Bhutan - The Land of Happiness - Part 1

This Diwali we got an opportunity to visit Bhutan - The Land of Happiness. It was high on our bucket list and finally things were falling in place for the visit to materialise. 

Bhutan is a unique country since it gives more importance to Gross National Happiness (GNH) and not to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Happiness of her people is really important for Bhutan, you can see a glimpse of this everywhere. From the guides to the hotel staff to the people you mean on the roads, they all seem to be very kind, ready to help and of kind nature!

Another phenomenal thing about Bhutan is how they have preserved their natural beauty to a large extent.  

The moment you enter Bhutan you feel a sense of calmness everywhere, its fresher air, lesser people, lesser vehicles etc just make you feel a lot more peaceful!

The mornings are magical with pristine blue skies and beautiful landscapes. 

Bhutan has a lot of Dzongs. These are kinda fortresses which are now used as government buildings and monasteries. 

Quite often these Dzongs are located at the bank of a river. 

Bhutan was never colonised, this has helped them preserve a tint of buddhist architecture in every single building. 

Bhutan loves flags! No matter where you go you will see a cluster of colourful flags waving boldly in the cool breeze. 

Currently about 71% of land area in Bhutan is covered under forest. And this is not just a number in government books, it can be seen everywhere. The hills are covered with variety of trees, its difficult to find a bare patch of land!

Another glimpse of a magical morning.

We did the Taktsang (or the tiger's nest) monastery trek today. Whenever you google about Bhutan you are bound to see this picture. This monastery is located at the edge of the cliff. 

Its a wonder how they even built something so magnificent at the edge of a mountain!

This is the picture of Taktsang from the base village. Yep, at this point it did fell like too far away!

The trek is about 6 km from the base, the trail is marked and is very clean. It is a beautiful trail going through thick beautiful forest cover.

Like I mentioned earlier, you will find clusters of colourful flags everywhere and the trail is no exception.

The view from the Taktsang is breathtaking. As far as the eye can see in every direction, not a single patch of land remains bare; instead, it is blanketed with trees for miles on end.

Since the trail is relatively easy to walk, we weren't very tired after reaching back to the base. It took us about 7 hrs in total to go and come back. 

So far it had been an splendid experience for us, we were already in love with Bhutan and its green cover. In the next post, I will take you on a journey to its major cities.

Uttrakhand - Deoriatal Chandrashila Trek - Part 3

This is the final post that describes our trip to the Uttrakhand. If you haven't read the previous two posts already I would highly recommend doing that here and here. 

From Rishikesh we were to go to Sari basecamp from where we had to start our 4 day Deoriatal Chandrashila Trek. We were taken in a small tempo traveller from Rishikesh to Sari basecamp. The journey is long and takes about 8-9 hrs. The basecamp was a group of 6 big tents - with 8 bunk beds in each tent.

Do you see the only snow capped mountain in the above image? That is Chandrashila peak and that is where we had to reach in another 4 days via trekking! At this point it felt very very far away.

Evening view of a red cabin + snow capped mountains!

Night view from basecamp with the moon in its full glory is a treat for the eyes. You feel so mesmerised by the view that you just want to keep looking at the sky!

Here is where we met all our trekking buddies as well. We were 26 trekkers (including kids) + 3 guides.

My son was 2nd youngest -10 years old, youngest child was 9 yrs old kid.

We were trekking with IndiaHikes. It is one of the best organisation to trek with. Their values are all geared towards sustainable living and trekking. For e.g. they do not believe in generating trash. You wont find any dustbins near the camp site. Their expectation is that we carry all the waste we generate back with us and not leave it at the camp site. This is such an incredibly powerful value to have. 

They take this concept even further, they give all trekkers a small yellow bag, its called the eco bag. This bag is to be tied around our waist (all of us are wearing it if you look closely in the above picture), we are expected to pick up and collect any trash we find on the trail during our trek and put it in the eco bag. IndiaHikes then recycles it or disposes it off correctly. This small gesture helps leave our mountains cleaner and prettier!

Next day we had to start trekking. The path is filled with unprecedented beauty, mountains, jungles, streams, meadows and what not!

On Day 1 we reached the Deoria Taal lake, from here you can see the magnificent Chaukhamba peak (shaped like a crown)

Which we actually could not see because the weather wasn't clear enough. But we were rewarded during the night when the sky cleaned up and we were able to see the Chaukhamba in all its glory. 

This was the first place where we started sleeping in a sleeping bag. It is a different experience, its quite warm inside and it feels like we are a caterpillar in its cocoon.

Next day, with excitement filled in our veins we started again:

On the path the view and weather changes every few minutes. You are moving in a clearing and then suddenly you are walking in dense forest with rain poring like there is no tomorrow, then suddenly you come to a stream which needs to be crossed and then at some point you look up to see the breathtaking view of the mountains, sky and the sun!

Finally after walking for 8 hrs or so, we reached our camp site - Syalmi. This is a nice little camp site with 2 people tents neatly pitched. 

Next morning, dosa's were served for breakfast. Those were the best dosa's I have ever tasted! As soon as a new stock would come, they would disappear. People just couldn't stop having them!

This is Me with my full trekking gear - holding my breath for the picture!

Like I mentioned before, many random streams would come on our way and we could just drink water from them - #no-filter-required! 

Final day was the Summit climb, we had to wake up at 0130 in the morning and start at 0300 hrs!  During the night - or early morning depends on how you look at it - it rained heavily, I was thinking we will not be able to start our trek at all. But at 0130 our trek leader called out and asked everyone to get ready - we are going to attempt the summit - The Chandrashila Peak.

Walking through pitch darkness and the calm of the night was a completely out of the world experience. As the first light appeared we were about 3.5 km away from the peak. First time we could see the snow all around us, everything was pure white because of the fresh snow fall the night before. 

We even saw a Himalayan Monal, a beautiful and colorful bird - again pictures do not do justice here.

Finally we managed to reach the Tungnath temple - the worlds highest Shiva Temple. The temple was serene and peaceful place to spend a few moments of solitude. 

This is where Blacky found My son and decided to take a 45 min nap on him.

The last 1KM of the peak was a hike through the snow. So our trek leaders gave us micro spikes to put onto our shoes so that we get extra grip on the snow.

We finally managed to reach the peak - The joy of making it to the peak was something that I cannot describe in words, we even saw people shedding tears of joy. At the summit, you get this feeling that you have managed to do something that you didn't think was possible earlier. It widens your horizon, you feel this immense confidence pulsating through your body - everything feels within reach - or may be its just adrenaline messing with your body - who cares! 

By the time we started descending, the snow had started melting. In fact while climbing up we had seen a stone hut fully covered in snow and while returning it had no traces of snow left!

We reached our campsite at about 1600 hrs, this meant we were trekking for 13 hrs! After having a quick lunch we were taken to Sari basecamp in a tempo traveller and this is where our trek concluded. From Sari basecamp when we looked up towards Chandrashila, it was truly hard to believe that just a few hrs a go we were at the peak of that beautiful snow covered mountain!

Overall our trek was a huge huge success, thanks to the IndiaHikes team for taking care of us all through out the trek. Special mention of our trek leaders and guides, Vijay, Amit and Sayantan who never left us alone and kept encouraging us to keep moving forward!

Would I recommend Trekking to anyone? 110% YES without missing a beat. As IndiaHikes says it, "Everyone must trek"!

KGL - A Trek To Cherish For A Life Time

Today we have a guest blogger, please join me in welcoming Sapna Shah. I am a proud husband of Sapna. She recently completed one of the most beautiful treks called the KGL Trek - Kashmir Great Lakes. She is the first person from our family to venture into some serious trekking. Her experience was so spectacular and so special that it deserved a blog post. So here it is, KGL - The heaven on earth!

Lohagad - Nature at its best - Rejuvenate yourself

It all started with me and my friend Mahendra, talking about how the weather in Pune is perfect for a trek.  We have been talking about doing a trek since one year now, but because of some or the other reason, never managed to actually do it.  But this time, I really really wanted to do it!  After some initially talks, we decided to do a trek to Lohagad. 

I asked around to see if others were interested.  Total 12 people agreed for the trek.  We decided to start at 0630 hrs on Saturday and come back by afternoon.

Staring from 2000 hrs on Friday evening, I started getting SMS'es from people saying they cannot make it.  By morning, I was thinking it will be just me and my wife who will be going for the trek :).  But in the end, we were 5 adults and 4 kids (all of them 8 years old) made it!

As planned we started off at about 0630 hrs.  I had been to Lohagad in the past, at that time, there were no shops at the top, i.e. no food and no water at the top.  Hence, we wanted to have heavy breakfast before starting.  We tried a few good restaurants but none of them were open that early.  Finally, we settled for a dhaba type place to have breakfast.  Although the ambiance of the place was not all that great, the food was good!  We had Misal, Poha and Tea.  After filling our tanks, it was time to hit the road again. 

We reach the base village Malawali at about 0830 hrs, it was a good surprice to see a very well organized pay and park facility at Malawli.  We parked our vehciles there and started the climb.


The Way Up:

Right at the beginning of our ascent we saw two waterfalls.

As we climbed up, breathtaking views would unfold in front of our eyes.  The natural beauty on the way was simply amazing.

A few images to illustrate what I mean

At one point right over our head we saw a big rock which looked like a gigantic ship.  It would immediately remind you of the famous scene from "Titanic" where Leonardo and Kate are standing at the tip of the titanic to feeling the breeze.

The snaps does not do justice to the view that we saw!

For the first time in my life I saw blue beetles

After walking some more, we saw another natural miracle.  We saw a big rock hanging by the side of the cliff.  The rock and cliff would be attached only at the ends.  The space between the center of the rock and the cliff formed a shape which looked similar to Shiva's third eye!  Its difficult to explain, a picture would clarify things.

Finally, after about 1.5 hours of walking and enjoying the natural marvels, we reached the base of the Fort.  There we were greeted by our ancestors

There are lots of monkeys in and around the Lohagad fort.  They were waiting to get one opportunity to snatch anything that looked like food. 

There are proper steps created to go from the base of the fort to the fort itself. 

During the monsoons, small stream of water keeps flowing down the steps.  On our way into the fort, we saw a small lake formed by the back waters of the Pawna dam.

On the way up, we saw ruins of few small cannons.  We tried to lift them just to see how heavy they were, but they wont move even a inch!

A few more steps and we saw a gigantic Maratha gate!  It had massive chains and sharp spikes all over it.  Needless to say that one person cannot open or close the gate.  The spikes made sure that, it would be difficult even for a fully grown elephant, to break open it.

Last few steps, took us into the fort.  No one wanted to walk any further without having a bite.  We decided to stop there and have something to eat.  We had carried lots to eat, Sandwiches, Chips, Sabzi Roti etc.  When we were half way through our lunch, one monkey located us and came extremely close to us, looking for an opportunity to snatch something.  We reacted quickly, we put everything back in the bags and started walking.  5 adults and 4 kids against 1 monkey, believe me, monkey was not at all afraid of any of us.  In fact he was actually trying to scare us.  We had to finally give him a peace of sandwich.

We decided to move ahead since we could not continue our lunch at the same place.  After walking for 5 min we saw a Dargah and a small pond, we decided to finish our lunch there.

After lunch, it was time to sit and relax and do nothing absolutely nothing!  Cool breeze was blowing continuously. 

I was at "peace" with myself! 

I was not thinking about anything, nothing absolutely nothing at all!  Not thinking about the city roads, traffic jams, home, projects to be delivered, meeting the deadlines, nothing! 

My 10 gallon head was completely empty.  Simply, sitting and enjoying the natural beauty.  I have to admit, I had not felt like this for quite some time now.  I am not a person who would keep thinking and worry about stuff, but still the feeling that I got at that point was beyond anything that I had experienced before.

In the movie The Pursuit of Happyness, right before he gets the job as a Broker, Chris Gardner says,

The next day, after work, we just went to the beach. Far away from anything, everything, just Christopher and me. Far away from buses, and noise, and my constant disappointment in my ten gallon head, in myself

At that moment, I was able to understand what he was talking about.  What is that feeling and I can tell you one thing, it surely feels great!  That moment for me was the best moment in the entire trek.  It was totally worth it!

After relaxing for about an hour or so, we decided to explore the, West side of Lohagad fort to see The Vinchukata(Scorpion Tail).

On the way to Vinchukata one has to climb down an almost straight wall made of rocks.

It was pretty steep, but in the end I did make it.  From the tip of the fort you could see the entire landscape.  There was no obstruction.  On one side you could see magnificent Sahyadri range and on the other side you could see the Pune-Mumbai express way.  Clouds were passing right through us.  Its was simply beautiful!

Later, at about 1400 hrs, we decided to start our descent.  While coming down one of our friend, twisted her ankle.  Luckily, it was not that bad.  After some rest she was able to walk normally.  We reached the base village at about 1545 hrs.

It was trek a wonderful trek with breathtaking views on the way and at the top.  But the most important USP for me were, those moments at the top when I was at peace with myself!


I would strongly recommend everyone to do treks on a regular basis.  Oh! almost forgot, all 4 kids did manage to do the entire trek by themselves.  No one had to carry them, in fact the kids carried their bags all by themselves!

If 8 year old kids can do the trek without any problems, so can you!  Go for it, I can assure you, you will return completely rejuvenated!

PS: To view all pictures visit this link