We don’t like to find out too much before we venture to a new place, and we’re glad we didn’t know what was ahead of us when we woke at 4am to leave Manali at 5 in a 16 seat bus.

We climbed and winded through the dark for a few hours and as the sun broke we became aware we were moving into completely new terrain; a terra of glaciers connected to the Himalayas.

This is a dry-cold Mother Country,

inhabited by sheep, goats,

and shepherds.

India is a country of almost two billion people; most of whom do not live here, in the remote parts of Himachal Pradesh and Ladakh.

The scale of the mountains astonished us,

and as we climbed we began to feel cold for the first time since leaving central Australia months earlier.

The intensity of the climb, the winding and bumpy roads began to unsettle Woody. He had his first vomit

before our first road stop. He declined breakfast, but us adults had roadside chai and omelettes. None of us had jumpers to put on. Our wind and rain jackets were in our bags roped to the top of the van. Woody was grateful for the scarf his dad knitted him to keep him warm, and for his mum’s hugs.

This road from Manali to Leh will be closed in the coming months, due to snow.

We each had on all the layers we had,

and carried on climbing into the clouds,

and ice.

This high country desert is like no other environment we’ve experienced.

It was no smooth ride. Like the bus trip from Dharamshala to Manali, the driver threw us from side to side, racing at the hairpin bends, then braking suddenly. We don’t know whether it was motion or altitude sickness, but Woody threw up everything his body had, including his stomach bile, until he was just dry retching.

The physical intensity inside the bus was accompanied by the immense physical beauty of these lands.

The road was unforgiving in places,

and again, it was a journey encompassing a string of near-deaths.

What a magnificent place to die!

Much of the road didn’t have any barriers to stop vehicles going over the edge.

The vomit bag needed emptying regularly out the window.

Retaining walls, holding sections of the road in place, had given way.

As passengers, our attention flickered between oncoming challenges,

and spectacular beauty and life force.

As picture makers our beginner eyes marvelled as our stomachs churned.

It was joy and discomfort riffing each other, with fellow mammal Asiatic ibex coming into the mix at places,

and little settlements offering sustenance and motion relief.

We did not take the recommended pharmaceutical (Diamox, made by Pfizer), not just because of the long list of adverse effects these junk science tablets contain, but because we know we are hardier than the industrial medical complex gives our bodies credit for, and we trust the old ways – ginger, water, chewing and belching as one climbs, exerting little as one adjusts. Woody couldn’t stomach any of these things, except for sitting, exerting little.

As the hours passed, the road became wilder, and roadworks brought we traffic-species to a halt.

Desert rock became finer,

and more intriguing.

We stopped for lunch. Woody stayed on the bus and slept, while his parents entered a little Ladakhi café with fellow travellers.

We were all in a trance as we ate dhal and rice, and drank lemon, ginger and honey tea. The air was thin,

and our urine flowed more quickly than usual from our bodies. After lunch we visited the most beautiful dunny in the world.

Ladakh borders Pakistan controlled land, the Tibet Autonomous Region, the Indian states of Himachal Pradesh, Indian administered Jammu and Kashmir, and China. Until 1960, when the Chinese government blocked access, it was a centre of trade along the Indus Valley between Tibet, Kashmir, India and China.

As the day aged the temperature warmed, and for a while we felt the comfort of the sun.

We had travelled only 300kms in the first several hours when we reached a plain with momentary sealed and straight roads.

Such comforts were short lived. We climbed again, and twisted and vomited up into snow country,

reaching the dizzying altitude of 5,329m at the very climax of the journey.

We met frozen rock,

and overturned vehicles,

mountain ponies,

and Changthangi goats and herders as we descended into the Leh district of Ladakh.

As we approached Leh, the largest human centre in Ladakh, small-scale agrarian settlements popped up through the rock. Many of the roofs of the houses supported cut hay, drying for the coming winter.

The annual rainfall in Leh is 35mm. Farmers and growers rely on melted glacial waters, which despite the land’s desert appearance,

is in abundance in the rivers and irrigation networks that feed into the homes, farms and settlements.

After 11 hours of travelling, we arrived in Leh in the late afternoon. Modern, touristy Leh, we noticed, is being transformed by cold concrete,

while old Leh is built with thermal-friendly clay and rock.

In a clay, rock and manure version of shelter culture, Mr Adani and his mines are not required.

We walked from the bus station to a cheap hotel room that offered beds but no running water, dumped our bags and headed out to explore. It was at this point, Woody, who had vomited 14 times throughout the day, turned to his parents and said, “The beauty of that journey was so worth the discomfort.”

We found ourselves in a remarkable town,

with much history and prayer,

a town of 260,000 people,

built into rock and cloud,

with stupas on every corner.

and dogs, cattle and donkeys wandering the streets.

Leh is a town of cultural life force and of unmediated death,

of celebration and festival,

and, like much of northern India, it is yet another place of radically untuned traffic.

Local growers sell their vegetables,

their fruits,

and their saved seeds in the streets.

These farmers delighted us with their joy and wisdom,

and with their passion for their food.

We cannot get enough of the beautiful acceptance for earth-others inhabiting human-centric settlements in India.

Woody was particularly drawn to the local ass.

At times, we could not get enough air in Leh, at an altitude of 3,524m and with only 65% oxygen in every breath, we often had to stop and slow. Right. Down.

So much life attracted our senses in Leh. Old bulls scavenge the detritus on the streets,

and at the markets,

and little back alleys led us to quieter accommodations.

At Ree-Yul guesthouse, where we moved to after our first night, we met four Kashmiri motorbike travellers. We yarned in the sunny courtyard, they offered advice for our next leg, and invited us to take a pic with Woody on one of their bikes.

Each day we wandered the streets, seeking to lose ourselves in daily life here.

We beheld the preparations for winter, and the many local poplars (Populus nigra ‘Afghanica‘).

The stark qualities between human and more-than-human made forms.

The modern and makeshift.

and got among the forage-worthy plants,

such as the fruit-medicine sea-buckthorn (Hippophae rhamnoides).

These fruits, also known as Leh berries or Ladakhi Gold, are rich in antioxidants and essential minerals including potassium, calcium, magnesium, iron and phosphorous. Fresh off the bush they taste lemony and slightly astringent. On our last afternoon, we ordered a juice of this berry from a local restaurant.

For $15 we hired a motor scooter for a day and headed out of town a little.

The three of us on one little scooter slowly meandered up high above the town,

arriving at the 15th century Victory Fort on Tsemo Hill.

We paused for a while, looking out

and up

and through

remnant cultural structures of the past, as they stand in the present. We descended back into Leh and took chai,

before heading off to find one of the main sources of life in this little city, the Indus River. This took some time as the main road travelled alongside this mighty water serpent, but never within reach, with few side roads to take. We stopped for a lunch of Tibetan thukpa (noodle soup),

and with goodly nourishment in our bellies, eventually found a road to the river.

We spent time by the Indus, washing our feet,

yarning and knitting,

and it was here Woody learnt to ride a motor scooter.

Leh will remain in our hearts as the apex of this journey. Much like Hope Vale was on our 400 day bicycle adventure to Cape York, Leh is our most northern stop. As we ready to leave here, and descend south we feel a returning spirit enter us. Excitement for home, for reconnecting with friends, family and community. This air, albeit thin, is feeding us with new possibilities and projects ahead. We still have time in India ahead of us, and we remain present to what is in the now, but there is a turning at this juncture. There is both sadness and excitement.