Places visited: Hall of Fame, Kaali Mata Temple, Magnetic Hill, Sangam Valley, Pathar Sahib Gurudwara, Leh Palace
With all the memories keeping in our mind, we all woke up around 8 AM. It was a beautiful day with full of sunshine.
We had to visit mainly three places, all were in the same route, so we had plenty of time. First of all we went to "Neha Snacks" for our breakfast, we had Chole Bhature in the breakfast, it was quite heavy :P. The owner of Neha Snacks advised us to first visit to Leh Market -> Hall of Fame -> Kaali Mata Temple -> Sangam Valley -> Magnetic Hill -> Pathar Sahib -> Leh Palace -> Leh Market.
I found one board in the Neha snacks shop and it was full of letter and words of appreciation. People had put their words on the tissue paper and pinned it on the board.
We started keeping the same itinerary and directly went to Hall of Fame, Hall of Fame is build and maintained by Indian Army in memory of brave soldiers who died in the Kargil War, 1999. It was just situated near the Airport area, we bought the ticket and went inside. There were so many prototypes of Various points, Glaciers and Indian soldiers. There were few Army people who were explaining all the histories, it was a great feeling to read and listen about Indian Armed Forces. There was a small movie as well which we saw inside on the Kargil war. There was a small shop with few of the items being sold out at very less price by Indian Army. I bought one sheet made of world famous Pashmina wool, which is only found in J&K state. Kaushik and Praveen bought Apricot from there as well.
From Hall of Fame we went to Kaali Maata Temple situated just after 1 KM on NH 1A. It was situated on top of the hill but there was a road so we reached directly to the gate of the temple. From the top we could see the complete Airport which was under Indian Air Force. This temple is quite famous in Leh, as it was one of the oldest temple and only temple which I observed in last 10 days. The people in Leh area are mostly Buddhist so everywhere it was Stupas only. Here one thing I observed inside the temple i.e. all the faces of the statues were covered with cloths. I tried to find out the reason and then got to know that the faces are very scary so the temple Administration has covered it and it gets opened once in a year.
After visiting the temple, we had some snacks and water as it was very hot that day. We left the temple area and went ahead to Sangam Valley via NH 1 A. This was the best road we saw in our trip, it was black, smooth and surrounded by mountains. We reached Sangam valley, where Indus and Zanskar river meet. Kaushik was quite interested in Rafting but others were not because the water was freezing :P:P . We sat there for sometime and enjoyed the peace and sounds of water flowing.
We started to come back to the Magnetic hill, so we were travelling towards Leh. We stopped at Magnetic hill, everyone says that there are some effects of gravity here, but I could not find any. So I was least interested in staying there :-). But I must say the mountain there was very black and huge.
After few minutes, we headed towards Pathar Sahib and went inside the Gurudwara. This was very famous place and maintained by completely Sikh Regiment of Indian Army. We missed out the bhajan-kirtan by just few minutes but as the day was Sunday, so there was Langer in Gurudwara. We had the food there which was very nice and again sat inside the Gurudwara for some time.
After a very good food and blessings of God, it was the time to go back via NH 1A, best highway of the trip. We accelerated a bit to reach out to Leh Palace, in between the petrol was finished in 4243. I was carrying the reserved petrol on 4241, Kaushik and Praveen were waving their hands which I saw in the mirror and went back. Filled all the three tanks with some fuel and started again to reach out to Palace.
The palace was situated on top of the hill in the centre of the city, the view from the top of the Palace was great as we could see the complete city just like Shanti Stupa.
The palace was created in 17th century and mainly made from woods, it was ruined by some king in 19th century so it did not look great but Indian government were doing some beautification so I believe after few years it would be one of the attraction among the tourists.
Still there were few sections for tourists but it was not that good, so we left quickly after visiting all the floors.
We came back to hotel, me and Mannu was not interested in shopping so stayed back at hotel while Shashank, Kausik and Praveen went out to the Market and bought few things, mostly Apricot.
Today we had to return our bikes at 8.30 PM as agreed on the first day. We returned the bikes and had dinner in Changs Pa area in a punjabi restaurant. This was our last dinner in Ladakh, we were even discussing about our experiences during the dinner.
We came back around 10 PM and packed everything because we were having flight in the very next morning.
This is how the tenth day ended, mostly with the experience of good food :-).
Next Day
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