickshaw back - 100 rupees for something of a thrilling ride across Lahore. Also much better value than the taxi (200 rupees). By the way, had a good lunch - some sort of sweet and sour dish with rice, air conditioned restaurant next to hotel. Need to change some dollars and find internet.

Day 52 Islamabad

6:15 am and I feel considerably better. Hope it lasts.

The town of Besham is like many smaller towns in Pakistan - a bit of a mess, yet there are plenty of people just sat about in the streets - seems no incentive to clean any of the mess up. Like the other smaller town (and larger cities for that matter), the electricity supply is on and off - yet the Pakistanis can afford (or perhaps not) to buy nuclear weapons.

7:28 pm; we have made it back to the camping ground in Islamabad. Took the opportunity to dry out the tent and sort out my gear. Still feel a lot better. Earlier, T and I had a nice lunch at a roadside cafe - some sort of rice dish for fifty rupees. Making sure I drink bottled water, and avoiding coffee too. Aprehensive about the Indian part of this trip - suspect there won't be much climbing - this trip really has very little climbing, considering it's meant to be a climbing trip. It would help if there were more keen climbers.

Day 51 Besham

Still ill. Early start today at 4 am - requested by Lianna; but when I got to the bus at the requested time, nobody (including Lianna) was ready. Eventually got going at 4:30 am. It's now 8:05 am and we've stopped at Gilgit for breakfast. Pancake and fried egg - uncertain whether to eat it or not but I think that (a) I need to eat something and (b) from a hygiene point of view probably okay (i.e. cooked in hot oil): hope it's reasonable sterile. Lots of rain.

9:55 pm and we have rolled up in Besham; we've covered a lot of miles since Karimabad. Still feel very ill. T has 'prescribed' me some antibiotics: Ciprolon 500 - looks like they should tackle most things including anthrax and typhoid (both of which one could easily contract on Hot Rock); possible side effects include tendon rupture - but that's okay since there's hardly any climbing on this trip. But I need to eat first; yet another skanky Pakistani eating place; although this time at least there's some nice looking food (rice). Worried about the forthcoming Indian leg of this trip.

Day 50 Karimabad

It's 2:16 am; camping; woken by bad feeling in my gut: need loo pretty quickly, but it's raining outside the tent; I'm a bit shivery too - definitely not well. Taken two Imodium - hope that these allow me to get through to the morning - or at least until the rain eases up. Definitely do not fancy going out in this weather, and in the dark.

8:18 am. Woken by Hot Rock voices, still raining: sounds like real English rain. Nuisance since I do not actually have a coat with me up here. I'll stay in my tent awhile to see if it eases up at all...then head on down to Karimabad and the bus. Hopefully my revoluted guts not too unstable. We will see.

4:15 pm. Feel quite ill indeed. No energy at all. Headache. Very arduous walk down to Karimabad - despite it being down hill all the way; on and on and on. Went a bit wrong in the village itself and ended up having to go back uphill. Raining most of the way down too. Pretty miserable. Lianna has secured us another cheap and crap hotel - to be fair the room is okay if basic - but the loo - as seems normal in Pakistan - is disgusting: it's beyond me why they cannot connect the thing to the water supply - I mean there is a water supply there. Just needs a short length of pipe.

5:00 pm. Despite feeling really ill, found a cafe which sells a rather nice Hunza walnut cake, had this with a hot chocolate. Met Geoff in the cafe. Goodness knows if eating walnut cake is a good idea or not - but just felt like it.

Day 49 Ultar Meadows

8:11 am. Another good night's sleep. Rained again during the night. I think today my plan is to go back down to the 'halfway' camping spot [a flat region of grass we passed on the walk up from Karimabad] - from what I remember walking up, there's the potential for some climbing there. Not much here to do at Ultar Meadows proper, except the fine views. I'll see what I can find for breakfast first though.

10:06 pm. Temperature is a very British 17 degrees. Have moved the camp down to the halfway meadow by the stream place, about thirty minutes downhill from the previous camping place. Plan was to find some climbs to do (new routes) but, despite there being much rock, there was very little new route potential: plenty of giant rock walls - which would run to dozens of pitches, with no obvious ways off, but not much else. The others seem quite keen and content to boulder, but I don't find bouldering very stimulating! But little else to do, and in the event I got into it a bit and did find a really great mini-route - a slab followed by curved arete, on a large boulder next to the path / stream. Needed a bit of cleaning - the rock being covered with a fine layer of something like mud. Getting up the slab took several attempts - demands good footwork; small boss of rock out left for layoff, thence big step on to sloping arete and delicate finish. This route's for a unique friend ;-) and is called Beryllium. The rest of the team climbed it - Ben (Hot Rock's bouldering guru) reckoned it comes in about V3, about French 6c/7a (UK 6a I would think) or something. Pleased with this: like I said before, creating a new route is not easy and despite being short I like this one very much.

Next I had a go at a finger crack splitting another boulder, a bit further up the path. The route gives just 4 metres of finger-width crack climbing, looks a bit like Stroof at Subluminal - but easier. Difficult start - I needed to stand on some small stones piled up; 2 wires placed before starting, friend 1/2 shoved in midway, friend 1 at top of crack. Mel videoed the proceedings. Funny that - here I was climbing in the Karakoram, complete with porters etc for the approach, and all I manage is 4 metres of crack climbing. Anyway, I just loved doing this route. It's called Liquid Engineering, HVS 5a. Geoff did the direct start (sans stones).

Day 48 Ultar Meadows

7:40 am and 16 degrees in the tent. It rained during the night; funny to think that I am up here in the Karakoram - in the tent I could easily been in the Lake District. Been wake for 30 minutes - so I got a good night's sleep. Feel okay, but don't know about energy levels: will find out when I actually start to move around. Definitely looking forward to climbing - even if it's just some small crag stuff as discussed by Geoff yesterday. In fact probably rather do short routes at the moment. I can hear the glacial streams and the occasional (big) rockfall / avalanches off Ultar.

7:30 pm. Back at the tent. Today: longish uphill walk - well actually just 35 minutes - but seemed longer - abortive attempt at a route with Geoff - looked good but there was a damn thorn bush thing growing out of the crack; rock has a thin veneer of crappy sandy stuff on it which doesn't help. Would have been a good route, but one cannot go around chopping trees down...Then we did a better route: slab, V groove to break; overhang to right, but again put off by loose bits and vegetation. Not bold enough to do overhang; Geoff did it and I followed. Finished off by leading Geoff's route of yesterday - a good VS 4c 4c, climbs a big crack line up the centre of a huge glacial erratic [boulder], left of waterfall at the head of the valley. Tried a variant to the right, block filled off-width, but horrible - all loose and jammed full of big loose blocks. Lowered off tape slings around loose block - scary stuff!

Currently sat about in the sun, amongst these silent mountains. Funny - it's like the Lakes in good weather - until you look up and see the high stuff. I've bogged up the food front completely: would give anything for fruitcake and custard or sunpin like that...Finally, I've decided that doing new routes is like trying to write or make music - it's easy to produce / create a load of convoluted junk which essentially leads nowhere interesting at all. Much, much harder to create even the shortest capriccio.

Day 47 Ultar Meadows

Slept okay: about ten hours' much needed sleep. Still tired - a combination of lack of sleep, being ill and altitude. Felt really lacksidasical this morning, but eventually got going enough to go and try and climb something. Sophie and I picked our way across the glacier - stones and dirt and ice to get to an obvious brown slab of rock; glacier crossing was interesting: a bit of a route finding challenge. Important to leave little cairns to mark the way back. We attempted a line up a big crack system in the slab; backed off - I was put off by the scale of the thing and the flaky rock: climbed up about ten metres or so, placed a peg and climbed back down! Eventually climbed a short scrappy pitch to the left - about 18 metres, up a slab / ramp; moves left, reasonable rising right hand crack. Good job I had the pegs - abseiled off two hammered in at the top. A completely rubbish route. Tried to find something else to climb but the rock was either really flaky or really glaciated and unclimbable at least by us!

It's now 5 pm. Light drizzle, I am in my tent. Geoff and Carolyn have apparently found some route up the valley - sounds promising and I will investigate tomorrow. It's fun being here, but I find the shear scale of the mountains big. I like the noises the glacier makes: meltwater and the occasional falling boulders - big and small, a few really big ones. These generally don't go very far - just shift a few tens of metres down the glacier. I guess eventually they'd reach the end of it. The glacier is a dynamic beast - but not fast moving.

8:49 pm. 16 degrees in the tent - have had some supper - rice and vegetables, soya and fruit salad; stomach feels okay - but suffering from a severe lack of energy. It's difficult walking uphill - get aching muscles and breathe heavily. Just need to take things slowly. By the way, the sketch is the south face of Diran Peak (7257m) as seen from my tent doorway camping at Ultar Meadows.