Lamayuru rises from Ladakh’s rugged terrain like a vision from another world, cliffs twisting into eroded formations defying symmetry and logic—some standing like ancient pillars, others breaking into jagged ridges—spilling into a barren sweep of golden earth. No wonder this landscape is called the ‘Moonland of Ladakh’. Arguably, it feels more lunar than earthly.
Yet in this seemingly inhospitable terrain, life has clung on for centuries. Atop a craggy outcrop, stands the Lamayuru Monastery, founded by Mahasiddha Naropa in the late 10th century, though some accounts place it in the 11th. Legend tells of him drying up a lake that once existed here to make way for the monastery.
Another version attributes the draining to Arahat Madhyantika, who, during a visit, made a crack in the ground and prophesied that the teachings of Sutra and Tantra would flourish here. Science, of course, offers a different perspective—an ancient seabed, lifted skyward by the slow, unyielding force of tectonic shifts.
Standing here, watching the rock patterns, every explanation holds weight, as though the land itself remembers the water that shaped it.
