Week 2 (Richikesh-Valley of Flowers-Richikesh)

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(before this post i would like to ask everyone to ignore the times that i have spelt 'woak' rather than woke in previous posts, thank you)

Haven't posted in a few days so i've decided to cover the whole of the last week in one post.

Having arranged to the Valley of Flowers on Tuesday morning (i think it was Tuesday, its very easy to lose track of the days here) myself, Steve, Ilona and Lyn all had an early night on Monday and i set my alarm for 3.30am :-/.

I got up at 3.55am grabbed my (thankfully) prepacked bag and shot out the door to meet the others and the car that we had paid 600 rupees each for to take us to the Valley. i needn't have rushed. After half an hour in the early morning drizzle the jeep rocked up, and we jumped in, feeling a bit damp.

We had been told in advance that 600 rupees got us a shared jeep which meant the driver took us 10 minutes down the road to a large and very busy (for 5am) Sikh temple, here we waited for another half an hour or so whilst the driver disappeared to find more customers needing rides.

A little background: The Valley of Flowers where were headed is a few kilometers away from a place called Hem Kund, a place of religious significance to Sikhs as one of their gurus meditated there in a previous life. To get to this temple you have to travel to a place called Govindghat and then trek 16km to Gangria from where you can travel to the temple or in our case the Valley of Flowers.

Once the driver found our companions for the trip the car contained 9 people, 4 older Sikh guys who didn't speak a word of English and 2 younger guys, one of which could just about communicate with us, we got the feeling that the 10 hour ride was going to feel particularly long. Which it did.

A little more background information: Monsoon = Landslides. Lots of landslides.

We headed off just as it was getting light, which was a relief as we knew from the guide that some parts of the ride there would be scary, like two wheels off the mountain scary. Lyn was having a particularly rough time, which continued for most of the trip, but it wasn't as bad as i expected, it seems we all went over all the 'what if's' and emergency drills/bear grylls survival techniques a few times in our heads but I'm happy to say (and i'm sure mum will be ever so happy to hear) that all wheels stayed firmly on the ground, unfortunately however, the rocks were less willing to stay firmly on the side of the mountain.

After a few hours we slowed behind a long line of traffic, unsure what had happened Steve, Ilona, Lyn and myself jumped out of the van and walked to nearer the front of the line of cars. It was clear there had been a landslide, but it was no more, a few bulldozers had cleared it and within 10 minutes we were moving again, happy with our good timing and that we weren't being held up. the happiness didn't last long though, after we had been traveling for about 6 hours in the hot, sweaty car we came to a stop again. This time it was big. I climbed onto the roof to have a look and about 300 meters ahead of us was a bolder, not a little bolder but a two man high, road wide and very solid looking bolder, surrounded by smaller (but still considerable) boulders. After about an hour they still hadn't reached the big one, after 2 hours they still hadn't reached the big one and after about two and a half hours there was an explosion. I jumped out of my skin and I'm pretty sure the others did too. We scrambled out of the car as about 20 Indian people came running past us away from the explosions which were still happening, there were about 8 in total and after they were over the boulder was reduced to a large pile of small boulder bits, unfortunately these took another 2 hours to clear and so we were stuck in the hot car with the two young guys who where getting closer and close to Ilona, which she didn't seem too happy about. After about 4 hours we started moving again and after a few smaller landslides that were generally cleared by hand or by guys with shovels we arrived at our destination. The 10 hour journey had taken 15 hours.

We got some food in Govindghat (at Nany's Restuarant :-) and headed for the nearest hotel, Steve and i shared a triple room and everyone passed out, ready to get up at around 8am the next morning so we could begin the 16km, 6-7 hour trek in the morning.

Just a little bit more background information for you: Before we left Richikesh we asked the tour operator how steep and difficalt the trek to Gangria would be, his reply, 'little little'.

(Expletive Deleted :-)

The trek turned out to be 98% uphill and 99% rough track or at one point large pebbly riverbank. It was tough going, probably the most exercise Ive done in years (granted i don't do much). Much of it was at a horrible angle and the path zig-zaged for miles. We managed to complete the trek in less than 5 hours (4h 50mins, an almost crippling achievement). We all went at our own pace, i just about managed to keep up with Steve and Ilona, sometimes dropping 5 minutes behind and catching up with them at their rest stops, Lyn had more trouble keeping up and decided to hire a mule to bring her up. We grabbed some food just as Lyn arrived, found a hotel and passed out, once again setting the alarm for a 8am breakfast.

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Th next morning i woke (Yay!) up, feeling surprisingly good. A little back ache but otherwise A-OK (considering i had just climbed a bliddy mountain).

The walk to the Valley of Flowers was not nearly as strenuous as the trek the previous day. We headed to the entrance, paid our entrance fee and headed in. The walk went through a section of forest and into the valley, before we reached the Valley of Flowers proper we had to cross over a small glacier and cross a section of river/big stream on a bridge made of a few logs and some metal sheets.

Then we reached the flowers, and it really was lovely. Although it was earl in the monsoon most of the Valley seemed to have flowered and we waked for about half an hour along a narrow dirt track through the flowers, here we reached a small cliff. Unsure of the way down Steve took one rather steep path down to the bottom and i took the other rather steep path down to the bottom, luckily (for me) i had reached the bottom where a river/big stream could be crossed on what i supposed is called a bridge, but doesn't really qualify. It was made of two small tree trunks, about as thick as a fist (my fist, so about 5cm) with 4 bits of old wood positioned like a 4 rung ladder. Ilona decided she didn't want to cross it, Lyn decided she didn't want to cross it, or even walk down the steep path to it, so me and Steve said goodbye and carefully crossed the 'bridge'.

We headed through he flowers for another half hour or so before we came to a smaller bridge (this one just two logs put together but which was much shorter so not a problem) and a little further on a section of stream with a glacier further up the side of the valley. We decided to walk up the stream for a while until we came to the glacier, we continued to walk up the glacier and found a large rock to sit on, get our breath back and enjoy the view of the valley, feeling brave we decided to fill our water bottles up with water from the stream (we could pretty much see exactly where the water was coming from and there wasn't any animals in the valley apart from birds and butterflies, and probably a few snakes but it seemed ok). After about 4 hours in the valley we headed out again and went shopping in the town and got some food before heading back to our rooms and passing out. Setting the alarm, once again, for an 8am start :-/

The next morning we got up and headed back down the mountain, getting down was much easier than coming up, by about 1000 times. Steve and Ilona shot ahead and i followed, after less than an hour i bumped into a boy i had met on the way up called Amandeep (quite a few people had managed to remember my name from the walk up). He decided to walk with me pretty much all the way to the bottom, he was good company but had damaged his leg on the walk up and he often needed to rest. The first time he suggested a rest i said i was going to continue on to meet my friends, and he decided to continue walking with me, after a while i noticed his leg and asked if it was ok, then he told me it was damaged but he said he didn't want to rest until i did. I could managed another 10 minutes or so before i flt bad for him and stopped. I know it sounds a bit bad, but i had set myself a time of 3 hours to get back down the mountain, and as it was so much easier going down than up i was pretty sure i could have done the whole walk without stopping, but my new Sikh friend was tough and managed to make it all the way to the end with just two or three breaks.

Once at the bottom i said goodbye to Amandeep and went to meet Steve and Ilona at Nany's Restaurant. They had practically run down the hill, partly because they wanted to do it within 3hours too but also because Ilona was feeling a little harassed by some of the men on the walk. They managed to do the walk in 2h 45mins whilst i clocked in at 3h 30m. Lyn was behind us and while we waited for her we went to check out the bus stop about a kilometer out of town. Here we found two french women who had been waiting for the bus for over an hour already. We went back to meet Lyn.

She was in Nany's so we all headed off to the bus stop together (i say bus stop, it was actually just the front of a mans shop where the buses apparently stopped) where we found the french women still waiting. We hung around in the burning sun for half an hour having been told a number of different things about the bus. We were told that it would be here soon, that it leaves in half an hour and that there wasn't one. After the half hour i headed to a nearby jeep and asked the passenger how much he was being charged to get to Joshimath, where we planned to stay the night. It was 40 rupees (about 60p) for the hour long ride so we grabbed the two french women and jumped into the car.

We arrived, found a hotel in the guide and headed or it, here we realised that we didn't have any money, i had a few hundred rupees, Lyn had a few and Ilona didn't have any, and all the cash machines in town were broken. Thankfully the Royal Bank of Steve was open so we could all afford to eat and get the shared jeep back at 4am the next morning :-/

The return journey was much like the outward journey, and by that i mean it was 15 hours long, a few big landslides had us held up for a few hours. Lyn had not come back with us, as it was raining on the morning we left and she didn't fancy traveling the mountain roads in the rain.

We got back to Richikesh in the evening and got our rooms (mine was a little grottier than my last one but still only 3 pounds a night :-) and i passed out, happy in the knowledge that i could have a lie in the next morning,

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I got back 2 days ago and have spent most of the time relaxing, reading and occasionally heading into town. Tomorrow i am heading to Shimla.

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