While in Leh it was impossible not to notice the mountains which surround the little pocket of civilization. It’s nestled into a small valley, along a tributary of the Indus River and barren rocky ridges press in on the edges of town, or rather, the town is expanding and crawling up the hillsides. Off to the south the Indus valley could be seen a few miles away and much larger mountains sprinkled with snow beyond that. I couldn’t help but look around and wonder:
What’s off in those hills?
What if we followed the river upstream out of town?
What’s the view like from the top of that ridge?
What am I going to have for dinner?
There were many possibilities for really nice day hikes easily accessible simply by walking to the edge of town, and continuing on. With the amount of time we had on our hands it seemed silly not to explore some of them.
Few people stayed at our guesthouse but I told someone that I met walking around about the place and he ended up staying there for quite a while too. He was in town for the Ladakh marathon (which is insane) and he needed to go for runs and hikes to get acclimatized for the big run. We also had a lot in common and were fast becoming friends so he was game for walking some trails and working up a little sweat.
For our first excursion we headed northwest out of town up a dirt road that followed the small river upstream. Grassy areas with grazing animals filled the floor of the valley and decayed stone structures dotted the craggy slopes.
Along the way we encountered a dog. Nothing unusual about that, in fact Leh is full of dogs running around in the streets. This one seemed to have a caretaker since part of her fur was shaved – a sign that she had been to a veterinarian. She was friendly and it was hot and dry so we tried to give her a little water but she wasn’t interested in that. We gave her a little attention while resting in the shade for a moment and then moved on. She followed.
The river and its accompanying road turned to the west and out of sight of the town. It was surprisingly green and stone walls marked off grazing plots. The farther we got from town the more we tried to discourage the dog from following us but she stayed with us, always walking 20 or 30 feet behind us.
Eventually we found our trail, which led off the road to the left and steeply up into the mountains. We were heading for a spot I noticed on the map, a smaller peak which would hopefully give us some nice views into the neighboring valley. We could feel the altitude as we climbed and the sun beat down on us. It felt like the act of climbing required much more oxygen than we were getting from the air and our ribcages struggled to pull in more air. It was bone dry up here, and there were almost no plants around. Being this far away from town and climbing into a rocky wasteland we thought the dog would finally abandon us. Nope. To our incredible surprise she maintained her position a little behind us and climbed. Occasionally we wouldn’t see her for a short while but she always reappeared. Eventually we reached a saddle just a bit down from the peak and figured it was good enough without needing to climb to the very top. The dog followed us all the way to our resting point and patiently sat by our backpack while we climbed around and took pictures.
What was even more surprising about this dog’s behavior was that we had some sweet pastries in our backpack and she didn’t touch, sniff, or show any interest in the backpack while we left her alone with it. I guess she just really liked our company. We eventually made our ways back to her and gave her a little love. It was at this point that Fern christened the dog with her new name – Mary of the Himalayas. We offered Mary some nice chunks of our pastries and she graciously accepted.
On our way back down we passed through the same pastoral valley and stopped by the river to splash a little cold water on our faces. Although we couldn’t see her, we knew that Mary was waiting for us up on the road. I’m not sure why she didn’t come down to have a drink. She must have been incredibly thirsty by then.
Shortly after our little river break we passed a pack of dogs in the road. They didn’t pay much attention to us but they definitely took an interest in Mary. They circled around her and the alpha male seemed to want to have his way with her. A little tax for passing through his territory. It felt inappropriate for us to meddle in her private affairs but we also wanted to make sure she would be OK. She was one of us now, but who knows, maybe this would be the highlight of her day. Who are we to judge her for her taste in men? So we watched and waited. Mary wanted nothing to do with these scruffy ne’er-do-wells and she firmly held her ground. There were some mounting attempts and snarling but she managed to move past them without injury.
Once she was in the clear we kept moving. All the way the back to the gate at our guesthouse and there she was. She must have had a home somewhere but she decided to come to ours instead. We seriously tried to lose her a bunch of times because we didn’t want to lead her to an unfamiliar part of town where she couldn’t find her way home. Our hearts sunk as we shut the gate on her since it didn’t feel appropriate to bring a dog into our hosts’ walled-in compound. Dogs could get in and out if they knew where to go but there were a couple of other dogs who patrolled this territory and they probably wouldn’t take kindly to an outsider. She might just sit by the front door which would be a nuisance to Gunzang and Tsering.
Mary hung around outside the gate and we noticed the other neighborhood dogs coming around and giving her some unwelcoming vibes. It worried us. Sid (our new friend) is Indian so he explained in Hindi to Gunzang about Mary and asked if we could let her into the yard. Surprisingly she said yes so we let her in but we couldn’t let her inside the house so we just kept an eye on her from the windows of our room and we briefly entertained the silly fantasy of adopting her and bringing her with us on our travels. Ha! Eventually she wandered out and disappeared.
What ever happened to her? The next day Sid went for his morning run over to the western edge of town and reported that he actually saw her near the spot where we first encountered her. That was a huge relief. We really thought she might be lost forever and have to fight off gangs of street dogs for the rest of her life. Leh is a rough place for dogs, especially during the winter when there aren’t lots of tourists around dropping food on the ground and many don’t survive long. It warmed our hearts to know that our sweet loyal Mary made it back to a place where she would be taken care of.
jim@snorkelbandits.com