We are constantly amazed on things we stumble across on our journeys, whether it is good timing (lunching monklets, Hindu processions) – or by a casual conversation with someone. In this case an Indian motorcyclist mentioned a rope bridge beyond Kibber village that stopped wheeled transport to the next village Chenai.

We carried on climbing from our overnight stop at the Kye Monastry and arrived at the village of Kibber (at 4000m altitude). Mid afternoon we went looking for the said rope bridge. What we found was an amazing deep canyon cutting through the laid back rolling plateau we were on. The ‘rope’ bridge was a cage and cable way spanning the canyon walls near the concrete pillars of a ‘to be built’ bridge and once the bridge is built the villages will be 30 mins apart by vehicle instead of 4-5 hours as they are now.

On the other side of this stomach churning span were some local women gesticulating and calling out to us. Despite a lack of Hindi, Spitian, or hearng anything over that distance we figured they wanted us to release the cage rope – for some reason it was hooked up.

We helped pull them across, and then their mates and then asked if they would mind pulling us back if we took the ride out into the abyss. Smiling and happy they loaded us into the wee cage and let us roll – amazing views down to the river and a fun experience. While hanging out waiting to be pulled back we spotted a tenuous trail heading down into the canyon – maybe tomorrows misssion.

Before breakfast next morning we biked back to the canyon, deserted our bikes and followed the exciting trail down into the canyon bottom. We went down the old zig zag trail we had spied from our ride in the cage, then had to get wet feet to walk back to the newer trail that is a dry foot trail. We watched people take the cage across high above us.

What a wee gem of a discovery – and a nice thing to do before breakfast and our return to Kaza.