Officially known as the Hangroo Loops on the old Lamayuru route, the Jalebi road winds for over twenty kilometres between Lamayuru and Khaltse. Along the way, it negotiates 23 hairpin bends, each one helping vehicles gain altitude gradually in terrain where a straight climb would be impossible. The mountain rises too steeply for a direct ascent. This is a highway that is both functional and beautiful.

Jalebi Road in Ladakh makes you forget your destination. Left turn, right turn, left again, another right. After a while, you stop trying to remember which bend you are on. The road is quietly testing your patience. Every corner looks familiar, yet the landscape is somehow different. The scenery never gives you time to get bored. The loops curl and overlap in perfect spirals. The name Jalebi Road suits it perfectly.

From the viewpoint above Jalebi Road, the vehicles below look like tiny insects inching across the mountainside. A truck that seemed enormous a few minutes earlier becomes a moving speck. People vanish altogether. The mountains are vast and silent. They rise in every direction, their colours shifting with the sunlight, brown one moment, golden the next, then suddenly streaked with shades of grey, green, or rust. In the distance, you can see snow on the higher peaks.

When you look at it from above, the bends create a pattern that naturally draws the eye through the frame. The dark ribbon of asphalt contrasts beautifully against the barren slopes. A photographer’s favourite frame. Not monasteries and mountain lakes, just a road.

Not just photographers, people usually remember destinations, the monastery, some famous monument or the lake. Rarely does an unexpected sight make you pull over, grin, and say, That really does look like a jalebi.

Some pictures from Lamayuru-

Photos and text by Prerna Jain.