06 Jun

Sarchhu to Leh, Pangong Lake, and Back via Kashmir

By Ashish

First town where some civilization could be seen was Upshi which is basically a check post where we did not stop. Next stop at about 30 km was Karu which basically a military establishment just before Leh. We stopped a Karu for a late lunch and some tea and then soon proceeded to Leh which took about 1-1.5 hours. On the way to Leh one can see gorgeous mountain views with Indus flowing along the road.

Next, day we went to places around Leh such as Patthar Singh Sahab Gurudwara (पत्थर सिंह साहिब गुरुद्वारा), so called Magnetic Hill, Confluence of Janskar and Indus rivers, a Kali temple and a Buddhist temple, and one of the oldest monastery near Leh. The landscape near Leh is also dry, barren but mesmerizingly beautiful. Buddhist temple have special wheels called Maney ( माने) carrying the holy mantra “Om Many Padme hum” or “ओम माणी पद्मे हूं” which the devotees rotate.

Road to Leh Part 2 : Manali-Keylong-Sarchu

By Ashish

The entry to Sarchu was amazing. After crossing the curvy path of mountains and snow, one suddenly comes across a vast plain between the high mountains but with little snow cover. There are gorges on one side where a thin stream of Yunam river flows. These gorges have very strange formations which look like pointed erections, possibly caused by wind erosion. The place is bone dry with cracks appearing in the soil with little precipitation even in severe winter when temperatures plummet below -30 degC. However, the place is very windy with wind velocities possibly approaching 40-50 Km/hr making the temperatures feel subzero despite actual temperature being about 5-10 degC. Here, no one lives permanently except a few Army settlements. Reception of cell phone is nonexistent and one really need to live like nomads. We found a camping site where we stayed in the camps. These camps serve you food and bedding and some of them also provide toilets which is indeed a luxury at this place (exposing your bum to morning frost is no fun :) ).

A Road Trip to Enchanting Mukteshwar

By Mishri

With all the theoretical knowledge collected through blogs, we had few recommended names for our stay. We started having a look on hotels. First and the very pleasing one was MT- Mountain Trail. Ambiance/view here was awesome. After discussing about the tariffs we moved on to other hotels. We were more concerned for a captivating view rather than the tariffs. We went ahead to few more lodges along with PWD Guest house. But, we had already lost our hearts to MT. So we called back the manager and asked him to book 2 rooms for us.

We parked our car near the entrance of Mukteshwar temple and started taking a walk towards the main tourist attraction point “Chauli ki jali”. After putting in few efforts in climbing the rocks we finally reached on the top of the cliff. The cliff gave a splendid panoramic view of snow-white Himalayan ranges. Captured the “Orange- setting Sun”, did some archery. As it was getting late and the temperature started dropping with Sun, instead of going for Rock climbing we opted to just give a pose :)

Road to Leh – Kanpur to Manali (Part 1)

By Ashish

Next day, our plan was to reach Manali, another 450-500 km or so drive, but there were two routes: either via Chandigarh-Mandi-Manali or via Panota sahib-Nahan-Dharampur(Solan)-Sabhathu-Arki-Barmana-Mandi-Manali. These two routes meet near Surendernagar, but the first leg is what makes difference. We thought we wont travel through the plains and avoid the rush so we decided to go via Nahan. We started at about 9.30 which was a bit late, but nevertheless.. I don’t know whether it was a mistake: the road was bad for quite a bit but traffic wasn’t much with sparsely populated places and the scenes were gorgeous. Soon after Panota Sahib, the beauty of mountains started and we started working, busy with the our cameras or busy looking at the nature. Worst was to be the person driving the vehicle in this situation, for whom it was an excitement as it was his first real mountain driving experience and he did very well, 100/100. We reached Dharampur after driving for about 4-5 hours at about 2.30 pm and after covering about 175 km. Dharampur is a junction for people going towards Solan or Shimla from plains or Chandigarh/Delhi, so we faced a bit of crowd there. Had our lunch and then proceeded towards Sabathu and Arki. The roads in this stretch were basically state or district roads, traffic wasn’t much but roads weren’t good either. We couldn’t drive fast enough, and by the time we reached Darlaghat, to join NH-88, it was quite late, about 6 pm and we hadn’t traveled enough, almost 70km in about 3 hours. We realized that it would be tough to make it to Manali on the same day in good time. We then switched over and I started to drive, my first real experience of driving on mountains. However, the road towards Manali was good as except at some places, so not much of an issue. We could not much of scenery as it was getting dark, except the visible forest fire at certain places on the high hills.

Walking The Royal Mile

By Shubham

Each floor had a different theme of illusions. I liked the floor with 3D illusions the best. There were a lot of interactive illusions as well. And the best part? They encouraged you to touch everything! The Mirror Maze was also fun. My mom kept walking into the mirrors, and I finally had to go in and help her get out.

Valparai Series – Part 2

By Gita AM

The estates brought prosperity for the new settlers but ‘development’ also meant massive deforestation of once pristine forests with the attendant depletion of indigenous fauna and flora. In those days
of abundant natural wealth, this was not a matter of concern.

In recent times, the Nature Conservation Foundation – an NGO, has engaged the estates in a successful conservation programme to maintain wildlife corridors and regenerate the forest. Consequently, you never quite know who you might meet in and around those Valparai tea gardens!

केदार यात्रा: ऋषिकेश – रुद्रप्रयाग – केदारनाथ

By Vipin

आज सुबह करीब 2 बजे अलार्म बजने से पहले ही मेरी आँख खुल गयी, लगता था जैसे हमारे मच्छर मित्र भी चाहते थे कि…

Valparai Series – Part 1: An Introduction

By Gita AM

Green Hills has a restaurant that is dingy and uninviting but their food is delicious. Some of the home stays provide meals, some do not have this facility. There are several restaurants, food stalls and messes along the one and only main road where you can enjoy a cheap and delicious meal. Besides this there are umpteen bakeries serving hot snacks, cakes and locally grown tea. The problem arises for strict vegetarians who will not eat vegetarian food in a non veg establishment, and as we all know there are many such good folk not just in Tamil Nadu but all over India. I have seen only one place near the Gandhi Bus Stand – the Sabari Mess – which proclaims itself to be “Veg Only“. No personal experience but you can not go too wrong with the local food. We dined at the Plaza on the main road opposite the Police Station. It was consistently good with excellent service and spotlessly clean. For us, once we are on to a good thing, we are reluctant to experiment with something new so as with the home stay, the staff at Plaza now also treat us as long lost friends. I did notice a Mary Matha Mess in the adjoining building on the first floor which seemed to be popular. Mess in these parts means restaurant or a place where meals are served.

Scotland – Touring Edinburgh Castle

By Shubham

We were told that the Queen was coming to Edinburgh the next day, and the Palace was being spruced up. Since this was our last day in Edinburgh, we would be missing that (not that she was inviting us to tea or anything like that). We would, at best, have got to see her motorcade.

माता वैष्णोदेवी यात्रा भाग -५ (धनसर बाबा, झज्जर कोटली, कोल कंडोली)

By Praveen Gupta

हम लोग करीब नो बजे कटरा से १७ किलोमीटर का सफर तय करके बाबा धनसर पहुँच जाते हैं. सड़क से करीब २०० मीटर पैदल उतराई करके हम लोग बाबा धनसर के धाम पहुँच जाते हैं. यह क्षेत्र बहुत ही सुरम्य स्थान पर पहाडियों के बीच जंगल से घिरा हुआ हैं. एक छोटी सी झील हैं जिसमे एक झरना लगातार गिरता रहता हैं. एक और एक गुफा बनी हुई हैं जिसमे शिव लिंगम के रूप में भगवान शिव विराजमान हैं. झील में कहा जाता हैं की साक्षात् शेषनाग वासुकी विराज मान हैं. यंही पर ही उनका एक मंदिर भी बना हुआ हैं.पौरौनिक विश्वास हैं की जब भगवान शिव, माता पार्वती के साथ, उन्हें अमर कथा सुनाने के लिए अमरनाथ जी की गुफा की और जा रहे थे, तब भगवान शिव ने अपने नागराज वासुकी को यंही पर छोड़ दिया था. नागराज वासुकी एक मनुष्य के रूप में यंही पर रहने लगे थे. उनका नाम वासुदेव था. बाबा धनसर इन्ही वासुदेव के पुत्र थे. कंही से एक राक्षस यंहा पर आ गया था. और इस क्षेत्र के लोगो को परेशान करने लगा था. तब बाबा धनसर ने भगवान शिव की तपस्या की थी. भगवान शिव ने उनकी तपस्या से प्रसन्न होकर यंहा पर उस राक्षस का संहार किया था. बाबा के आग्रह पर भगवान शिव यंही पर विराजमान हो गए थे. यंहा पर स्थित झील पवित्र मानी जाती हैं. एक झरना लगातार प्रवाहित होता रहता हैं. इस झील में नहाना शुभ नहीं माना जाता हैं. कभी कभी इस झील के स्वच्छ जल में नागों की आकृति भी दिखाई देती हैं. हर वर्ष यंहा पर, महाशिवरात्रि के अवसर पर भगवान शिव और धनसर बाबा की याद में एक वार्षिक महोत्सव व मेले का आयोजन होता हैं .

Shimla – Kufri – Jakhu Temple and Back Journey

By Sushant Singhal

Early morning at around 6 o’ clock, when rest of the family members were still asleep, I attended to daily routine and then decided (as usual) to wander and acquint myself a bit with the geography of Shimla. The first important thing I discovered was the fact that you didn’t need to go through the Victory tunnel to reach other side of the town. The tunnel is for automobiles only (but you won’t get fined if you do venture into it). Even if you walk towards the Bus Stand, you would find lanes at your left side with very stiff heights to scale, which promise to leave you at other side of the hill i.e. Mall Road side. However, without going to the Mall Road side, I walked roughly 1 km. in the opposite direction of the railway station and discovered that I had reached Bus Stand. Well, I was as happy at my discovery as Vasco-de-gama must have been after discovering Bharat Varsh aka India! Regarding it enough achievement for the time being, I made a U-turn and arrived at the hotel. Since I didn’t find any group of pahadi girls singing as I often see in Hindi movies, I had to hum a song myself and that too without any tabla or dholak (no it was not Abida Parveen this time but someone else which I don’t remember! ) First rays of the Sun peeped into the room and blessed us with very exhilerating and invigorating feeling. Technically, these were not first rays of the Sun because when the Sun ascended high enough in the sky to defeat the hills and throw its rays directly into our room, our watch was already showing 8 a.m.

केदार यात्रा: दिल्ली – ऋषिकेश

By Vipin

दोस्तों जैसा कि आपको ज्ञात है पिछली गढ़वाल यात्रा विपरीत परिस्थितियों के कारण अचानक ही समाप्त करनी पड़ी. केदार हमेशा से ही मुझे बद्रीनाथ…

1 Thinairexpedition The adventure of driving to Leh and Pangong from Kargil

Really nice Asif. I am going to Leh–Ladakh this June, feeling excited already
2 B Chandramouli Experiencing the temple town of Puri, Oddisha

Hi. Thanks for sharing your experience. Kindly share the Panda's contact details on my email id and also the dakshina that can be paid to him.
3 Shivani शिव खोडी – SHIV KHODI

What a wonderful blog, written very precisely and informative. This blog will definitely help me to plan my trip to shivkodhi.
4 sunil kumar गौरी से वो मुलाकात व इकाकुला का हसीन समुद्र तट !

Very well written about Bhitarkanika .
5 rjnivah Andaman and Nicobar – Around Port Blair

Really enjoyed reading this detailed Port Blair itinerary—it nicely captures both the sightseeing and relaxed moments like Wandoor beach and Chidiya Tapu. The mix of history, nature, and local experiences…
6 armaan Andaman and Nicobar – Around Port Blair

Really enjoyed reading this, it feels like a well-paced and genuine travel experience rather than just a checklist. The mix of relaxed beach time, museums, and a bit of trekking…
7 Abhinandan Sharma Delhi to Nepal in my Honda City!!

Great post. Planning to take my Honda city there soon. Was not sure if i can take a sedan there.
8 Abhinandan Sharma Delhi to Nepal in my Honda City!!

Great post. Planning to take my Honda city there soon