"Salaam, sahib!"
"Hullo there, pal."
"Baksheesh?"
"Bugger off!"

Pete brushed the ragged little Indian shepherd boy aside and stomped on up the valley. The gaggle of children quickly gave him up as a bad job and turned their beady-eyed gaze to me, toiling up the slope a hundred yards behind. They tripped gaily down the hill and planted themselves in front of me. Surely this one would give them a rupee? With bright eyes and sheepish grins they stretched out thin arms, imploring a coin, a pen, a cigarette.

I solemnly explained that where I came from, Scotland, nobody ever gave baksheesh away. Their painful attempts to look doe-eyed came to nothing and I trudged on past the screeching crowd. They glared furiously at my enormous rucksack, no doubt crammed to the very brim with wads of crisp rupees. They became unbearably persistant, running past to block our way time and time again. Why should Allah bless these soft white Europeans, who had obviously never done a days work in their lives, with as much money as they wanted, while they had to scrape a precarious living on these high Himalayan slopes from their sheep and goats? How could it he fair?

This was the Thajuras Valley, near Srinagar in Kashimir, inhabited by the Gujar people. Further east an enormous change occurs in landscape and people. One could be entering a different world as one crosses the Zoji La Pass. The lush greenery of Kashmir, watered annually by the life-giving monsoon, gives out and is replaced by a rocky wasteland. Dry and barren hills of rock stretch up to a fierce blue sky - cloudless and withering. The rock is sand coloured but tinted by a range of impurities that give it an unbelievable range of colours. The land is cracked like the palm of a hand by the muddy glacial rivers carrying their loads down to the sea by contorted routes.

This is Ladakh, ’Little Tibet’, and the change in landscape is accompanied by an equally profound contrast in the people. Kashmir is populated by Moslem Indians, people whose years of isolation in the Vale of Kashmir has given them a quite disproportionate love of money. The Ladakhis, however, are Mongoloid and more closely allied to their Tibetan neighbours. Their character is cheerful and friendly – the children are shy but quick to smile. The aged have faces seamed and creased by years of exposure to the dry climate. Tourism has not yet stretched its grasping hand over the country, although the process has started in the capital, Leh. The religion here is probably an important factor in the more easy-going attitude to life. Ladakh is Buddhist – littered with isolated monasteries tended by red-robed monks devoting their lives to study and worship. Buddhism is a gentle religion, advocating improvement through the mind, not like the material aggressiveness of Islam.

Further south is Zanskar, much the same as Ladakh but with its own language and costume. Even less exploited, especially if you escape from the main north-south trekking routes, it is an inspiring place. There are villages every few miles on the big rivers: clusters of sandy flat-roofed houses, surrounded by a patchwork of fields irrigated ingeniously from side valley springs. The main crop is barley, from which is made flour or tsampa. The tsampa is usually added to butter tea to make a nourishing if. uninspiring meal. The mixture when redried looks very like sand but tastes like doughy wholemeal bread.

We trekked down through this country, often stopping at villages and asking if we could have a roof. for the night. Communication was always smiles and hand-signals, which made it impossible to fix prices until it was too late, but we were never over-charged. Occasionally after dinner some chang would be found – a potent barley beer that tastes very innocuous.

Still further south, on the Indian side of the Himalayan range, our ethnic tour of Kashmir and Ladakh ended at the fascinating village of Manali in Himachel Pradesh. In a high valley away from the humid North Indian plains, perched amid its acres of apple trees, Manali is a cool, relaxed haven. Living is cheap, dope is plentiful. Manali is a veritable melange of cultures; Buddhists, Moslems, Hindus and a lot of well established Europeans mix in a melee of clothes and colours. There is a large Tibetan contingent led by the exiled Dalai Lama – the living god of Buddhism – who lives nearby. The town with its markets and restaurants, Indian and Chinese, is friendly and cheerful: a luscious tonic after a strenuous holiday.