India – Surfdog

Last Day Trekking near Salang and than back to New Delhi

OK – today I really wanted to sleep a bit longer since this would be a day with less walking. So I told the guys not to come in my room and wake me before 8 in the morning. Who had to get something really not important at 6.30? You guess! That was my night and since I was up we had breakfast and started to walk. All the steep way that we went down yesterday – we had to go up today again. And soon enough thick fog and rain again. Why would it be better than the last two days?

An update on the finger situation. The finger was not to happy to be in that hight!

A bit like Jurassic Park out here…

It does not matter where we passed – we were invited for tea and even food. Nice to dry a bit on the fire as well.

Some of the trees where really big.

Down in to the green again

Clouds above, clouds below and to the right and left.

The next few houses – the next cup of tea!

We got lower and closer to civilization again.

And every time when you think – now we had it with up the hill. There was another one coming out of the fog for us. Sweet!

How far Anil? 3 hours for you and 50 minutes for the locals. Gr8!

Waaah I remember – now we are close to the village.

The next morning it was back towards Rishikesh again. And there was even some sun!

Waiting for the Jeep? Have a tea than!

A flat – no problem – we fix that!

Than it took the whole day to get back to Rishikesh. I stayed across the street from the bus stand. There was a really good and cheap restaurant on the street just in front of the hotel. I had a great dinner and then my last night in sweaty India for that trip.

Entrance to the hotel

I went a day to early to New Delhi to meet with Sandra again. Since she did not stay at the hotel where she told me i could not find her. But of course late in the afternoon she did spot me. So we had dinner together and it was a nice end of that trip. I had an air con room since it was round 38 in the day and it did rain from time to time. Way to humid to do anything apart from last-minute shopping and nothing at all in the room.

Great – I had all three seats for myself for the whole flight! That was it. Two months of summer holiday. See you again India!

Day Two in the Mountains near Salang

I have no idea why people get up in the middle of night when trekking??? When I did the Annapurna circle it was December and quite cold in the night. So some of this crazy idiots got up even when it was still dark and started to walk when there was no sun nowhere. I did sleep till I woke up and then I had breakfast – watching the crazy ones walk past the guesthouse. Thick jackets and still it was to cold. I was waiting for the sun to come out and then it was trekking in the T-Shirt only. So sure enough the guy’s where up at the break of dawn. And sure enough they made sure I wake up as well. Tea Sir! Grrrr!
It was raining and the clouds where even below us. But Anil was a hundred percent sure that it would be a good day and the rain would stop. So we did pack and after break fast we started to climb higher up into the woods.

View over our camp in the morning.

You can imagine the view of the snow peaks behind the clouds. That was what I had to do most of the day since the clouds did stay put.

Another camp with a small lake a bit higher than ours from last night.

One of the rare views of a snow-capped peak below.

Above the clouds

Behind the dog you can see the best view-point of the whole trek! High and beautiful snow-capped peaks till the end of the world. But not today! I think the view was about 50-80 meters at best. Most of the time it did rain and than thick fog came in. We passed a part of the forest with lots of nice black monkeys. But they rather went when we where close enough for a picture. Than we got lost in the fog a few times in step forest. I did not really like that part too much. Imagine – the ground is covered with 50-70 cm high plants so you can not see where you step. Wet wood, stones or other obstacles. Than down, wrong way – up again – wrong way – than left – hmmm – let’s try here. Visibility about 10-40 meters – changing all the time. And it keep raining. After quite some time we did meet some sheepherders that did point us in the right direction. Quite an interesting day with another steep descent down to a village for the night.

Hello my friend!

Trekking in the Mountains near Salang

Had a good but short night at Uttarkashi. Like everywhere in India the locals start the day when I still sleep. In the night waterfalls of rain came down so the streets where super clean and after a quick shower I was looking for break fast. Than it did not take to long and Anil was there to pick me up.

We walked a bit than a Jeep took us to the Jeep stand. There we had to wait a while and then it was off for the first leg of the trip. Somewhere we had to change the Jeep and after a while we where on the road again.
Than it was a steep hike up the mountain towards Salang.

Salang is a very small village at the road from Uttarkashi to Gangotri in Uttarakhand. If you come up with the jeep you will not even see it from the road. I was looking forward to the trek since Salang and the surrounding mountains are far away from the tourist highways of India.

There was some kind of temple thing going on so we die watch the show for a while

VIP seating

A lot of dancing – not to interesting…

Did not get more interesting when the girls joined…

Since the dancing went on forever and we got hungry i did never find out what this thing is used to.

The grass is always greener on my site!

The next morning it was off to the mountains. It was super humid and the kids where super fast. Lush green and so much vegetation.

The first tea stop. In the summer they do stay up here to work in the fields since it is to far to walk here every day.

Further up the mountain

It is a wild forest with a really soft ground.

That was one of the few moments that day with a bit of blue sky!

The original fairy forest! I guess it is quite wet most of the year.

Our stop for the night. Usually the guys that look after the cows stay here. But not this time of the year. Since it was raining for a few hours already we could only find wet wood to burn. The roof construction is quite good. It was dry inside. Only the smoke has not really a way out. So you sit inside and get smoked a lot. And outside it gets colder and colder.

Fog was coming down the mountain

The guys preparing food

Apart from the smoke the fire was super 🙂