The Sind Valley
The most bold and striking of the side-valleys is undoubtedly the Sind valley. A fourteen-miles' ride, or a night in a boat, takes the traveller to Ganderbal at its mouth, from which Sonamarg, the favourite camping-ground near the head of the valley, is four marches distant. The lower portion is not particularly interesting, though even here the pine woods, the rushing river, and the village clusters are beautiful. But at Sonamarg—"the golden meadow"—the great peaks close round, glaciers pour down from them almost on to the camping-ground, and the scenery has all the grandeur of the Alps.
GORGE OF THE SIND VALLEY AT GUGGANGIR
Sonamarg itself is a narrow grassy flat, 8650 feet above sea-level, extending for some two miles between the hill-side and the river bank where another beautiful valley joins in from the south-west. All the slopes and meadows are covered with alpine flowers. Rich forests of silver fir, intermingled with sycamore and fringed on their upper borders with silver birch, clothe the mountain-sides. From each valley flows a rich white glacier. Grand rocky cliffs encircle the forests and meadows, and culminate in bold snowy peaks which give a crowning beauty to the whole. It is an ideal camping-ground and a strong rival to Gulmarg.
Some fifteen miles beyond Sonamarg is the Zoji-la Pass leading to Ladak and Baltistan. It was by this pass that I first entered Kashmir in 1887, and coming thus from the opposite direction, the change in scenery was most remarkable. For hundreds of miles from the northern side I had traversed country which though of the grandest description, was absolutely devoid of forest. The great mountains, sublime in their ruggedness and in the purity of their snowy mantle, were yet completely barren. Then, of a sudden, as I crossed the Zoji-la all was changed in a moment, and I burst into one of the loveliest valleys in the world with glorious forests clothing every slope. It was a refreshing and delightful change, a relaxation from a sublimity too stern to bear for long, to the homely geniality of earthly life, and the remembrance of it still lies fresh upon my memory.
Gangabal Lake
About forty miles from Srinagar, and lying at the foot of the great peak Haramokh, is the remarkable Gangabal Lake. It is reached by a steep pull of 4000 feet from the Sind valley. By the side of the path rushes a clear, ice-cold stream. From the top of the rise are superb views precipitously down to the Wangat valley leading up from the Sind and beyond it to a jagged range of spires and pinnacles. The path then leads over rolling downs, covered in summer with ranunculus and primulas, to a chain of torquoise and ice-green lakes, above which grimly towers the massive Haramokh six thousand feet above the water, and giving birth to voluminous glistening glaciers which roll down to the water's edge.
It is a silent, solitary, and impressive spot, and is held in some reverence by the Hindus.