The Nanda Devi experience

1st Mar 2010 - 2nd Mar 2010

It was Holi. We were expected to play and spend the day with the gang. As usual we hadnt even started packing. Plus my eyes were giving me a bit of irritation so we decided to stay back at home itself. The day just seemed to fly. Before we knew it was 10.30pm and we had to leave for our train to Haridwar from Nizamuddin. We said bye to everyone at home. And babu was to leave the next morning as well, so we bid mutual farewell and left home. I was both excited and a little sad to leave our folks behind. Anyways the train was bang on time. Only because it was starting from Nzm itself. Our Nzm-Dehradun express left at 11:55 pM. Journey was smooth except for the fact that there was this little rat that gave niks company for the night. He couldnt sleep. Lol...

We reached Haridwar station at 4.10 am.. a 15 min delay. But that dint make much of a difference because our first bus to joshimath was only at 5.00 am from the bus stand. It took us 15 min to reach the stand from the railway station. While we waited for the bus to start, we could not help notice how well lit Haridwar was. This small town seemed to welcoming pilgrims with open arms. They had built huge areas with many small sized huts. Even ganges looked very pretty with the reflection of the strings of lights that adorned it. The sight was peaceful and satisfying.

Our bus started its journey at dot 5 much to our relief. We were a little apprehensive of it being a private vehicle and whether they would keep their word. Because the last cable car from Joshimath to Auli is at 4.20 pm, and if we missed that we would have had to stay overnight at Joshimath itself. But once we started it, both of us got more convinced. The driver was quite cautious at the same time efficient and we reached joshimath at 3.15pm. We got our first glimpse of the snow clad himalayas at Gauchar. And closer we got to Joshimath, we were welcomed by such spectacular views that we couldn't wait to get off the bus. Especially niks couldn't wait to get his hands on his camera, but I guess it was worth the wait. The moment we reached we bought tickets to the cable car for the 4.20 pm ride. Everything fell into place neatly.The weather here is quite pleasant. Not cold nor too sunny. We expected it to be extremely chilly. But to our surprise it s magical. Cool winds blowing through my hair and bright sun rays to keep us warm. Just a jacket and a pair of sunglasses is enough to keep you through. Even during the journey it was very pleasant. Now I'm sitting here at the cable car station waiting to go to our hotel, cliff top resort. Have to see what's in store for us.

I'm now sitting in my room by the blessed warmth of the heater. Well after we got into the cable car the temperature started dipping tremendously. When we started crossing the 3rd tower we started seeing huge sheets of ice. We had to alight at the 8th tower(out of the 10 towers) and we had lots of other people for company. So all of us got out and started walking towards cliff top resort. That was my first step on ice and a giant leap for my expedition experience hopefully (if the kuari pass trek comes true). Our room is quite spacious. And the view from our window is simply magnificent. It opens right to the majestic Nanda Devi. We came in put our luggage in and stepped out to enjoy the surroundings. Throughout the place we saw patches of snow. We walked a bit around the place and then headed back to our room. There were these 2 mountain dogs which were giving us company. At night they had a bon fire for all the hotel guests. We sat for a while and then retired to bed.

03 Mar 2010

We got up early morning to catch a view of the mountains. it was a clear blue sky and we could see Nanda Devi in its royal glory. The tallest peak of india (7816 mts) right outside our window waiting for us to take pride in her. About some of the tallest peaks all visible from one point. We could see Mana peak (7272 mts), Kamet (7756 mts), Gouri parvat (6719 mts), Hathi parvat(6727 mts), Barmal(5843 mts), Dunagiri (7066 mts), and Trishul range (7120 mts) all very clearly and at such close distance like they were just across the street. We just couldn't believe its true. The last time we had come we weren't able to see a thing. We had absolutely no clue that there were so many peaks to see. We decided to go on a morning walk and clicked a few snaps. And then came back to have hot aloo parathas and tea. After breakfast we freshened up and thought of doing a bit of sight seeing.

Well Auli has a lot to offer in terms of trekking. There are a lot of trek routes that you can do. But due to peak weather conditions with temperatures around 7-8 degrees and everything covered with snow we were unable to do our kuari pass trek. :( These guys are saying its impossible to do any kind of trek in this weather condition. We attempted our first lessons at skiing and fell as many times as we tried. But after a while we managed to ski down for about 60 sec without falling. That was an achievement..lol. We have spoken to a few locals here to see if we can camp in the jungle for a night. We ll finalize it tomorrow. And they said there is a small trek of about 10 km that is doable. So that's it for today. Going to bed now.

4th Mar 2010

As planned the previous day, we were to leave for our Gorson's top trek (a 8 km trek) at 9.30am. Our guide, Rajesh was waiting outside our room at 9.20am. We were all set to begin our trek. We started our trek towards the Gorson's top, which is actually en route to kuari pass. The deeper we went, we saw pristine white snow. It was just so beautiful. Fresh snow lay in huge mass all over the place. At some places it was two and a half feet deep and my knees sunk into them. There was a padiyar temple on the way, which is supposedly being maintained by the ITBP (Indo Tibetian Border Police) now. Throughout the trek we saw the ITBP guys getting prepared to take part in the ASIAD for skiing which is due to take place next year(oct 2011). It was an awe inspiring sight to see them practising. Whoosh.whoosh.whoosh. They just whizzed past us like they were born with skiis on their legs. Finally we reached the top called the Gorson's top. The view was enchanting. From the top most point we could see all the peaks surrounding us. There were extremely cold winds blowing almost numbing us, and so much snow had gotten into my gum boots that it had started hurting a little. But once we started walking it got better. It was a little cloudy so the peaks weren't quite visible, but we managed to get some beautiful views of the snow covered mountains. Our guide had bought his skiis along so that he could ski on our way back. Niks decided to do some heavy skiing stunts on the steep slope and this was the result..lol..

We then trekked back and reached back by 1.00 pm.

05 Mar 2010

This is by far the best day of my life. We'll we set out to camp last evening. The weather was quite unpredictable. It had started getting dark and cloudy. We weren't sure if we'd be able to camp overnight. They were predicting snow fall. But it had been drizzling since 2:30 pm and till 5.00 pm there was no sign of any snow. Our guide came by our room at 5.45pm with the snow boots. We camped at a place inside the jungle about a km from our hotel. We were particular about camping at a place far removed from the commercial centre. And this was just perfect. We pitched our tent below few trees beside the snow track. After all arrangements were done like gathering firewood, setting up the tent, placing the sleeping bags etc our guides went back to get food supply for the night. They set up a nice camp fire outside our tent. This is to ensure that no animals come closeby. The smoke from the camp fire supposedly keeps animals at bay. They came back at 9pM. By then the hailstones that had slightly begun by around 6.00 pm, had stopped . The sky was really clear and we could see millions of tiny stars..something which one can only dream of seeing in delhi. We cooked dinner in the jungle. A simple maggie and an omlette toast. while our guides (Shibu and his brother) were preparing dinner, we all sat around the fire and chatted. Shibu began telling us the local history, mythology and his expedition experiences and we were telling him our trekking stories. By the time we finished it was 11 pm and we went into our cosy tent to sleep.

It was our first camping in the jungle experience under snowy condititions and we were so excited. I would be lying if I said I wasn't scared. When they let us all alone in the middle of the jungle (and we had no weapons)I was a little nervous with all terrifying thoughts of a bear or a snow leapord attacking us . Ha ha.It was warm inside. After a while I think by about 2.00am it started getting cold. And we started hearing noises like some kind of stones falling on our tent. We could also hear our guides talking throughout the night. At 6.45 am we woke up and the first thing that caught our eye was something on top of our tent. We jumped and looked outside. Yes. The entire periphery was filled with snow. We immediately got out to capture the morning view of fresh snow and what we saw we couldn't believe. It had snowed heavily and the entire place looked like it was under a white carpet. The place which was covered with grass a few hours ago was now unrecognizable. "It was icing on the cake ". We enjoyed the experience of camping out in the jungle, in a tent, cooking food, sitting and chatting around the fire. But what we saw in the morning was like bonus. We had never imagined to see snowfall while we were out. We could see all the peaks very clearly and distinctly. Beginning with Mana parbat on the left, Kamet, Gouri parvat, Hathi parvat, then the barmal, dunagiri, Nanda Devi and lastly trishul in the far right. The view was too irresistible. Couldn't stop to enjoy the breathtaking view. Clicked a lot of snaps. it was 8am and we had to return. We dint feel like leaving that spot. But we had to, on our way back, the ITBP had started their training. We were taking snaps by the side. And to our pleasant surprise, their training head offered us tea and seats and invited us to their table. That was a very sweet gesture I thought. We had tea and chatted for a while. After that we thanked them and descended to our hotel. All in all it was an amazing unforgettable experience.