Where the Yamuna is young

( The title is a take on the great travel adventure "Where the Indus in Young" by Deverla Murphy)

This travel piece appeared in the EPW with a few (crucial) lines dropped.

Kamal Valley

The bus leaves Purola carrying daily commuters, and makes its way up the valley of the Kamal at a measured pace hugging the curves of the smooth road. I look out on a remarkably wide valley dotted with neat habitations amidst green fields of wheat and jawar. Seated next to me, a soft spoken pahadi patiently answers my questions. The driver plays a melodious Garhwali song and I can picture a slow rhythmic harvest dance. 

My phone rings and it is Rana inquiring. I feel welcome in the hills.

I got acquainted with Rana in Dehradun yesterday after we both missed the last bus to Purola. Rana was as desperate as me to avoid spending the night in the city, so I decided to tag along, trusting him, a local, to get me out. After a fruitless afternoon scouring shared taxi stands we finally got lucky. Rana recognized the driver of a charter bus speeding past us in Vikas Nagar and managed to get it to stop. The bus was headed straight for Purola!

Saur Village just off Sankri

 On a wet evening the large vehicle hurtled along a treacherous road at great speed following the Yamuna upstream. At a dinner stop, after having his glass of the local brew, Rana became positively friendly. Back on the bus, he called up and made arrangements for my night stay in Purola and instructed the driver on where I should be dropped. Before I could protest, he had paid my fare and hopped off the bus at a fork before Purola.

That was last night. Rana called again just now to check if I made the morning bus to Sankri!

Sankri is the start of a trail to a valley in north Uttarakhand with the enticing name Har ki doon. My plan is to walk this trail for the next few days, halting the nights at wayside Garhwal Mandal Vikas Nigam (GMVN) guest houses.

My trek begins earlier than anticipated because of a landslide a few km short of Sankri. Just beyond Sankri, I meet two men – caretakers at GMVN guest houses, it turns out - headed in the opposite direction to collect their salaries after a delay of 6 months! I part with an assurance that their absence will not cause a problem for me. I reach the guest house at Taluka village cold and wet after walking barefoot through several icy streams and braving rain and hail.

The next day, the trail follows the Har ki doon Gad (stream), passing below villages located precariously on the hill slopes. Terraced fields of wheat and mustard extend to impossible slopes and dizzy heights, adding dashes of brilliant yellow and green to the drab brown and grey.

Turning a blind corner on a ledge above the river, we get our first dramatic view of the village of Osla perched high up on the other side.  Below the village, the mountain drops steeply into the river; above it, it presents a sheer rock face. Why are the villages located at inaccessible heights rather than near the river bank, I ask Kamal, a young man from Taluka who is accompanying me? His intriguing answer is that in the past, this helped the villagers to secure themselves against raids by local kings!

Soon we reach the settlement of Seema, across the river from Osla. Jainder Singh’s dhabha opposite the guest house looks the livelier place and I make myself comfortable by his chullah. Villagers stop by for warmth and conversation and the evening passes amiably in the company of simple people. The dinner tastes especially good after I have been witness to the labor that has gone into its preparation.

Forest rest house, Har ki doon

A hard third day’s trek, the last part crunching snow, brings us within view of the colorful forest rest house in Har ki doon. Sticking out of the snow in the shadow of a gigantic boulder set against a steep mountain face, it has a fairy tale look. There is still an hour’s plodding now through knee deep snow before we reach the GMVN guest house. Pavani, the canteen contractor at Har ki doon has himself just gotten there and is trying to get a fire going. It starts snowing and turns bitterly cold. For the rest of the evening, I am obsessed with trying to keep warm.

By the next morning, there is an amazing turnaround outside. I look out on a clear blue sky and the sharp outline of Swargarohini stretching nearly 3 km above us. Like in most parts of the Himalayas, there is a Mahabharata association here too. Swargarohini, in local legend, is the ‘stairway to heaven’ climbed by Yudhishtar, the eldest of the Pandavas.

A forest of pine borders either side of a gentle meandering stream. The grassy mountain slopes on closer look reveal the brown giving way to green. Numerous flowers - yellow Dandelion, Marsh Marigold, and blue Gentian - have sprung up in anticipation of spring. Pavani informs me that but for the abnormal wintry conditions, it would have been impossible to sleep this late in the morning because of the chatter of birds with as he puts it, their "108 boli" (108 tongues).

Good weather and a descending trail make the return walk a relaxed affair. Near Osla, women in colorful attire are readying the fields for the next crop of phafra, a local grain. At the satellite phone center curious little children, dressed in layers of grey-brown and wearing pretty headscarves gather around us.

Osla hugs a steep hill slope and has streets at several levels. The houses are multi-storied and follow a pattern. The ground floor is used for cattle and sheep and above it is the family residence with an overhanging balcony. Right on top are the lofts for storing wood. Kamal points to separately housed silos that stock family grain and other rations to last the harsh winter.

We stop at the village temple, a stark reminder of how far local beliefs can differ from the dominant ones. The temple is dedicated to Duryodhana! The deity is shared with several other temples in this region, moving between them according to a customary schedule, I learn.

 The return walk to Taluka along the Har ki doon Gad is memorable. We walk past the beautiful fields of green and yellow. It is early morning and birds abound. Drongos sit companionably in the trees. Dippers squat on the rocks midstream. Redstarts perform acrobatics, showing off their brilliant colors. A majestic Lammergeir glides low over the water. Blue sky, warm sun, the sparkling river and birds of so many hues, nature invites to come again.

On crosswords

A good piece of writing on crosswords by S V Venugopalan

the-craft-behind-crossing-swords-with-crosswords

On a pilgrim trail

Our trek starts at Lohajung, a small town in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand, north of Almora and Kausani. For much of the next week, we will walk the trail of the Nanda Devi Raj Jat Yatra. The yatra organized once in 12 years symbolizes, for the faithful, the return of devi Nanda to Kailash after her visit to her mait (maternal home). The yatra takes pilgrims right up to the base of the Trisul massif at the edge of the Nanda Devi sanctuary. This ancient trail has been ‘rediscovered’ by trekking enthusiasts.

The path we take descends to a valley floor past terraced hillsides and patches of forest. The fields, their shapes dictated by the contours of the land, display crops of wheat, maize and potatoes. Horses graze in separate pastures. 

Ali Bugyal

Trim houses - made of stone and often double storied, with wooden windows and doors and slate roofs – stand scattered about. Narrow concrete channels lead down the hill slopes to water storage tanks in the fields. On a bright summer morning it is a pretty country. Reaching the floor of the valley, we cross a stream and climb up to halt at the village of Didina.

The next day, we start on a climb through a forest of Oak and Rhododendron to get to the bugyals - grassy meadows above the tree line - located above Didina. Deep inside the forest, I come across a group of young girls wearing colourful clothes, earrings and nose studs, and with sacks slung around their shoulders accompanied by an older woman. They greet me with a polite namaste and are not shy to talk but firmly refuse to be photographed. They have come to collect jhoola (lichen) in the forest. I later learn that the lichens from this area are procured by pharmaceutical and perfume industry and even exported.

Ali Bugyal

We emerge from the tree line on a grassy mountain slope with brilliant blue sky for a backdrop. I climb up to the ridge for a 360 degree view. The incredibly beautiful expanse of Ali bugyal unfolds to the north, stretching as far as the eye can see, its surface lovingly sculpted by the elements. 

Nanda Ghunti seen from near Bedni Bugyal

 In the distance, shiny black buffaloes make their way in single file over the pale green tinted silver grass, with no herder in sight. We have a long exhilarating walk over the length of the bugyal with grand views of mountain, cloud and sky.

The next day, the early morning sun lights up the great Himalayan snow peaks in full view of our camp at Bedni Kund. I recognize the fortress like Chaukhamba massif, the unmistakable pyramid shape of Neelkant standing sentinel over Badrinath and the pretty Nanda Ghunti (the veil of Nanda) standing so close. But most dramatic of all is the view from the trail of the knife edge ridge of Trisul rising majestically in waves to the pinnacle over 7000 m high.

The trail now is a paved stone path, visible over great distances. During the yatra, an endless line of pilgrims in colourful raincoats, and carrying staves, umbrellas and kitbags would be making its way over it. Now, it appears as a thin tear on the green paint of the hills. Below us, a huge flock of white sheep in perfect V formation moves over a bugyal. The shaggy sheep dogs wear metal collars with jagged edges; the danger from the baag (leopard) is real.

 We camp at the Pather Nachauniya (dancing stones) campsite. The graphic names of places along this trail are all part of the folklore of the Nanda Devi yatra. A fierce storm that evening that nearly blows away our tents serves to remind us of the violence that nature is capable of here in the lap of the Himalayas.

Trishul looming over the trail

The trail onward ascends a cliff, at the top of which is a little shrine dedicated to Ganesh with a black idol, appropriately named Kalu Vinayak. We have left the bugyals behind. The landscape is now bleak and the hillsides are covered with loose stones and streaked with snow.Dark clouds have descended to hide the mountain tops. Our next campsite, Baguwa Basa is set in these chilling surroundings.

We start walking at the crack of dawn. The trail climbs a mountain face, crossing several steeply angled snow fields. The hard and crunchy snow must be negotiated very carefully a step at a time; a slip will mean an uncontrolled slide down a slope whose bottom we cannot see. After a tense climb we reach the edge of a large crater set against a jagged wall of rock rising into the sun. The crater bottom, now partly in shade, is translucent ice with a sprinkling of snow. We have reached the famous Roopkund, a spot on every Himalayan trekker’s wish-list.

I climb a snow covered slope beside the crater halfway to the ridge line. Trisul rises over two km above where I stand, appearing as an inverted cone of rock and snow from this angle.

Trishul from Roopkund

During the yatra, pilgrims, many barefoot, climb the ridge to descend on the far side at the foot of Trisul. But this is as far as I will go. The return journey is already weighing on my mind; the snow on the slopes would have started to melt making the path slippery. I reach camp at Bedni Kund late afternoon, exhausted and feverish.

The walk down from Bedni is a relaxed affair. I get talking to Raju, a tailor from Lohajung, who has been ferrying our supplies on his khacchars (mules). He has lovingly named them Bunty and Babli, names to which they respond. They have large bells and colourful collars around their necks. They are loyal and can find their own way on the trails, he tells me with obvious pride.

At a clearing, we come across a man resting taking in the grand view; a backpack lies beside him with a small solar panel and an umbrella trussed to it. Umrao Singh has been camping in the higher reaches of the bugyals for several days collecting keeda jadi, a kind of caterpillar killed and mummified by a fungal infection. The jadi is prized in China as an aphrodisiac and for its use in Chinese and Tibetan traditional medicine and somehow finds its way across borders. Umrao shows me one keeda from the precious handful he has collected. That one alone could be worth a couple of hundred rupees!

Our last halt before the trek ends at Vaan village is at the small temple of Latu devta set under a beautiful clump of Deodhar trees. Latu devta, in folklore, is the adopted brother of Nanda devi. The great yatra stops here on its way up so that Latu can escort Nanda to Kailash.


This is my second travel piece published by EPW