Stretching boundaries once again, Razdan Holidays recently organised an exclusive “By Invitation only” 4×4 Self Drive Expedition to Zanskar and Leh via Shinkun La, Singe La & Sirsir La.
These roads have been taken by fewest travellers from India or anywhere in the world and it is indeed a great achievement for all the participants to have traversed the terrain which not many humans have done so far. It’s also worth a mention that this was the first-ever driving expedition undertaken by any tour operator or travel agent from India or elsewhere.
The expedition was led by a professional motorsport expert driver and Managing Director of Razdan Holidays, Sanjay Razdan. The “Sweep Car” was driven Dhruv Razdan who is also one of the Directors at Razdan Holidays. All cars were connected via a Walkie – Talkie as communication is prime in these kinds of roads and terrain.
In this 12-days-long expedition, participants crossed the regions of Himachal Pradesh, Zanskar, Leh, Nubra, Changtang and Jammu & Kashmir.
The participants also traversed over eight high altitude mountain passes averaging over 5000 metres. The main highlight of the route was the journey to Zanskar over ShinkuLa and the journey to Leh via SingeLa and SirsirLa.
These new roads are still in its earliest fancy with plans to connect Zanskar valley via multiple roads for the army in order to have alternative routes to the border areas but will eventually be beneficial to the local population as well as the tourists in future.
However, with no tarmac on these roads, the participants and their machines had to go through extreme levels of testing and endurance levels. The day 02 of the journey covered the stretch between Keylong and Padum via Shinkun La in one day, a gruelling journey of almost 14 hours with just one stop planned for Lunch under the massive mystical mountain, Gonbo Ranjon.
Sanjay Razdan, who had done the recce of the tour prior to its actual departure, exclaimed to the participants, “this will be a test of both your mental and physical endurance in a way never experienced before”.
This journey was conceived and developed after Razdan Holidays organised the first-ever driving expedition to Shinku La in October 2020 in which about 20 tour operators participated. Once Shinku La was achieved, the ambition to take the journey to the next level was imagined and hence the planning started from that day and finally the tour was organised all the way over Shinkun La (5100 Metres) to Padum and subsequently to Nurla over SingeLa (5050 Metres and SirsirLa (4850 Metres).
For some of the people like Sanjay Razdan and Rajiv Tomar, the route was highly nostalgic as is used to be a popular trekking route which was undertaken by them multiple times.
The terrain and roads (read off-roads) were extremely tough but everyone was rewarded with visuals and beautiful landscape one would have never imagined even existed as well as with the sense of achievement of doing something which no tour operator had even thought of doing.
The experience overall was extremely enriching which all participants would not forget for a long time to come.
The following adventurers participated in this trip:
| Sanjay Razdan & Anita Razdan | Razdan Holidays (Lead Car) |
| Dhruv Razdan & Kanishk Razdan | Razdan Holidays (Sweep Car) |
| Richa Nayal & Wg. Cmdr. J.S. Nayal | Era Tours & Travels India Pvt. Ltd. |
| P. Balasubramaniam | Namaste Tours Pvt. Ltd. |
| Ajay Vinayak, Vandana Vinayak & Kartik Vinayak | Palomino Hospitality Pvt. Ltd. |
| Deepak Sharma & Khwaish Sharma | Katha Tours and Travels Pvt. Ltd. |
| Akshit Chandra | State Express |
| Rajiv Tomar | Mystical Journeys Pvt. Ltd. |
| Shibani Kapoor, Vishal Kapoor & Aditya Kapoor | WanderGlobe Inc. |