A Random walk in Park - Feeling Life

One Saturday,

Just as other routine days with phone calls, movies, cooking, eating and a lazy day. I was even bored of watching movie. I suddenly felt very restless, I couldn't even sit for sometime and be calm. I just left the house and started walking randomly on roads.

Many random thoughts flashed in the brain, what the hell I am doing here, why am I here, what is the reason for this life and what am I doing to accomplish this, why am I dependent on others when most of the things in life have to do be done alone. May be I should be hard on myself, may be I should stop talking much, may be i should stop being super active. I suddenly felt missing everyone and then realized its only me.

Just as I was walking in the Denny park, I was just seeing the things around me in the realworld. An old couple sitting on the beach silently holds hands, a group of people smoking, a person lying down on the bench, a person jogging, a superactive dog and its master playing around, a kid playing in the park, a kid holding hand of a man and then smiling while walking asking random questions, an young couple smiling and looking at each other. Just with in a small radius of 200 meters, I could see there was so much life.

I just sat silently and I was just figuring out the entire stages of life in just a 10 minutes walk around. Starting with a kid who just started walking and getting to know the world with questions, An active kid who was able to play by himself in the park, a young man trying to workout hard, a group of friends, an young couple and an old couple and a man. Is this all the life? I am just left with so many questions but what I did was just smile. Sat on the bench, just observing the trees, the dried leaves on the grass, people walking around and what I was doing is just smiling.. :)

I might not know all the answers, but what I can do is just keep going on, realizing each moment of life be it being active,sad, happy, angry or whatever.. but just I have to feel the life..!!

Feeeling Life... :) :) !!

Night Beach

In the trip of Oregon coast,

At around 12 30 am, was sitting in front of a long beach just watching the waves, listening to that sound and entire silence.
There was no moon because of the clouds but the light from far away houses was the only light available.  
This lights was reflected on the waves and made waves look more special. Though it was complete dark, I could see different shades in the sky, blue, dark blue, black.The night beach was silent with no much forceful waves.

Just sitting on the sand and watching the beach, I could feel the sound of waves, touch of sand, cool breeze and peaceful mind.
My mind was so calm and was not even listening to the people talking beside.  
Rather then being active, running around, busy with some or other things, this time I was calm, enjoying the nature, knowing myself....

The Adventurous Himalayan Trek

I was writing this blog in a word document and I dint expect this blog to turn out into a 6 pager document. So, just writing the highlights of the trip in the beginning. This blog is just a remembrance of our awesome trip. I don’t expect people to read through the entire blog as I myself dint read it after writing. If interested can go through this, get inspired to plan another trip like this and if so please do call me :P

(Pics to be inserted on the way and bad English editing on the way)

Highlights of the Trip:

• Awesome views of mountain ranges from Auli
• Walking in Hailstorm rain for 2 hrs
• Staying in Tents at -5degree centigrade temperature
• Crazy walks in steep slopes and heights and awesome pictures
• Stone age life: No phone No Connectivity No pollution and Blank state of mind.
• Snow formation just in front of eyes.
• Climbing the Pangarchula Peak
• Lots and Lots of Tea and Soup
• Badrinath trip and darshan of Lord Narayan
• The GIO team’s support throughout the trip

Pre – preparation:

Out of the vexed up office routine and a long planning of a long holiday, we decided on a Himalayan trek. The trekking group was the one where I know only 1 or 2 of them and all others were mutual friends. So, decided and booked a date which is 1.5 months from then. Had to go through all taking permissions from parents, shuntings from relatives and some of the friends as it would be difficult to breathe and as there were recent earthquakes, encouragement from some of the frnds and ppl as it was an awesome idea. As the date approached, started preparation of the Trekking by toning the body with physical body activities buying trekking material shoes, rucksack, jackets, sun glasses and all petty things needed.

The Trip Begins:

Day 0 – Hyderabad to Delhi to Haridwar

Started from Hyd to Delhi as usual with my crazy friend Pavani. Any trip with her would be something different say it crazy/stupid/ awesome. As we reached Delhi caught the metro to NDLS and met the rest of the troupe there for train journey to Haridwar. As it was late night, we dint even introduce properly with each other.

Day1- Haridwar Railway station to Auli

In the waiting room, got freshened up, introduced with each other’s and were waiting for the GIO team co-ord to start the Trek.  Had the first typical north Indian breakfast with Aloo Parata and chole bature and started the journey.  It was an 8-9 hrs journey, but it did not seem so. The ghat road always had a river stream at one side of us all the way. We went through Rishikesh, saw the 5 different prayagas Pancha Prayag (Vishnu prayag, nanda prayag, karna prayag, rudra prayag, dev prayag) on the way, and were looking at the beautiful river sangams (Alakananda, Dhauliganga, Mandakini, Pindar and Bhagirathi), the Ram jhoola and Lakshman Jhoola. We stopped at many places taking pictures. We had lunch and again the journey continued. As we were approaching Auli, we could see different Mountains of our Himalayas. We saw the Elephant Mountain (hathi pahad), Trishul Mountain, Nandadevi Mountain, and Mountain near valley of flowers (don’t remember all names). We saw the Joshimath, Tapovan, Bhavishy Badri on the way.

We reached Auli around 6pm. The GIO team was ready with an awesome tea and pakora, which made all our journey tiredness to just disappear in one spot. The rooms were too good, had very good dinner and sleep. 

Day2 - Auli to Tali

The early morning in Auli with all the snowcapped mountains around and had a beautiful view of sunrise from a garden with all flowers. It is a very peaceful place and a good place to spend holiday time. After a good breakfast of puri, cornflakes, egg burji, bread butter and tea we started… A small journey of 15 mins in the tempo, we reached the starting point of the Trek. We are geared up with our Rucksacks, walking sticks, cap, water bottles,  we started our trek with Ropeway.

This was an open ropeway with only support for the legs and this was my first ropeway experience and that too open it. It was soo exciting sliding in the air and taking selfies in Ropeway with Pavani :P. We started walking, walking, and climbing. We were not aware of destiny also. We walked through the roads, hills, meadows, rocks.. There was already a good lunch prepared for us and was served in the middle of the trek. Again walking, walking… the route was turning out more and more beautiful. The mountain ranges just beside, the green grass and hills around. There was a narrow path where only 1 person can go through it and it was so dangerous that one wrong step, we fall so down and we are gone. The climate was sunny till then and suddenly it started raining, we all wrapped ourselves in raincoats. Initially we thought it was rain, but immediately it turned into a hailstorm rain. The force of hailstorms was too much and soon all the ground was filled up with white colored ice balls. We walked through it very fast, the meadows looked more beautiful in the rain and walking in it was exciting too. We could see the formation of snow then and there itself.. J we walked more in the rain and finally reached the place (Thali) were tents were setup. We were all shivering with sudden drop of temperature to 0 degree. The team has given us required material to warm up ourselves and also served hot tea. The team setup a bon-fire, it was too good to warm us up and our clothes too :P . We had a good Soup (many glasses of soups) and had dinner. We all went to our tents and put ourselves into the sleeping bags. I and Pavani in one tent started our stupid talks, previous tent experience in dandeli, jokes on variety of topics, Intra tent communication and disturbing others in the other tents. :P

Day 3 - Tali to Khulara

Waking up in the morning, we looked around the place where all the snow in the previous evening has disappeared and enjoyed the good sun. We were praying there should not be any rain that day J and yea stopped singing ( Barso re megha megha song ). We had a good hot breakfast and all the other tent people teasing us with the jokes and talk pavani and I had the previous night. (kada manasa…. Hhihihi). As per the team our today’s path is better and was lesser trek compared to yesterday to reach the next camp ( Khurala). So, we started walking again…: P. Glucovita helped us in regaining energy where ever possible. We had an awesome view of Pangarchula peak from long, the sheep in the meadows and various viewpoints where we had awesome pics. We all kept 2 letter shortnames which we were using to encourage to while climbing up.. It was soo funny calling each other with jhaaa, geeee, vaaa, paaa…. We were dancing on the hill with random songs. We had a long way through the rocks and we had to climb down to the rocks to reach our base camp. We had a good lunch and just went to tents to have a small nap, but the climate did not allow us to come out of tent again till dinnertime. It was raining continuously; the temperature was around -5 degrees centrigrade. We had dinner in the rain and were checking out the possibilities on the next day plan if it rains again L. We all hoped for a good clear climate the next day so that our main most difficult hike to Pangarchula peak would be possible

Day 4 - Khulara – Kauri Pass – Pangarchula - Khulara

Luckily we had a clear sky and so geared up as early as possible with minimum daypack possible to go to Kauri Pass and climb the Pangarchula peak. We again started walking and walking through the rocks. Today we had too much of climbing. We climbed and reached mini pangarchula point, which was a very nice view point and again continued to walk walk.. Our first sight of long block of snow filled in a lot of enthusiasm in us and started snow fighting.. :D. We went on, we had a point where we have to cross through the snow to reach the top. The team taught us how to walk through the snow and made us through it. The team also made us slide through it on legs and it was too good balancing on foot and sliding through it. We walked and crossing snow became easier, we made a path by ourselves like football kicking and walking with heels, toes, sideways as per the snow. We had different awesome crazy pictures in the snow. We continued walking through the view of valley on oneside, the peak on other side. The oxygen levels were becoming lower, the snow started to increase, the way we walked and when we just looked back at it, it turned into snow. We were amazed just seeing the flow of water turning into snow in front of our eyes. The place seemed more dangerous as we were unable to see the people just infront of us as the fog covered them off. Coming down of the hill was too easy and fun. We all did snow sliding and our backs and hands became numb. We slided a lot and lot and realized all the climbing effort we did and just got down so fast. We reached down had our lunch with very nice leg pains :P. We had a bonfire again and sat around it sharing our experiences, jokes, seeing pictures. Had a sound sleep that day because of too much tiredness. The main most imp day of the trek was over and next is to return back.

Day 5 - Khulara – Auli

We decided to start early as possible so that we can go to badrinath that day. We all had a good breakfast with upma, oats, bread butter jam and started. We all had too much confidence this day and today was only getting down and no climbing. It became so easy for us today and none of us were taking the actual path and started taking shortcuts through the rocks. The climate was too hot today, the way was easier but since most of it was getting down, there was a lot of pressure on the toes and knees. We continued walking and reached a small village and had to cross that village, walk more. We also walked through the way that had landslides. The sun made us more tired and there was a temperature change of –ve to too much sun. We all reached a point where tempo picked us up and reached Auli. The picture of our trekking team after the trek was so funny. All of us were very tired, tanned faces, leg pains, sleepy and happy :D. We could not go to Badrinath as it was already late and we all sat in a room playing Mafia. The game turned out to be too addictive and we continued it till dinner. :) We all decided to getup at 3am next day to cover Badrinath and reach Auli the next day.

Day 6: Auli – Badrinath – Auli – Haridwar

As planned for target time of 4am to start, I started like a warden calling out ppl, waking them up and finally started at 4:30am. The path to badrinath was too dangerous. We could see all the damaged hills and road because of the floods. Our driver was an awesome one who drove very well where there were sharp turns. We reached badrinath, it was soo cold and had good pictured again :P and went to darshan of Lord Narayan. We had breakfast and started back. We again played mafia in the bus, shared our experiences, had farewell speeches and so on. Got new names for me as: EnthuCutlet, energetic candidate :D We all departed and each of us had different plans and so me and pavani reached Haridwar, had dinner and again to Haridwar railway station :)

Day 7: Haridwar - Delhi – Hyderabad

With all tiredness and sleeplessness, waiting in Haridwar station for that train, almost sleeping at wherever possible. The train arrived we setup things asap and had a sound sleep. Reached Delhi, got freshened up. We went to Jurassic Park 2 movie, as there was time for the flight, next to Delhi’s Deloitte office and then to airport. I was so sleepy that I slept whenever found place and time. We reached Hyd and Pg at 8pm and then immediately slept off.

Finally our adventurous trip turned out awesome with different experiences with:

Awesome friend of mine Pavani, the cool sweet Geethanjali, my partner Vani, caring and helping Jahnavi, the co-ord Sai Krishna, the two bros and photographers of the trip Aditya and Jagan, the GIO main team: Jaichand, Ameen, Bhuvan and Vijay