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Published: August 18th 2008
Arrival into Haridwar, confirmed our idea that we were well and truly ‘over’ Indian towns. Hardiwar was absolutely jammed packed with people, most of which had come to do their pilgrimage to the sacred waters of the Ganges.
Haridwar is an interesting enough place. The Ganges properly begin here and thousands and thousands of devotees and pilgrims come to the sacred ghats to take a holy dip in the waters. It also attracts beggers, sadus (holy men - easily spotted in their orange robes, slightly wild eyes and hair down to their backsides) people with deformities and everything else in between. The crowds of people lining the river made an amazingly colourful and overwhelming sight. I wish I could have photographed everything. The photos would have been stunning but it didn’t quite feel right to take photos of people taking part in religious ceremony.
In the evenings we made our way to the more quiet parts of the river banks and watched families lighting fires, putting ashes on their face, before dipping in the waters and setting their floating candles and offerings off down river. It was pretty amazing and felt quite peaceful.
Our whole reason for coming
up to Haridwar, was not for the Ganges, but for the mountains. Our destination was to be the Valley of Flowers, a world heritage site that we had read about a few years ago in, you guessed it ‘1001 Natural Wonders to See Before you Die’
The Valley of Flowers came to the attention of the world in the 1930s when a botanist camped here and wrote a book about the area. This high-altitude Himalayan valley is a bit of an effort to get to by public transport, so we arranged a Government driver in Haridwar for six days and set off on the drive of our lives!
Organizing a driver for this six day stint was one of the best decisions we have made in India. Unfortunately, the best time to see the valley in full bloom is July and August. This is also monsoon season and the whole area is really prone to landslides.
We set off from Haridwar and it wasn’t long before we hit our first landslide in the forest beyond Rishikesh. This was to be the first of many, in a ten hour road journey that was absolutely breath taking. We passed
Engaged!
Set the camera on self-timer in case you're wondering!through forest, plains, terraced paddy fields, packed little villages and spectacular waterfalls. At times the road was wide enough for one vehicle to pass and crash barriers to stop motorists from plunging over the cliffs were non-existent! This of course being India, the driving was appalling. The nastiest blind corners, the biggest drops down to rivers - hey what a great place to overtake! That seemed to be the opinion of the massive old trucks and the rickety buses. For awhile I played “spot the person vomiting out the bus window” but that lost it’s novelty after the first few hours.
The final two hours were the most impressive as we entered mountain country. The tiny roads cut into the side of the mountains and as the darkness grew and the mists came down - things became even more spectacular and quite frightening! Hundreds of metres below us, sharp rocks and huge flowing rivers - Hundreds of metres above us, loose rocks, waterfalls and peaks surrounded by cloud. We didn’t know which way to look but at one stage I covered my eyes and told Chris to wake me up when it was all over!
We finally made
it to Joshimath in the dark. We booked into our Government Guest House (simple but cheap) and ate a Government Dinner (‘plain’ but cheap). Our driver arranged to meet us at 6 am the following morning for our drive to the start of the trek up to Gangria. We had a Government shower (luke warm) and fell asleep in our Government beds (hard).
The following morning we set off through the ‘Valley of the Gods’ to Govindghat where we hired a porter to carry our packs up the 14km pilgrim track to Gangria. We stumbled over the swing bridge and finally set off! Interestingly enough, the first 3 or so km of the trek is lined with dope plants! Thousands of them, some about 6 foot tall. Weed is literally a weed over here and just grows wild. Now that’s not something you see everyday!
The Valley of Flowers is also located near a very important Sikh temple and lake called Hem Kund, so the path up to Gangria is used by thousands of Sikh pilgrims. It was amazing to see the determination of the old people making the pilgrimage. Dressed in their traditional clothes, orange turbans covered
in plastic to stop the rain, some had swords strapped to their sides - a few even completed this 14km trek in bare feet! They were really sweet, especially the oldies. So many of them talked to us and complete strangers gave us sweets and glucose power which I thought was something dodgy at first!! (Naive I know, think I’ve been in Richmond too long).
Not everyone completed the trek on foot. Hundreds of donkeys and mules stumble up the path too, carrying huge loads. Many of the people they were carrying were in their twenties and smugly rode past the struggling oldies. I felt so sorry for the tiny donkeys (covered in girth galls and saddle sores) but at least there was some attempt to match the load size to the size of the animal.
Chris and I do a lot of walking so we completed the first 8 km’s without a problem. We made very few stops to rest and kept a good pace up the track. At about the 8km mark, I experienced something I haven’t had since I was a tubby ten year old. I ‘hit the wall’ and felt absolutely stuffed!
I
Half-way there
Just before the altitude sickness hit felt like I was scuba diving and the oxygen flow was only half open. Until now, I had always thought that altitude sickness was just an excuse for bad fitness. Now I know the effect of altitude is real! From then on, every step was exhausting and to make matters worse, the last 3 kilometres was the steepest.
Still we kept trudging on, in the last few kilometres, we needed to have a short rest about every 20 or so metres. Looking back, we were a bit silly to complete the first half the trek in such a hurry. We should have stopped to rest more, drink more and let ourselves get used to the altitude. We will have to remember this when we travel even higher up to Leh in the coming weeks.
Upon arrival at Gangaria, we found some ‘basic’ accommodation which consisted of a bed and a cold shower. Electricity was provided for 2 hours per day but we were given a candle and box of matches for free. Hot water came in a bucket for 60 rupees. Luxury!
It seems that no one is interested in sleeping in pilgrim camps. At 4am we
were woken with music, shouting and the sounds of people beginning the next 6km trek up to the Sikh temple. We tried to sleep for another few hours before heading out to the Valley of Flowers.
The Valley of Flowers was everything we expected. The track starts with a few kilometres of walking through forest and rivers. You pass by a receding glacier before entering the Valley proper.
What more can I say about the Valley of Flowers? I guess the name says it all. The valley covers nearly 90sq km but visitors can only see about 10 of it. The valley is feed by beautiful high waterfalls that trickle down to the raging river. It is towered on either side by giant mountains that are snow topped even in summer. The flowers were absolutely everywhere. Most of them small and delicate - but some areas were covered in carpets of pink and blue. It really is stunning and worth the effort.
One of the best things about the Valley, is the small crowds. Most people making the trip up to Gangria, are heading to the Sikh Temple and the entrance fee to the Valley of Flowers
keeps many out. After a few hours going “oohhh, ahhh, look at that one!” (flowers I mean, not tourists) we stopped next to a waterfall surrounded by stunning flowers. We sat taking in the scenery for awhile and ate chocolate.
Well now, I could stop here and not write anything about Chris’s marriage proposal, but I suppose if you have read all this then…
Let’s just say it was a perfect place for a happy moment. He confessed that he didn’t bring a ring because he knew that I would have found it hidden in the backpack (too true). The ring instead was a small red flower that he tied around my finger and we photographed as evidence!
The walk back to camp was awesome!
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Nicola
non-member comment
HURRAH
Congratulations!! All the very very best. Nic