The cold desert keeps its own time

Spiti does not perform for visitors. The mountains here are the colour of ash and rust, the villages are small enough to cross in four minutes, and the weather makes every plan provisional. That is precisely the appeal.

We drove in from Kinnaur, which trades altitude for time and lets the body adjust. The alternative route over Kunzum is faster and considerably less forgiving. Either way, the last stretch into Kaza is where the landscape stops resembling anywhere else.

What stayed with us was not a viewpoint. It was a monastery courtyard at seven in the morning, a family in Langza pouring butter tea without being asked, and the particular quality of a night sky at that altitude — dense enough that constellations become difficult to pick out.