I had always wanted to visit someplace cold. Very cold. For example Siberia and Lake Baikal in winters. Or Svalbard in Norway, which happens to be the northernmost city in the world which I wanted to visit after reading Michael Palin’s book Pole to Pole. Little did I know that such extremes exist within India itself! The Zanskar valley in J&K, which has the Zanskar river flowing through it is cold. Very cold. So cold that the river freezes! A blanket of ice, a few feet thick forms. This lasts for a couple of months. The chadar trek is a trek about 60-70 km long and you can do sections of it. I went along with a community called “Indiahikes”. I had done a skiing program with them earlier, so I knew they handle such excursions well. The Chadar forms early Jan and melts away end of Feb/early Mar. If you were wondering about how cold -30 celcius is, let me assure you , it is cold! Unless you are in multiple layers.
Since this is more of a photo blog post, here are a few pictures:
Which are some of the coldest places you have visited?
Thundering Typhoons 