In the lap of Nanda Devi (Part I)

 (A trip to Auli,Joshimath,Tapovan,Gorso Bugyal.Kuari Bugyal,Rishikesh,Haridwar with friends)

Day 1: The Unplanned Journey-

  We made our plan of the trip just few days before with one of the friends coming in just one day back. All four of us gave awesome and creative explanations to our families  for not coming to home on Holi vacations with one of us even not informing them about the trip. We couldn’t get a tatkal reservation so decided to travel by bus, which indeed was a bad decision. We left the campus in the evening around 7Pm, reached the bus stop and took a bus to Bareiley. We were expecting to reach Haridwar by 8Am but of course one should not predict about Indian roadways and Railways. Meeting many traffic jams, accident sites and changing bus two times we reached Haridwar at 12.30Pm next day.

Day 2: The Holy Dip (Rishikesh)-

Reaching Haridwar we had lunch and then took a bus to Rishikesh which is about 25kms from Haridwar. Buses are easily available and we reached Rishikesh in one and half hours. We decided to spent rest of the day in Rishikesh as buses to Joshimath are available only in the morning. After resting for sometime in a relatively cheaper room because of offseason benefits we left for Lakshman Jhula. On the road to main Ghat one could find many shops providing services for Adventure sports like rafting, trekking,wild safari, camping, bungy jumping  and many more.I doubt that once a religious place, Rishikesh has now become a place for adventure sports with adventure shops rising in numbers at least 4 to 5 times then the number of temples there. One more peculiar thing was that you can find more people in rafting boats and on the banks of Ganga in Shivpuri then on the Ghats of Rishikesh near temples. Finally we reached Lakshman Jhula, its a hanging bridge on Ganga, vibrating up and down when people move on it. We spent some time jumping on it, clicking photographs and discussing how resonance can bring it down in the Ganges flowing about 30 metres below. 
We reached the Ghat below after sometime with intentions of taking a bath but touching the ice cold water we almost left the thought. After much of provocations two of us jumped in the waters. It was too cold but relieving. Following us two other foreigners also jumped in. One very strange thing about the Ghats in Rishikesh was that we could only see 2 or 3 Indians there, rest of them were all foreigners.  Sometimes it felt as if we were in a British colony. Some were busy in reciting mantras and hare ram hare krishna. There was a group of 50 foreigners near by singing the tone of Shiv Shiv Shiv Shambhu with the help of Guitars and flutes. It was so sweet to ears that we sat with them. There was a girl painting the Ganges ghat in the sunset .In Rishikesh you can find many foreigners getting inclined to Vedic religion, practising Hindu rituals, reciting mantras and bhajans, some even becoming saints. We returned back with a walk of 7kms passing the Ram Jhula and temples.

Day 3: The dangerous turns-

The next day we woke up at 4 as we had to leave for Joshimath. Private buses are available from Rishikesh till 7 Am and a bus is there from Haridwar at 5.30Am. We took a bus from Rishikesh at 6Am, it was a small bus with not so comfortable seats but we had no other option. The road from Rishikesh to Joshimath is all along the banks of Ganges, providing a wonderful picturesque of mountains and the rivers. Because of the awesome scenery the 250kms distance consuming a time of 10-11 hours doesn’t seem boring at all. On the way there are many towns, some of religious importance like Dev Prayag, Nand Prayag,Rudra Prayag,Karna Prayag and cities like Srinagar and Chamoli. Prayag means confluence of tributaries of Ganga. The road however was a bit damaged and very often one could find boards saying-"आगे रास्ता संकरा है और धंस रहा है | कृपया सावधानीपूर्वक चले ". Many a times I found the tyre of the bus just passed the damaged corner of the road. A small mistake from the driver could have very easily lead to the salvation of the 50 lives onboard in the Holy Alaknanada itself. When we were just 50kms from Joshimath,a suspension of spring of one of the front tyres got broken.Now the driver was driving it at a rate of 15kms/hour and finally we reached Joshimath around 5Pm.
 
On reaching the taxi stand we met some of our seniors who reached there in the morning for vacations. We then talked to some of the people providing services of trekking and camping for a possible trekking activity. All of themrefused considering the heavy snow in the Kuari  pass region saying that it was risky and also Police won't grant permission. However one of them gave the contact details of a guide from Auli and said he may do something for you. Now the most interesting thing- After 2 days, including us 3 groups were doing trekking in Kuari Bugyal region inspite of the fearful warnings from the locals, and the best part-All the three groups were from IIT Kanpur.

Day 4: Lost in the Wild-

As per plans we had to spend next day in Auli which is about 16kms from Joshimath. Instead of taking a taxi we decided to trek through the village and the forest ,with shortcuts distance reduced to about 7 kms. We left for Auli around 7am.While passing the village we had to trek through the stair cases which became a difficult task with heavy load on my back. When the village ended we had two options either take the road to Auli or go in the forest through some more short cut routes. Locals suggested not to go in Jungle because we might get lost, but we did. It was great fun with splendid greenery and birds chirping all around. The fun turned to excitement soon when we saw the snow and then to adventure and then to terror when we realized that we have lost the track and we were just wandering here and there.
 Out of fear we put our cameras in bags and started applying all our brains to get the right directions. We had just 1 packet of biscuit and 200 ml of water left. We decided to reach the top of the snow clad hill as from there we would be able to easily see Auli and then proceed. But the hills are decisive, as we moved up we could see some other hill tops to reach. In the snow it was difficult to climb up so we left the hope and started descending right. Coming down in snow was again risky and we slipped many times. After 3 hours of wandering in forest with no food and water we finally found a one ended road which lead to the main road.

After reaching Auli we took a room, had some food and left for skiing. There is a chair lift available from GMVN hotel to the ski resort. It’s a bit costly but the experience is worth the money invested. The ski resort has an international ski slope of 1.5 kms with all the modern facilities.SAIF winter games were held this year in Auli.We were given some heavy shoes and practised walking with them without support. It took us some time to learn the balancing on snow but it was great fun later. We fell many times in the process. We forgot to bring our gloves and our hands got frozen. I also had a sweet little snow fight with a kid there. From there one can get an awesome view of Nanda devi and other peaks covered in snow. After 3 hours of skiing we were tired and decided to come back. In the evening we contacted the guide, gave him some advance money and fixed our trekking tour.


Part II

Photographs by- Sravan Photography