India, Day 11

The most boring day to date.The half-day jeep trip was only around the valley Manali is sitting in. It's beautiful nevertheless. The driver takes us to Slavoslav Reutcher's museum, the Russian painter inspired by the Himalayas. His 100-year old tea cups were on display, you could walk out with them. I'm surprised at his contemporary way of painting, in spite of being made in 1940-ties. We then go to Siva's temple and a castle. All mildly interesting.I travel with an Engligh-Spanish guy, Ramon. He will be my partner over the next 5 days. He says I look fit. He gets worried. I do not tell him that I once ran a 42-km cross-country event. I don't want to be left alone on this hike. I spend the rest of the afternoon on Yahoo IM chatting with friends and collegues. I carefully avoid questions about work, else I will get sucked in. My mind is very far away from it all. I hike the other part of Manali called Old Manali. I come across Miss India 2015 and her runner-ups. I take her pictures, she's loving it. Many of the women here are so beautiful. Light brown and green eyes are common, high noses, prominent cheekbones. They are of Aryan origin.

I buy some last-minute warm pants, a cap, as the pass we will climb in the next 3 days will be 5500m heigth. The weather forcast says "rain". Not good. We will live in tents, I'm thinking about hot showers, knowing this is wishful thinking. No mobile roaming, no internet, no shower, no other company than Ramon, the guide and 2 porters.

More updates in 5 days time.

Also, thank you for the emails and SMS. It's a good feeling to keep in touch with you guys when I'm alone here. X.