Delhi – Kathgodam – Almora - Kausani – Ranikhet – Delhi (Part 1)

Trip notes from an exciting trip that happened by chance!

Sunday (20^th August 2006):

Rajat coaxed me into this one!

We were generally discussing the Bored of out daily routine Rajat told about what he wants to do and I was quite interested, we decide the Leh was our destination. Thanks to my pals who were already traveling to that location. We were meeting up with Saluja n Sharry @ RC’s place where we proposed the idea. RC was game as usual. The others had something up their sleeve so it was left to them to deicide upon and let us know later. We started our research, from blogs to write-ups to websites to books and finally devised a plan.

Saluja was not interested cause of him being bored by the hills because of his 4 years in God’s own land…Sikkim. No definite new of Sharry, he is to travel so he could not confirm anything as of yet.

Monday to Thursday: (ABC…kidhar jayenge?)

Now the thre of us sat down and started deciding, places which came up on the list were Auli, Lansdowne and Kausani. We zeroed on to Kausani cause of its remoteness and the season for travel.

Friday (25^th August):

Final list of the people 2 come

• RC a.k.a Ramit
• Tyagi a.k.a Rajat
• Puttar a.k.a Parveen
• Mohan a.k.a Me

Most of us decided on taking leaves for 31^st as well to have a four day weekend outing but for me n Puttar it was not possible cause of the CEO visit that week. We were deciding about the leaves when RC n Tyagi were researching on the place and mailing me the excerpts. Till all this time Puttar was not know to these to people.

Saturday (26^th August):

Me cought up in office big time, had to meet up with RC n Tyagi for the booking for KMVN (Kumaon Mandal Vikas Nigam) guest house but was not able to go with them due the time unavailability. RC n Tyagi got the place booked, 1900 for a suite with four beds for the four of us. Tyagi also engaged a travel agent for the train ticks, Ranikhet Expres which will take us till Kathgodam.

Thursday (31^st August):

Slogged like hell @ office and was getting late, had to take dad to the hospital but was not able to some how managed to leave office @ 8:00 PM when the train was @ 10:40 PM from old Delhi station. Puttar came to my place with me in the car. RC n Tyagi reached my place in RC’s car.

I book a taxi from the Mast Ram stand and it cost us 230 bucks from VV to the station. Good uneventful drive.

When we reached we were hungry, so cought up in Comesum to have bhojan. The chicken roll sucked BIG TIME! But the Chicken Biriyani was awesome! After food, we boarded the train to avoid any confusions. We entered our S3 only to find that it was S5….grrr.. then we searched for the real S3 and tmade ourselves comfortable there.

The train finally moved out of Delhi and Tyagi enjoyed mixing up with the chai wallas and tried his best to imitate them. Probably he has a bright future in chai delivery business. After these guys discussed the optimal route I was pondering…kitna masti kar rah hun main. A lady in the coach joins RC and Puttar and tells them the places around. Me send a few important SMSes and as usual pulling other people’s legs.

Sleep time.

Night:

We were enjoying the dreams but @ 12:30 AM the TT uncle decides to check our tickets. He switched the light and then very causally leaves. We manage to catch some one to switch it back off so that we can go back to our dreams after the interval.

Morning (1^st September): in the chook chook gadi

I got up earlier than others and after brushing and washing my face sat @ the window seat to enjoy the outset of the hilly region. The foothills were amazing and we reached Haldwani @ around 05:30 AM.

We met our first travel enthu guide here. After half n hour and traveling @ 5 kmph the train reached Kathgodam, the drivers gathered around us to give us the best deals possible from 500 to 2000 :D

After much negotiating we decide to take an Alto. He settled for Rs. 800/- till Kausani direct and Rs 600/- extra if we wanted to do off-route sight seeing. We agreed for the second option as well.

The driver’s name was Gopal from the famed Hindi movie Krishna Gopal! All in the car and on the track, our first stop is Bhimtal (the lake which was created by Bhim’s Gada when he hit it hard on the ground and all the water from the nearby streams rushed in to form this lake) There was nothing much to see here as it was 06:30 AM

Few pictures clicked and we are amazed by the greenery and the sceneries. The roads were smooth and nice. Gopal told us that till Almora the roads will be nice and good. We stopped momentarily at a point where one could see some sort of a tiger hill, on top of the hill the tree was carved as a tiger.

The not so mighty (atleast right now) Kosi followed us all along the route. The road was on the banks of the river and carefully winding alongside the mountainous terrain we were proceeding towards out next destination. On route there was this nicely carved frog like structure which the river had carved a rock into the shape of a giant frog. It seems like Godzilla revisited.

The three of them had fallen asleep and my viral attack (I had viral fever before I started the trip) was reoccurring. I was feeling feverish and was fearing the return of the same sickening feeling all over again. We reached the Chitai Temple next which worships Lord Glou Dev. This temple was full of bells! Every one who asks for a wish here and his/her wish is fulfilled, they donate a bell to the temple. Literally the bells were amazing to watch. Unfortunately I was not the one who went up to the temple as I needed to rest badly but the photographs were amazing.

We all made a short stop here and fulfilled ourselves with tea and some grub to get some energy. We set out to another destination next, to Jageshwar.

Next stop Jageshwar temple: This ancient temple hidden deep in the heart of the mountain forest is definitely worth a visit. The Deodar trees surrounding the landscape filter the air and the area is a bit warmer than the rest of the valley. The winds channel out and reach the valley cold and laded with moisture, the trees mingle with the clouds and engage the rain. During winters the place records temperatures as low as -10 degrees.

The Pandits were continuously asking for money and offering to the God. Its was an amazing sight with two mighty Deodars. Both these trees were having trunks soo big that my entire room is not as wide as those! There was a stream flowing behind the temple and it was an amazing sight. Jageshwar is a 7^th century temple chain which has over 180 (I am not very confident of this number) small and big temples which primarily worship the God Shiva. Every temple in the Jageshwar complex has been build by a King from the earlier centuries where they used to offer a temple to God upon their visit. This place is a one of the ‘Teerth Sthal’ and one of the 8 destinations one has to go to. Inside one of the temples there is a light which the priest claimed has been burning since the 7^th century.

Photography was not allowed inside the temple complex.

Till now we realized that our cards were full with pictures and we had to somehow dump these somewhere. None of us was carrying a lappy so that was another ‘lafda’. I somehow located an internet café and the owner Mahesh was willing to burn a CD for 50 bucks. A deal was struck and we were ready to start, but there was no electricity. We waited for some time and had a bit of a grub before the electricity came on. We met BABA CHRIS there, a US citizen who had spent the last 8 years in India to attain nirvana and find inner peace. Quite a lively creature he was.

The CD burning continued with a lot of hiccups but we eventually did it!

We bid adeu to this place and proceeded to our next halt, Almora.

to be continued......