First trek in Himalayas: Valley of flowers and Hemkund Sahib

These are the views which Valley of flowers and Hemkund Sahib that soothed my eyes in August. 

Hemkund Sahib

Carpet of flowers

I had strong desire to visit valley of flowers from 2011 after seeing some stunning pics on Facebook of friends album. 2012 went as 1st year in job, 2013, the disastrous floods and 2014 it was closed. In 2015, working on weekend in office in July, a sacrilegious sin, I hatched a plan to cover valley of flowers and came to know Hemkund Sahib can also be done in the same trip. I did some background research sitting in office and I decided to go with IndiaHikes. It will be a honest review of IndiaHikes as I was going for the first time through them and neither I knew anyone in my friend circle who had opted for IndiaHikes.

Searched air tickets and I got a good deal on Air Vistara tickets from Hyderabad, same price band as the low cost flying carriers and coupled with credit card, got a pretty amazing deal three weeks prior to the trip. Train tickets were booked onwards from New Delhi to Haridwar. With some shopping of clothes and medicines done, I was all set for the trip.

8th August:

Hyderabad had cool weather early morning and I requested my cab driver to not switch on the AC. Zipped through Hyderabad and reached airport. Air Vistara has brand new aircrafts and it is divided into three sections, namely business, premium economy and economy. I always opt for back seats of plane as thrust experienced is maximum and you get uninterrupted view. The food served onboard was exemplary and we landed at T3, IGIA. Moved to aero express line. As I soon I stepped from the metro railway station, it was so humid, that the five minute walk from aero express line to Ajmeri gate side of New delhi railway station exhausted me. I was carrying a backpack and I was sweating as if I am in coastal area of India. As I was carrying my luggage at station, I chanced upon seeing the board of IRCTC executive lounge and checked in. At lounge, my two and half year old Nexus 4 started misbehaving and it gave me jitters for some time. After some relaxing, I checked out and boarded 12055 New Delhi- Haridwar JS which started bang on time. Crossed western Uttar Pradesh and entered Uttarakhand, the land of Devbhoomi. Haridwar was a complete mess due to some festival going in the city. I had booked a dorm through IRCTC at station itself and it was manageable for me to stay at the same as my transport to Govind Ghat which was arranged by IndiaHikes was to start from Haridwar Railway station. The railway dorms are decent place to retire for night for as low as 100INR. 

9th August:

After contacting the transporter of IndiaHikes at 0600 hours in morning, I reached our tempo traveller. We started around 0730 hours as five trek mates train got late. Due to some coordination issues between IndiaHikes and the transporter, we six people had whole tempo traveller for us. More on how we negotiated with them regarding the sharing of cost of the tempo traveler for six people at the end of travelogue. We were till 0900 hours in Haridwar city itself due to huge traffic jam. Since reaching Rishikesh was impossible due to festival, it was decided by driver to enter Uttar pradesh and back to Uttarakhand skirting Najibabad and going through Kotdwara, Satpuli and Srinagar to get back to our original route. Once we left Kotdwara, the route became scenic and we were gulping miles till we joined our main route at Govindghat at 1600 hours. It was race against time as commercial transport is not allowed in Uttarakhand after 2000 hours. Seeing the snow line of Himalayas for first time en route was blissful experience. Innumerable landslides had occurred and one looked to cleared just two days prior. We reached Joshimath at 2015 hours and were stopped by police. After much pleading we were allowed to go ahead to Govindghat while a private car from Delhi was not allowed as it was land slide prone area. We reached  Govind ghat at 2100 hours. We stopped only twice during entire journey due to risk of spoiling our trek on first day itself.

Our camp leader, gave a introduction of himself, told us do’s and don’ts and collected non disclosure and medical forms from us. They advised us to take our last bath at GovindGhat itself as people in batch before us took bath at Ghangria and fell ill. We were 14 people in the batch from varied background. From now on India Hikes is taking care of us. We had a good dinner nearby where we were placed and trek starts form tomorrow. 

10th August:

We started early at 0700 hours from our hotel to our base village Ghangria. I was carrying my 11 kg back pack with me. We got ourselves registered near the main arch of valley of flowers and then we continued our 14km trek to Ghangria. The main leader trekked ahead while sweeper of IndiaHikes was behind me all the time. We would be gaining an altitude of 3000 feet in course of 14km. We saw few Tata Sumos going up on the road. Later we found out that the Tata Sumos go till 3 kms to some village. We all started slowly as we were getting acclimatized to the hike and slowly we covered 3km motor able stretch. Then the trail narrowed and we were continuously climbing big stretches of up gradient followed by small but insignificant descents. We covered 7 kms by 1030 hours and they had arranged our lunch at the midway hotel. 

The lunch was pretty decent and tasty. We started around 1130 hours. After lunch, carrying a 11 kg backpack was the toughest part of trek. After one kilometer, we all had a good time besides the bank of Laxman Ganga. After may be 8 km or 9 km mark, the trail started climbing steeply to Ghangria. We were gaining height very fast and after 11 km, I felt the drop in temperature. I was dead carrying my back pack and had fallen last in the group. The sweeper of India Hikes then carried my back pack and I carried his light back pack. After too much huffing, we finally reached the helipad of Ghangria at 1630 hours. The 600 meters board looked deceptive as we took half hour to walk to Ghangria. We all were dead tired. IndiaHikes put us at some under construction hotel at Ghangria. The walls of some rooms were damp and we had to raise our voice so that we had our quilts and bedsheets changed as we felt it was damp. We had good dinner and slept early.

11th August:

Today, we were trekking to Valley of flowers. Since we had trekked 14km and our body had got acclimatized at 9000 feet, this 4 km trek to valley of flowers was not that tough for us. We started around 0700 hours from our hotel. The trail was medium grade and thankfully no mules on this route. The weather was cool in the morning and we crossed many temporary man made bridges. And finally, we reached the valley of flowers. Below are few HDR pics from my modest phone Nexus 4.

Climbing the 4 km trail to Valley of flowers

The trail to valley of flowers

Photosphere pic of valley of flowers

                                              Tomb of botanist Margaret Legge

The valley of flowers had opened after two years. Though the flowers had bloomed, the pop or carpet was missing this year. I walked the extra mile and visited the grave of Margaret Legge, the botanist who documented all the flowers at 11000 feet. Unfortunately, she slipped and died in this valley. Roamed the valley for two odd hours. The misty fog was scaring us but it used to clear in few minutes. But around 1300 hours, the mist was thick and we could see clouds were coming towards us. Our India hikes team lead told us that the weather was deteriorating and told us to descent. It started raining and I took out my poncho. The path had become slushy and some people were slipping on that path. After descending some 2000 feet, the weather cleared up. We reached Ghangria at 1530 hours. Relaxed at the hotel. 

The previous batch of IndiaHikes completed Hemkund Sahib and we lit a bonfire in the verandah of the hotel. The team lead of that batch was taking active participation and our team lead was dead tired and slept in his room. We had a good time with other batch. After covering so many kms in span of 2 days, the pain in the legs had started to disappear. I kept on drinking loads of water. Everything is sold at double rate in Ghangria due to lack of road to this area. Again slept like a log as tomorrow was going to be toughest day of trek.

12th August:

Hemkund Sahib is the pilgrimage site for Sikhs and a Gurudwara is present at a height of 14500 feet. It is accessed by a very tough 6 km trail. We woke up at 0530 hours, I quickly freshened up, had breakfast and carried some lunch given to us by IndiaHikes. The trail is very steep with no flat surface anywhere. After climbing some 2.5 kms, I could see the trail of Valley of flowers which we took yesterday. I was around 12000 feet. I had crossed the tree line and could hear the chants of reading Guru Granth Sahib. At my pace, I would be reaching Hemkunt Sahib around 1230 hours. I didn’t want to miss out all the views from the top and wanted to spend some time at the lake. Took a pony midway for 400 bucks and reached top at 1045 hours. I had some hot tea and dal Kichdi at langar which felt something like out of heaven. Few people from my group had reached the Hemkund and were contemplating taking a dip in the lake. I just dipped my hands and feet in the lake and it was bone freezing cold. Four to five people finally took courage and dipped themselves in the lake. They came out as quickly as they went inside the lake. We visited the Gurudwara and after climbing a small hill overlooking the lake, we got some good views whenever the weather cleared up. The high point of the trek was at this point that we felt we have have achieved something remarkable and the effort to reach this place is worth every penny. Since at such altitude, there is chance of getting hit by altitude mountain illness, I decided to descend down at 1300 hours. 

Few pics taken from Nexus 4:

Steep trail to Hemkund Sahib

The serene lake at the top fed with glacial waters

Yours truly.

Valley of flowers trail is in opposite mountain

The descend was again painful and exerted too much pressure on toes. Then I decided to descend sideways by putting pressure on side. And lo, I had a side tear in my shoes. It took me 3 hours to descend at a leisurely pace as weather had not deteriorated like yesterday. The feeling of waking on flat land after 3 hours is something which I can’t describe. Again we had a good dinner, lit a bonfire, shared some crazy stories and then went to bed as tomorrow was last day of our trek.

13th August:

I am not that much interested in dev bhakti and I planned to go to Auli instead of Badrinath. Started around 0730 hours from Ghangria by thanking cook who served us some excellent food for three days. Raced down like anything as target was Auli, a ski resort. By 1000 hours, I was halfway. Took some rest at a hotel where I had lime water. Started the race to Govindghat. The shoes which I had side tear were giving tugging along with me. Reached Govindghat and then came bad news of landslide. The previous group had not left the hotel where IndiaHikes had put us. The landslide was very bad as the team lead of our group went till the point of landslide as it was just 1km from our hotel. IndiaHikes advised our group to leave Govindghat as there is less possibility of road opening again. 

We 12 people took collective decision to leave that day itself. We got news of one more landslide. And there goes my plan to reach Auli down the drain. It was decided to halt midway at Rudraprayag.

We started in same tempo traveller as we were still haggling the price for 6 people from Haridwar to Govind Ghat 9th August. We covered some kilometers quickly and at 2000 hours, we were at Rudraprayag. The hotel was overlooking the river Alaknanda. 

14th August:

I had a good sleep at that place and then we started for Rishikesh. Rishikesh was reached at 1230 hours. We did some haggling with tempo traveler fellow as it was not our fault that 6 people had to pay 11500 INR for transport, the extra 1500 as we took some long route. The return was flat 10000 INR which we 12 people settled without fuss. After some calls, we six people who traveled by this tempo on 9th August paid 6500 INR which I felt was reasonable. We told the tempo traveller guy to take remaining money from IndiaHikes as they had cancellations and six people were given a tempo traveler due to it. I visited Laxman Jhula at Rishikesh. Since I had to board early morning train at Haridwar, decided to give Ganga Aarti a miss and headed to Haridwar. 25 kms took some 1.5 hour due to three railway crossings. Checked into hotel, rearranged my stuff in back pack went to sleep.

15th August:

Independence day. Took 12056 DDN NDLS Janshatabdi from Haridwar at 0620 hours. Reached NDLS at 1120 hours. Forgot to take my trekking pole from trains rack, realized it when I sat in airport metro express. Spent time at Delhi T3 reading book. Caught flight to Hyderabad at 1730 hours and reached home by 2100 hours.

I had a good time throughout the trek. It was my first experience with the mighty Himalayas. Planning Rupin Pass next year which will be done. One Himalayan trek every year from now on.