This covers the typical Ladakh tourist route of Nubra Valley, Turtuk, and Pangong lake. Not that novel of an itinerary, I know. Check out my main Leh post for more info on my Ladakh trip and further recommendations. Here I’m writing about Diskit/Hunder first, then Turtuk, then Pangong, but note that I really only recommend Turtuk, which I loved, but also note that my opinions differ from most people’s. This was based on a summer 2022 trip and was mostly written then.
Nubra Valley / Diskit / Hunder:
Honestly the only reason to stay in Nubra is to break up the drive between Leh and Turtuk, which is where you really want to go (Turtuk is part of Nubra Valley, but when most people say they’re going to Nubra they’re referring to Hunder where the sand dunes are). Apparently most people who come to Nubra don’t even go to Turtuk though. This is weird, but it’s a good thing. Nubra valley is exceptionally beautiful, so I get why people come, but you can enjoy the views from the road. The long and uncomfortable drive from Leh here, and here to everywhere is, is full of incredible sights. As for Hunder, it is very touristy and crowded, and if you want to do shitty touristy stuff like ATV and camel rides, then fine, but otherwise I’d avoid staying unless you find a really nice place to stay. I’d rather spend more time in Turtuk though.
To be fair, I went to the Hunder/Diskit part of Nubra, perhaps the other side around Sumur is nicer. I saw an article about getting a quaint and quiet Silk Road experience at the beautiful looking Lchang Nang Retreat (archived). This sounds wonderful. The hotel looks gorgeous and the food looks great. There’s another incredible looking hotel nearby called The Kyagar. One day I’ll come with a suitcase full of books and stay at both of these places for weeks on end. The problem with these places is that they’re further away from Turtuk, though. Speaking of fancy hotels, in Hunder, I went to eat at the very nice Stone Hedge, which I recommend (see some paragraph down), and they also have the sister property Nubra Organic Retreat. That’s where I’d stay if I could afford them (the prices are very high in peak season, more reasonable outside of the season). And there must be some great homestays in some parts of Nubra. But otherwise I’m not convinced you want to spend much time around here.
I like to stay at homestays over hotels because I want a local experience, that’s the reason I travel, but none of the homestays I stayed at (one in Diskit and one in Hunder) were noteworthy. The people were nice but the stays cater to tourist hordes who come to take pictures at the sand dunes and don’t care about a local experience. Local food was impossible to get, and we were dished up grossly oily North Indian food at one homestay, and (actually surprisingly good) restaurant-style, cream and butter laden North Indian food at another homestay, cooked by a chef they hired from Nepal. They seemed confused by our request for simple, healthy, homestyle local food, as if nobody ever asked for that before. Both places had beautiful gardens with a wide variety of great looking vegetables, it was sad to see how they met their fate, and my request for some simple local greens went unmet.
I took a nice walk through the woods in Diskit. Other than that and going to the sand dunes, there’s nothing to really do. Near the sand dunes is a cultural performance. I liked the music and the outfits, but the dancing is boring. Probably not worth doing, like everything else around there. It probably would have been cool to go to the Diskit monastery, but I’d seen plenty of monasteries at that point and didn’t feel a need to see more. I don’t know, maybe I missed something here. Not sure why people come. I’m sure it was amazing 20 years ago. Now the villages are busy and full of ugly modern constructions. No charming village vibes. But I should stress again that the area is really beautiful, so if I had a nice place to stay with a nice garden to sit around and read and write in with the mountains in the background, I’d be happy.
(I’ll admit I got excited seeing the Bactrian camels, though I always find it sad to see animals forced to do this kind of stuff. That said, camels are always kinda miserable schmucks anyway so maybe it doesn’t matter.)
I did get pretty good (though inconsistent) cell network and wi-fi in my Diskit homestay. So there’s that. We had some work to finish before a long weekend in Turtuk where internet access was barely existent. Something to keep in mind for people who work remotely and want to go to Turtuk and maximize their time there but can’t take time off work.
Hunder does have the very nice Stone Hedge Hotel which offers some great food and a nice garden area to walk around and hang out in. The same can likely be said of their nearby sister property Nubra Organic Retreat, though we didn’t visit. We went to Stone Hedge for a chef’s tasting menu inspired by local produce, but I believe they moved that experience to the Organic Retreat, or these are separate experiences. I don’t know. But anyway, reach out to them to ask what sort of food experiences they offer at both hotels because they are worthwhile. Stone Hedge also has a frontier theme and plays old country music, which I thought was fun and actually kinda fitting.
At least when we went, Stone Hedge was the only hotel in this area that seemed to do anything interesting with the food and go beyond the basic North Indian formula (nor were there any standalone restaurants that weren’t just cheap dhaba types). The main menu did follow that formula (there’s even a “Chiness” section…), but they offered chef’s tasting menus that are more creative and have locally inspired elements. I went twice and really enjoyed it. Whether this still exists, I’m not sure, but they currently promote the Heritage Kitchen by ladakhichef, which is at Nubra Organic Retreat and looks great. While the meals I had were largely not Ladakhi, the Heritage Kitchen is a traditional Ladakhi affair with modern touches. I think all of these things need to be booked in advance, so call or message on Instagram before you go.
To give a quick description of what I had at Stone Hedge, it’s a mix of cuisines and is all fairly crowd pleasing, comfort food stuff, not super experimental or anything. Don’t expect the kind of meal you’d get at Tsas in Leh. But they use a lot of local ingredients and have creative touches here and there, and it was generally well made, ranging from pretty decent to really great. The menu changes all the time and you’ll probably get none of this, but two highlights were a salad pairing orange with fried bitter gourd, and a homestyle minced greens sabzi made with haak saag and served with missi roti made with barley and buckwheat flour. I also really liked kebabs made with local peas, momos made with buckwheat flour, and mini tingmo stuffed with an Indian-Chineseish vegetable preparation. There was an unhusked barley risotto with a yak cheese sauce that didn’t work because the barley was undercooked, but I liked the idea and the rich yak cheese sauce was very distinctive and delicious. The desserts had nothing local (disappointingly, why not throw in some apricot or sea buckthorn?) or creative, it was just shahi tukda and baked yogurt, but they were both excellent, maybe even the best I’ve ever had, not too sweet. All of the cooking was clean, nothing was heavy or oily.
Overall it wasn’t a world class meal or anything but it’s generally quite good and fun, occasionally excellent, and it’s nice to get food made by chefs who are talented and put some effort into pleasing you. Much better than the generic hotel meals that you get in similarly touristy places in India. I don’t expect Michelin star level food everywhere I go, but I’d love to see more places like this where they have some fun with local ingredients. Ask to speak to the chefs when you go, as they are very nice and explain the dishes well, while the service was bad otherwise (maybe they’ve since corrected this). There were two main chefs when I was there, one was from somewhere in the plains of India, and the other is a local who is now spearheading the Ladakhi meals at Heritage Kitchen. Here’s an article about him. I enjoyed reading about his life as a monk who fell in love with cooking. It would make a good movie.
Anyway, as I said, I don’t know if the meal I went for is still happening, but either way this is the area’s culinary destination. Nubra Organic Retreat also had a large Ladakhi breakfast spread which looked quite good, though I don’t eat much at breakfast so I didn’t feel a need to go out of my way for it. The meals I went for weren’t cheap but were a decent value for me (around 2k per person, and I’m not sure what they’d cost now), but if you can’t afford them I’d still recommend eating at the restaurants ordering a la carte because those menus were reasonably priced. I would just ask for some homestyle vegetable dishes. Most ingredients come from their garden, though that’s standard in Ladakh. They also have a nice little cafe where we worked from for a bit, though the wifi was spotty. My wife said the coffee was decent.
Turtuk:
Turtuk is undoubtedly one of the highlights of Ladakh, and I highly recommend it, though I don’t have a ton to say about it. It’s a Balti village in the hills. It is extremely beautiful and abundantly green in summer, it has cool traditional architecture, and the people are super nice. The food is some of the best in Ladakh. There are donkeys, and you can pet them. There’s not much else that needs to be said. It’s one of the most charming and idyllic places I’ve ever been. It’s a total pain to get to, but worth it (6ish hours from Leh, which you can break up by stopping in Hunder).
Turtuk is quickly becoming commercialized and there’s a ton of construction everywhere, but the charm of the place remained fully intact. I can only hope it stays that way. Tons of tourists come on day trips, but after 4pm it seemed like there were hardly any tourists around even in the peak season. I imagine it will only get more touristy though (I don’t know the status, but I heard talks of a new highway route from Kargil in the works). Don’t expect internet access, though that should change too.
It’s a lot of fun to just walk around, but there are also some really cool, interesting museums as well. Definitely go to the Balti Heritage House & Museum (buy the ticket that includes the cold storage, that was one of the coolest parts) and the Emperor’s Museum and meet the descendent of the former royal family. I asked him his favorite Balti food, he said moscat, so order that. He also said that the people of Turtuk used to be Zoroastrian before converting to Islam some hundreds of years ago. Interesting! Also look for the old water powered flour mill, and some other old stuff like the village coppersmith (where my wife bought a spoon). The fun of Turtuk is just wandering around, plucking fruit from trees, eating, etc. Chat with people if you can speak Hindi, if not just smile.
We stayed at Aairah Homestay and it was a great choice, one of my favorite stays that we had. It’s small, I think just two rooms, and the accommodation is pretty basic, but I was happy with it. The family is incredibly nice (then again, so is everyone in Turtuk!), the Balti food is excellent, and the views are great. Our host (who I should note doesn’t speak much English) gave us a tour and took us on a short trek, and when we came back to Turtuk on a day trip with the in-laws we came to say hi and he invited us all for tea. As it’s in the village and not on the main road, you have to go by foot which was quite difficult with our big bags, but he helped us up and down. Their donkeys live down the street, you can go and pet them. If you want something more luxurious, there’s the very nice Turtuk Holiday Resort where I ate a great meal, but personally I’m really glad I got to have a nice homestay experience.
Turtuk is the best place to eat in Ladakh outside of Leh, and despite being a remote village it actually has good dining options. The Balti cuisine has a lot in common with Ladakhi food, but there are some distinctive dishes and in general the food here is spicier and for whatever reason yummier. Also, the potatoes (not any particular dish, but the potatoes themselves) in Turtuk are the best I’ve ever had! You see beautiful vegetables growing everywhere but the cuisine doesn’t use a ton of vegetables? I never figured that out. The herbs that grow wild here are exceptional, our host showed us the local mint and oregano varieties, I don’t think I ever had such strongly flavored ones, though they probably go underutilized in the cuisine. The fruit here is also amazing, I was there during the seasons for mulberry, apricot, and cherry, it was a treat getting them fresh from the trees. If you can't reach them, the locals will help you.
I ate all of my breakfasts and dinners at my homestay and had lunch outside. The food at the homestay was great, and everything we got was local as we had asked, even when other guests were there and asked for North Indian food. It was nice of them to accommodate all of us. My favorite things were the greens for breakfast, served with chapati or the buckwheat pancake called kisir. We got two different varieties of greens, both I think unseasoned but incredibly flavorful on their own. I also loved the grangthur (yogurt with local herbs/greens, better than the Ladakhi thangtur) with kisir for breakfast, and the dinners I remember were tsapon (shredded up and stir fried bread with onion and tons of butter) and a local thukpa, which was more robustly flavored than other thukpas.
Other than homestays (hopefully you get a good one), the best places to eat are Turtuk Holiday Resort (which I think rebranded as Virsa) and Balti Kitchen. Turtuk Holiday Resort is the only upscale place to stay in Turtuk, and they have a six course Balti lunch where you eat right next to their garden, with the food being prepared in front of you on traditional cooking equipment by local women who you can talk to if you speak Hindi (or if by some off chance you speak Balti…). They’re quite shy but will tell you about how they make things. This is definitely the best meal you can get in Turtuk and one of the best in Ladakh. Everything was extremely fresh and flavorful, tasting cleaner, more refined, and more homemade than what I had at other places. It’s also a nice experience, with a great setting, and the host explained the dishes and ingredients well and answered questions about Balti cuisine in English. When we went it was 3000inr per person which is pretty steep, especially considering it was only six courses (every time I read about it online it said 10 courses, where did the four missing courses go?!). But if you can afford it I highly recommend it.
If you can’t afford that, the good news is that Balti Kitchen, the second best option for Balti food, is still very good, and if you have multiple days in Turtuk I highly recommend it either way. (Also, I think this place was started by the sister of the guy who started Turtuk Holiday Resort). The menu has a good range of Balti dishes, they had nearly everything that I tried at my homestay (but not the greens!) and at the Turtuk Holiday Resort, and it mostly compared favorably, if those were a 10 this was probably an 8.
When ordering, optimize for dishes you won’t get in other parts of Ladakh (though if I were to go back I’d be curious to see how dishes like skyu, pheymar, and mamtu (basically mokmoks here, I’m told) differed from other parts of Ladakh). I recommend the buckwheat pancakes (kisir) with different sauces (I love the granthur, which is the yogurt and greens sauce, but the walnut sauce moskot is the emperor’s favorite dish, so get both), a local noodle soup (different from thukpa) called baleh, something called channe baleh which I didn’t try, praku (gnocchi-ish dumplings with walnut sauce, a bit heavy and one note for me though I liked it, sauce is similar to moskot so best not to get both in the same meal), and tsapon (stir fried torn up bread with lots of butter and onion). It’s not that expensive so I recommend you over-order so you can try it all. Skip the zaan unless you have a large group or enough meals to order everything, it’s basically paba but made with buckwheat instead of barley.
Definitely get the tsapkor for dessert, it’s an unsweetened bread made with malted barley flour that has a natural sweetness, served with ridiculous amounts of butter. They don’t always have it, though if you ask a day in advance they can make it. It was awesome. The other desserts include cookies that are good but not that interesting (if you want to try them you can ask for them to go so you don’t waste stomach space, and they also serve them with hot drinks), and there are two dried apricot based desserts which I didn’t get here but had at the homestay and the Turtuk Holiday Resort and loved both, though they’re kind of overpriced here considering how simple they are, one is just boiled dried apricots that become soupy, another is a dry preparation of dried apricots with nuts and honey. With the exception of the cookies, these are all healthy desserts! Also definitely get the fresh fruit juices, whatever is in season, though I will say that the mulberry juice at Turtuk Holiday Resort was better.
The setting here is also very nice, overlooking the garden where they grow most of their ingredients. It is, for some reason, a very popular restaurant with tourists who go there on day trips and order sizzler. I don’t get how such people exist. If you are one of those people you are banned from reading this blog, consider any further reading to be a thought crime (though I admit it looked good, and I suspect it might be one of India’s best sizzlers, though I’ve never had a sizzler and probably never will).
Beyond these places, most places just serve typical tourist formula food, though a few of them do have some Balti dishes on the menu, and maybe there are more places since I last went. I feel comfortable telling you to stick to the two aforementioned places though. If you have extra time, Turtuk Holiday Resort has a few other food options and they look really good. One is an upscale cafe on the main road called Farmer’s House which has a mix of local and global options with some fun fusiony stuff. The other is a Japanese restaurant (!) called Yakitori which has a live sushi counter. Kinda crazy. The owner of the hotel is a chef who I think worked in Japan. I would have liked to try both places, but the Japanese restaurant was renovating when we were there, and the cafe hadn’t fully opened yet and was just serving coffee, which my wife enjoyed.
A number of places sell locally grown dried fruits, walnuts, herbs, flours, sun dried tomatoes, etc, and I recommend buying them, but check the bags well and eat them quickly as we found bugs in a number of things (hey, it’s real organic, homegrown, home-processed stuff).
Turtuk was part of Pakistan until the 1971 war and today is right by the border. You can see some nearby mountains where there may be Pakistani troops stationed. There’s no border crossing anywhere nearby, and our homestay host told us that some families here have relatives in neighboring villages on the Pakistani side of Baltistan. They used to be able to travel by foot (or was it donkey?) to see them. Now any family reunions require them to travel all the way to the Wagah border!
Pangong
Extremely beautiful. Like really, really stunning. Magical. Is it worth the drive though? There’s nothing else there except a pretty lake. Not even good food. I don’t know, to me it seems not worth the drive, and I’m a big 3 Idiots fan too. I don’t see the point in long painful travels just to see something beautiful. Nor is it worth the risk of getting sick from the altitude (though this isn’t an issue for people who are staying in Ladakh for a long time). My mother-in-law was in the hospital the next day, and this is not that unusual. Maybe if you get a nice homestay I’d see more value in it, but there’s hardly anywhere nice to stay there and they book up quickly. But it was really gorgeous (as is the drive). A lot of people say it’s the highlight of their Ladakh trip, and though they are obviously wrong, you should consider that you may also be wrong in my eyes, in which case it would be worth going to, assuming you don’t die of altitude sickness.
I forgot who told me this, but someone in Ladakh said how in winter when the lake would freeze up, there’d be off-the-books trade of kitchen utensils between Indians and Chinese, walking on the frozen river and meeting in the middle. Can this be true? Either way, I doubt it happens anymore.
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