Back to Kaza

This morning we could take our time as we weren't leaving until after an early lunch. Some of the others went for a walk with Joan to see another part of the village but I decided to do my own thing and potter about the hillside. There was a stupa just up the hill with a wall around it and terraces so I walked up beside the wall where there were some blue butterflies which I photographed and then a Clouded Yellow type eventually settled on a flower head, allowing some photos. A walk up the hill and the flora was very different with some pinks, house leeks, senecio and white labiates dotted about. An oriental Turtle Dove flew off the ground and settled briefly on a wall before going off up the hill.

I returned just as the walking party did and we all sat down to another lovely rice risotto lunch cooked by Rinco.

After packing up and making our way up to the parking area we found that the wedding party were in the process of leaving. The bride was in the car with her bridesmaid and was taking a tearful farewell of her mother. It is customary for the bride to cry and she sobbed quietly, still under her heavy silver and turquoise headdress. There was a band playing in bursts and one of the men from last night was saying prayers while dipping his feathers into some milky substance. There was also a collection of bottles with prayer scarves tied round them and money tucked in, which were retrieved after the prayers.

The drivers had loaded up the cars while waiting for the wedding party to leave and we climbed into our cars before setting off back to Kaza. We were in the middle of the wedding procession with the band playing at the front and about 25-30 cars in convoy. They stopped twice to perform a puja at the entrance to the village and at the bridge before they went right towards Tabo and we went left towards Kaza. At one of the stops 3 of the Kinnaur men came along and stood chatting with us. One of them kept inviting us to visit him in his village.

The drive back took about 4 hours and, at one point, we had to take a diversion across the river bed as the road was blocked. We were, by now, pretty used to the rocking and rolling of the cars and the dust could be a bit of a pain but some of the scenery really was lovely.
We stopped in Kaza for a couple of hours to do any last minute shopping and use the wifi facilities before heading back to the Spiti Serai Hotel. We settled into the hotel again and after a quick wash and brush up we went to dinner.