O.K, so forget the last place....this is the best view so far. Even better than Nepal. We are now in Kalpa (elev. 2960m/9700ft) on the hillside of the Kinnaur valley. Our room view is of Mount Kailash (elev. 6050m/19200ft) and the Kinnaur valley below. Our trip here was not an easy one we got a bus from Sarahan via Jeori through the Kinnaur valley. We clung to the bus, while the bus clung to the road and the road clung to the edge of the mountains. We were lulled into a false sense of security for the first hour, as the road, whilst swerving was smoothly tarmaced. I had decided that I needed to go to the toilet which was bad timing as we then bumped along the landslide ravaged NH22 road. The bus driver unperturbed by the pot holes, boulders and sheer 600m drop into the river below navigated the bus like a moon buggy at great speed. We had to keep raising ourselves off the seat to prevent injury. My bladder was near rupturing. We passed from beautiful valleys to the Hydroelectric plants along the banks of the Satluj river. Even Tolkein could not have envisioned a more brutal savagery of the environment. Green pine forested valleys had been gouged out to make way for ugly concrete clad river banks and dam walls. There was also the unsightly Hydroelectric plants and even small settlements of concrete towerblocks - presumably to house the plant workers or the poor villagers displaced by the project. Notable passengers on the bus were a girl clearly the victim of a facial acid attack and a guy with a sheep, we reached a small town in the valley called Tapri for a short stop. I went to use the grim bus stand toilets - an experience I will need counselling for when I get home. Bladder empty and Paul restocked with crisps we bounced off again still down the lunaresque roads passing diggers clearing rubble from landslides. Soon the valleys became green again and we could once more see the snow-capped mountains. Arriving at Reckong Peo (a relatively large town on the hillside), Paul was aghast at the views and wondered why we needed to travel on to Kalpa when Peo was stunning. On we went though, further and further up the hillside above Peo to Kalpa with an even better vista of the mountains. Having had help with getting the cases on the roof at Jeori by some border army guys, Paul was now helped at the bus stand by locals - refreshing change! I had chosen a hotel on the main road as I hoped it would be close to the bus stand. The town is so small that it consists of one road and stone paths leading off it - our hotel The Blue Lotus was a short walk up the road. Paul negotiated a knockdown from 750Rps to 550Rps (£6.50) on the room rate as we would be staying for at least 7 days. It was clean and had a soft bed - hurray! We grabbed a really cheap meal on the terrace facing the mountains and felt very smug. For the first time in India I had to wear my fleece, temperature was around 23 degrees. We have a Buddhist (Tibetan) temple nearby which blasts out its chanting ceremony at around 7 in the evening - very soothing though, not like the Hindu equivalent. After a storm had raged then quietened outside, we looked forward to our first good night's sleep in a long while. Not to be... a crack team of barking dogs was at work, its mission to leave no hour of the night undisturbed. First it was the north division three or four dogs barking and howling until tired, then the west division started their shift. Even my earplugs were no match for the dogs close to the hotel. At 7:15 the Buddhist temple started "Om Mani Padmi Hum" (search the tune on Youtube), which is such a nice way to wake up in the morning. After breakfast we went in search of the posh hotels supposed to be higher up the hillside - we hoped for wi-fi. We had noticed a turn off on the main road during our bus journey. The road was a gentle climb, the signs said the hotels were 4kms along. The weather was cool and sunny, the storm had left the skies clear. After about 3kms we spotted a path at the roadside with a map signalling a trek up to the next ridge, we thought it might cut out some of the road. The path was steep and we were struggling, possibly due to the altitude (3300m), we needed to catch our breath every 30m or so. The path was a dirt track, which often became difficult to make out. We spotted a local ahead, incidentally carrying what looked like a 10m hose on his back - he was probably wearing flipflops too!! Anyway we soon lost him as he skipped up the hill. As we walked there were sweet scented herbs all around. So we were a bit lost now - no sign of a hotel, house or civilisation just orchards, pine trees and stone walls here and there. Returning downhill looked slippy and steep. At last we spotted a goatherd. I shouted "Namaste" my trusty word and then "Hotels?" We climbed down to him and did a lot of signalling and shouting. Paul was miming 'sleeping' and 'eating'. He looked at us like we were mad. After a short while he gave a 'wiggle of the hand' gesture in the direction of down and across. We followed his advice and found a path through the orchards - we were lost again. Paul decided to use his internal GPS and directed us back to our original path and we clambered down - I only fell once. Once back to the road we continued along it just 50m before we found signs for the hotels a short distance away - silly us! We had lunch at Hotel Kinner Kailash - beans on toast served on raw cabbage - weird! We returned along the road for about 200m and spotted a stone stepped path down. We thought it might be a short cut to Kalpa - it was, it took just 10 minutes and came out opposite our hotel. We could have done the trip in 30 minutes instead of 3 hours if we had known, still, where is the fun in that? Next day, Thursday 17, it was sunny and around 25 degrees with cooling breezes. We took the road opposite our hotel up to a track looking like a landslide hotspot to Roghi a nearby village. The road was opposite the mountains so we had stunning views all the way. The road gently sloped so not too arduous - the town was more a work in progress than a quaint hillside village, but the exercise 12kms did us good. Next day, the Buddhist wake up call was an hour early - 6am, there was clearly some special day at the temple we went along to have a look. Buddhism is a very pure and simple philosophy, you don't need gods, you don't need to pray; everything you need to be happy is within your own power just follow the 4 truths and the 8 fold path (right action, right speech, right thought etc. etc.) That philosophy has been lost somewhat, the locals marched a mop headed icon looking suspiciously like the Hindu God Kali, they waved the big white tickling stick just like we saw in Sarahan. The townspeople then followed a visiting guru (with a necklace of Rupee notes around his neck) through the village up to the temple where they spun the prayer wheels and burned insence. Paul took photos and I stood by - both of us were waved away from the scene, whilst Dehli-tourists were allowed to video and photograph the ceremony - right action?...I think not! In the afternoon we walked down to Reckong Peo (to get internet access and an ATM) along the village paths, which cut through the winding road. The paths were lined with rubbish dumps. The same 'cut cable' problem affecting Kalpa's internet was also affecting Peo - never mind. We used the ATM and got the bus back. Paul has finally got 1GB of data (98Rps) working through his SIM so we can have internet access where there is a phone signal - cool! We had an insight into local culture that night at the Jyoti eating house. We fancied some momos. We sat in the shack a full 10 mins whilst the female owner had an argument on the phone - finally she turned to us mid sentence and shrugged - "Two momos please" Paul said. She then screamed at her teenage son to make the momos, who was not happy. After wiping his nose on his sleeve he went into the kitchen. After the phonecall the woman then screamed at her 8 year old daughter to get some water. She fetched water from the street pump in a fithy container - presumably to steam our momos in. The son then appeared from the kitchen and legged it. She had another scream at him and resigned herself to making our momos. It took another 30 minutes whilst she continued her screaming phonecalls - it was like an episode of Eastenders. Well they were not worth the wait. We hurriedly asked to pay and she consulted with her adult son (who she had just had an argument with) and they came up with the rip off price of 100Rps - crap! Our much cleaner hotel does a huge, tasty Thali for 70Rp. On Saturday I was determined to do a big walk and we had read on the internet that if we followed the watercourses up the hillside we would reach the snowline at 4000m and see a small lake. We took the stone-stepped path to the right of Kinner Kailash Hotel. We were a bit unfit really especially with the altitude slowing us. We stopped regularly for breath. The first part of the walk was along the open sewer watercourses, but higher up the water was pure. We passed through brick built hamlets, orchards and pine copses. The air was scented with thyme too. A killer walk but so beautiful. Each ridge we reached tantalised us with the idea we had finally reached the top, we hadn't! We stopped for a picnic lunch and Paul suggested we return to the hotel as the weather was closing in, as it usually does in the afternoon. We had reached 3590m/12000Ft. Lucky we returned the weather did turn stormy. Another walk to Roghi the next day, the rumbling sounds of distant avalanches and rock falls had me panicking a bit - we passed a pool of blood on the road. Someone had put flour and Ghee over it and had stuck a branch in it - not sure what or who had died there! On our final day in Kalpa I wanted to do the watercourse trek again. The weather usually clear in the morning was a little bit cloudy and hazy. We set off earlier this time 8:30 and made great progress, my legs were like lead weights, but Paul after an initial struggle was now skipping up. We reached the same height as before when the weather closed in on us. Paul found a sheltered spot between a tree and a wall (where it was 10 degrees) and we huddled up in our North Face waterproofs and watched the sleet/snow whip across. Disappointed that we could go no further we waited for a break in the weather and headed down again. We passed an Indian couple on the way up equipped with t-shirts and umbrella - they were not put off by our warning. The wind and the rain continued as we returned to the town. The weather cheered up a bit later. Paul popped into the barbers whilst I did some blogging. The barber had been a little over zealous after having been robbed by a cowboy in Jaisalmer, today he was scalped by an Indian (his joke) - see photo. The next day, (with Paul bobble-hatted up) we would head to Chitkul 10m from the Tibetan border, a valley in the Indian Himalayas - a valley at a chilly 3500m elevation.