Kaza – Superlatives, Paper Piles and Losses

12. + 13. October 2023

 

 

In Kaza, things were a bit messed up with my accommodation. The Spiti lady in Manali had actually organised something for me, the driver just dropped me off at an accommodation with a similar name, I called the accommodation, a man came with a car and then drove me to another accommodation. His was not so suitable at the moment. I am now at the Community Centre. It’s a really weird place with a floor full of rooms, but there’s no one there but me. Breakfast and dinner are included, which means there’s always someone there to cook me something and then I sit around all alone. It’s an eco-project, you can read more about it here. Anyway, the room has a very pleasant temperature. But when I look outside, I see the tents where labourers live.

 

 

Spiti seems to me to be the area of superlatives. I passed by this highest sports complex:

 

 

It also boasts the highest post office in the village of Hikkim, the highest village with road access called Komic and we have already had the highest bridge. I’m sure there are more highest superlatives, but I don’t know them yet.

 

Spiti is a bit close to the Tibetan border, so it needs a permit for further east than Kaza. Actually, you have to be more people for that and maybe a trek goes without or not or yes – and so I went to the permit office to enquire. But I didn’t need to enquire much, the nice gentleman issued me one for myself without any complications. In the office were his two granddaughters, who wanted to play with everything that was there. Mostly there was paper. India, at least in earlier times, was notorious for its enormous bureaucracy with massive forms and books where everything was entered and copied and I don’t know what – and then kept. In the meantime, this has decreased considerably, at least for travellers, and one no longer comes into contact with these ominous files so often. But here it was still alive, the old days!

 

 

There are still not many tourists. In the office I met a Frenchman riding a motorbike alone. We estimated each other’s age – and were both well above it. He was 62. I had lunch alone in a small place:

 

 

And apart from that, I mainly did little more and got used to the altitude – after all, I was at 3,600 or 3,800 m! Only one evening walk was still possible.

 

 

3,200 people live approximately in Kaza, the administrative centre of Spiti. This is also the only petrol station in the area. The next day I wanted to have a closer look at everything. But before that, I laid out my things for the planned homestay trek – and realised that I had forgotten some T-shirts in Manali. That’s why the backpack was suddenly so much emptier! But what a shit, there was my favourite travel shirt and the long-sleeved one for sleepingtrekking and a fine Icebreaker shirt. So first I went shopping, because I didn’t have a really good replacement with me. But after that I set off. Kaza doesn’t have any really nice or funny or otherwise corners, though. But I found this sign funny. There was an Indian couple from Jammu standing there and I offered to take a picture of them and then I got a picture too.

 

 

And here are some more pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

 

For lunch I was alone again, but I didn’t photograph it. Then I rested and when the sun disappeared behind the high mountains, I walked around a bit again:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can see that it’s already autumn. It’s a bit of a shame that the fields are already completely harvested, but I’m glad that I can still see the golden leaves.

 

So my plan is: homestay trek.