Deorital - Chandrashila : Trekking in Devbhumi

Winters in western part of India are pretty non glamorous although in Sahyadri mountains temperatures do drop to a level where we can call it "cold" ,in pune with rising pollution levels the days of cold winter mornings are rare.

It has always been my dream to spend a week at a place offering balcony view of Himalayas, a cup of tea and a book in hand ,camera ready to capture ever changing view of snowcapped mountains while snow drizzle outside. A beautiful dream indeed however reality of indian hill stations is something different, the hotels with view are overpriced even if you manage the prices and get ready to realize your dream there would invariably some group realizing their own dream of destroying mountains peace by playing honey singh or even worse Arijit singh songs as loud as they can.

Thankfully if you are ready to endure some physical pain you always have an option of a Himalayan trek, we did just that and had our seat booked for indiahikes deorital-chandrashila trek, our first choice was har ki dun trek but all batches had to be cancelled as last minute circular from forest department prevented any camping in the nearby jungles during winters.

Deorital-chandrashila is categorized as an easy trek but we were keen to explore challenges of trekking in harsh mountain winters and walking in snow.

Day 1 - Reaching the basecamp

The base village for the trek is sari, a small village in the lap of gadhwal himalayas near kedarnath.

Sari is about 250kms from haridwar, Indiahikes does offer pickup and drop from /to haridwar on a shared cost basis. It takes about 10-12 hours to reach sari due to mountain roads but the drive is very scenic and always accompanied by blue water of ganges river as we pass through the tehri gadhwal region.

Uttarakhand and specifically the gadhwal region is called as devbhumi ,the land of gods, its beauty must have tempted even the gods to plan their breaks here. Every town in this region has a mythological story attached to it our driver was telling some of them as we drove pass the holy town of rishikesh, devprayag and rudraprayag.

Finally after about 11hrs we had reached sari, small village of not more than few hundred homes most of them converted as homestays for trekkers. We were welcomed by our young trek leader karthik and a warm cup of tea.

After the briefing ,dos and donts and a very important session of green trails initiative by indiahikes to leave mountains in better conditions after the end of the trek we were given health card to regularly record our oxymeter readings ,readings for both oxygen levels and blood pressure were taken. Those with low readings were advised a course of Diamox, a medicine which increases RBC count in blood and helps in more oxygen intake which in turn helps in acclamatisation.Low rankers will be monitored the next day and it readings do not improve will be sent to lower altitudes to avoid risk of AMS."Mountains will always be there you have to be fit and come back again for them “karthik summarized.

The temperature was nearing 2 degrees now and wind was picking up, signal for us to retire to warmth of our rooms.

Day 2: Deorital - lake of the gods (6,601 feet to 7,841 feet)

Sari to deorital is just a small hike of about 3kms and would not at all classify for a high altitude hike but for first timers this small hike can still make you realize your limits as some from the group of 30 just found out that.

Umesh bhai was our guide for the trek, local from sari ,he has been pursuing his masters in horticulture and working with indiahikes as a trek guide in leisure. He has done this trek more than 500 times as a kid he must have done this trek while playing hide and seek with his mates or while he bunked a day in a school.

The progress was slow a km took more than an hour umesh bhai would make us wait after every 15-20 minutes for the other group to catchup. Stopping after every few minutes were cooling our bodies down and any kind of momentum was hard to build. While we do understand the importance of trekking as a group we do think that average speed of the group should always be more than the slowest person’s speed this keeps fast trekkers engaged and provides motivation for slow movers to catchup to and raise their levels. Umesh bhai would allow us to sneak forward every now and then but would warn us from going too far ahead.

After about an hour of a gradual to steep climb we reached the top and had a first view of snowcapped mountains, a huge square shaped mountain welcomed us first “that’s chaukhamba, a 7000+ meters peak” Umesh bhai cleared our doubts, there was some snow as well from the snowfall from last week, Campsite is just a km away from here.

Deorital campsite is said to be one of the most beautiful campsites on the route and I do second that opinion, there were camps from other private operators as well as this is a very well visited tourist spot. Many schools had bought students for a day field trip.

Deorital is not exactly a Himalayan lake, its waters are not turquoise blue in fact its dark green, I feared that the color is because of the pollution from frequent visits, however that’s not the case water is clean and the color is due to higher presence of plants in the lake.

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                                   Deorital Story

                                           Every place in devbhumi has a story associated with it Deorital cant be an exception , its story however dates back to  Mahabharata period , this is supposed to be the lake where  Yaksha ( angel )  asked questions to each of pandava’s before letting them drink water from lake, 4 of them died , Yudhishthira the oldest and wisest of them managed to crack and code and  yaksha spared lives of all pandavas’ , more about the story here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yaksha_Prashna

Deorital is believed to be the lake where gods come to bath and was also known as the Indra Sarovar, that’s the reason its not allowed to have a bath in Deorital , thank god for that !!

The lake is believed to be  created by a serpent god using his tail , myth is that its still protected by the serpent , these myths have managed to protect the sanity of the great lake.

Deorital is famous for its reflections of surrounding Himalayan peaks , don’t miss that on a clear day.

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  After some mandatory cool-down exercise , lunch and some rest umesh bhai took us for bird watching as the region is famous for it , however group of 30 walking thorough forest clicking selfies and making sounds seems to have scared away birds as we couldn’t spot many.

Forest dept has created a nice machan at a top hill which gives good view of himalayan peaks, Umesh bhai did explain is the peak names and their heights. From here one can clearly see Chaukhamba, Kedar, Kedardome, Meru – Sumeru and Bhagirath peaks.

At night the lake looks even more beautiful as its reflecting capacities are brought to full light, the lake glitters with its reflection of stars, we did not miss the opportunity to capture Milky Way and stars reflections in the great waters.

It was my birthday and friends made sure that the plum cake they had been carrying since pune would be put to good use here.

reflection of chaukhamba and kedar dome in deorital

Day 3: Walk through the jungles (Rohini bugiyal, 7,841 feet to 8,851 feet, 8kms)

Today’s trek was through the dense himalayan forests of Kedarnath wildlife sanctuary to reach rohini bugiyal, a meadow right in the heart of the jungle. Forest dept has prevented camping in the area, another last minute circular however Indiahikes managed to get special permits as it would be too hectic to reach chopta without camping here. Permissions to Bhrujgali could not be managed though which meant we would be skipping a camp and reaching chopta the next day.

We cared less about the complexities and concentrated on the beautiful jungle we crossed, deodar forest with Mahal Flowers all over , snow from last fall was adding to its beauty, progress of the group was slow which did allow us some time to soak in the forest beauty.

We began with a steep ascend for about 45 minutes to reach a table top , Sari , chopta and Chandrashila peak was visible from here. While we were gorging on few dryfruits I notices two huge himalayan vultures wiz pass Ninad at close distance, by the time we could take our cameras out the magnificent birds were gone but we were ready in anticipation that they would come back and for next 30 minutes the great birds did not disappoint, they kept coming back and we kept clicking. We were even paid a guest visit by a Griffin Vulture, biggest of them all. It was a great show a treat for bird lovers.

We unwillingly had to continue our walk and leave the ramp walk of vultures behind, from here the terrain is up and down, another 4 kms to go.

Jungle gets denser from here and after 2 hours of walk we did manage to reach rohini bugiyal campsite.

The campsite doesn’t offer the majestic view of the mountains but orange tents in the meadows do offer a good contrast for photographs.

As the campsite is in the mountain basin, its very windy and cold, and few extra layers to come out tonight.

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                      Amazing Anya

From day one, 12 year old Anya had everyone’s attention. Anys seemed to be at ease in the mountains. Parents Anurag and Rashmi’s love for mountains had brought Anya to her first ever trek , a great parenting I must say of bringing kids to the mountains at early age , Once they fall in love with mountains , love of not so good artificial things stays away automatically.

Anya was truly amazing, while few were worried about AMS, sweating and complaining, for anya it was a cake walk, she wouldn’t even sweat. All of us had taken instant liking for her. At this young age, we are at our fittest, I remember doing my first himalayan trek at almost the same age and was always running ahead. It’s important to channelize kid’s energy in the right direction, moreover they learn lot more from the nature than they do from bookish educational system.

Anya , Anurag and Rashmi set a great example for all the kids out there , hats off to them for this !!

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Anya

Day 4: Reaching the summit base camp (8851 feet to 9450 feet, 6kms)

Today would be another jungle walk, jungle would be even more beautiful, Umesh bhai had assured and it truly was.

We started with a small ascend which took us to the deeps of the forest , Umesh bhai showed us a mahal flowers which bears love to eat , singling the danger which may come out from anywhere , fear and excitement had us.

Bears however busy in their long winter sleeps as we walked through the most beautiful himalayan forest. Huge deodar trees and occasional sighting of pretty yellow beaked blue magpie kept us intrigued.

We had to be slow today as the brhujgali campsite was not an option in chopta there would be two batches, a single kitchen for two batches meant management had their work cut off so the idea was to reach a little late so that batch which is already there would get some time to finish off their lunch and other stuff.

Karthik has warned us to have an extra layer own as we were walking in dense forest which would trap sunlight means no warmth at all, to top it all weather has been really cloudy since morning, possibility of snowfall or rain lurked.

After 2 hours into the walk we stopped at a bridge and that gave us some amazing opportunity for slow shutter photography, cloudy light was conducive for that.

Ascend of about an hour from here we were at a place which has crossroads for bhrujgali and chotpta, a perfect spot for lunch.

After a lazy lunch break we continued our walk and after a short ascend and gradual walk we hit the tarmac , road leading to chopta market , motorized vehicles were seen after some days , not that it made us any happier.

Chopta campsite was just a km away from here, away from market but still closer to it as we prepare ourselves for early morning ascend to chandrashila the other day.

Chopta is at 9000ft + and is relatively colder than earlier two campsites, the sun reached here late so its gets very clod and nippy here, washing utensils after lunch is a herculean task. We had made sure to avoid steel plates which get pretty cold, sharing your plastic plate is the right way to go about it.

Tomorrows timings would be 2:30-3:30-4 , that means wake up at 2:30 , breakfast at 3:30 and leave by 4 , idea was to reach summit before the sunrise and the sunrise view from the peak is something to watch out for.

We went to sleep at about 6:30 in our cozy -10 sleeping bags.

mahal flowers

Day 5: The summit (9450 feet to 12,083 feet)

Chandrashila is not a very high altitude peak , infact it’s a treakable peak and locals here do it as a day outing, nonetheless excitement of summit climb did not let us sleep and we were awake before the morning wakeup call at 2:30.

The most difficult thing to do in such cold conditions is getting out of your sleeping bags, takes a lot of courage to do that. All of us were ready before 4, it was still dark and we had our headlamps ready as we started a slow ascend.

We had 4 layers on us to protect us from cold morning winds, progress was slow but steady. After some point we heard karthik telling umesh bhai over the radio to march ahead with quick trekkers as he did not wanted fast ones to miss the sunrise because of the slow lot. We were set free, I could see Ninad running in excitement with Vikram and Kaustubh following him , I however decided to try out Arjun’s formula of half step at a time from last trek as I knew we still have enough time before the sunrise.

Tunganath is one of the 5 holy kedarnath temples called as panchkedar, thousands of pilgrims visit this temple and hence the route is well laid hence we had no difficulty in staying on course. After about an hour we could see the silhouette of Tunganath temple, temperature had really dropped here and it read -4 on Vikrams protrek watch. We could see some clouds building up, danger sigh as we were already on 10000ft and clouds here could easily bring in snowfall. Snowfall is an enticing option but not so much on summit day as it gets really hard to walk in the fresh snow, we were already struggling due to frost buildup on rocks and it was very slippery. We had gained momentum and increased our speed, we could not see the summit, and few guys from different operators had already reached there.

Ascend from tunganath to chandrashila is a steep one, higher altitudes will make you tired quickly but continue at a slow pace and you will be alright.

We were nearing the summit now and sun has started to rise, I could see ninad has reached already with others about to summit, in another 10-15 minutes I was at the top and first rays of sun has just started to illuminate the Nanda Devi (India’s highest mountain), the scene had left us spellbound before cold winds brought us back to our senses. I had taken my gloves out to take a photo and set a timelapse on my phone, I wasn’t carrying another layer of gloves and that has left my hands freezing so much so that at one point I felt as if I might get a frostbite. Sun took pity on us and was shining brighter, bringing some much needed warmth and I gave up my fanatic calls of descending early.

Nanda devi was visible just for 20-25 minutes and sun overpowered it , along with nanda devi we could see dunagiri , nanda kot and other smaller peaks on one side and chaukhamba, kedar dome and bhagirath now clearly visible on the other.

Winds have frozen even the grass blades but we could still see some small birds and rats moving on the summit, tenacity of the wild to survive is amazing.

After about half an hour we could see few more members of the group making it to the summit, they had missed the golden hour but were happy to made it to the summit. Suddenly we heard music, two lads had brought out their speakers and were dancing to the tunes, destroying the peace but we choose to ignore it surroundings were too pure to be tarnished by such idiots.

We waited for long 2 hours braving the cold as other continued making to the top, little anya made it to the summit under a huge applaud from everyone, she just loved the moment.

After a group photo we decided to begin our descend which was slow due to frost and slippery stones.

Took us close to two hours to reach chopta but nor before we enjoyed simmering tea at one of the local dhaba’s.

We had a full day at chopta to relax, roam around and chit chat at chopta which we utilized to fullest.

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             Knowledgeable Karthik

This was my third trek with indiahikes and all of the trek leaders have been very dynamic, Karthik being youngest of them , 21 , we still find it hard to believe hes just 21 even though he did show his ID card to us.

IIT dropout, Karthik works for 6 months and travels for the rest, a standup comedian , a classic literature lover , a skateboarder he downs many hats seamlessly. He has decided to retire at 25 and travel. His clarity of thoughts is amazing at this age.

Karthik loves walking so much that he and his friends walked from Sonmarg to Leh and to Pangong Tso , 600 +kms in 22 days , his stories were full of wisdom and surprise.

His dream is to do NOLS (national outdoor leadership school) course in Alaska and is saving money for that.

Indiahikes have really good bunch of leaders and we are fortunate to have seen Arjun and Sandhya’s sensibility and maturity along with Saran and Karthik’s exuberance and energy.

All the best to him for his future plans!!

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Tunganath

first rays of light and mount nandadevi

Chaukhamba

frost ridden rocks

frozen grass blades

Day 6: Return Journey (Chopta to Rishikesh)

Today was the last day of an amazing trek and mountains did not miss the opportunity to give us last surprise, it has been cloudy since last two days and we could see some snowfall on the nearby peaks, all had become white with fresh snow. We made our journey back to rishikesh through picturesque valleys.

Deorital trek is not a trek whose completion lets you boost of your endurance but it’s definitely a must do for its beauty and views. Food indiahikes offer may end up in increase weight gain than the loss as it’s that good.

While on the trek I notices almost 70% of people offloading their bag packs, I had a chance to life few of the bagpacks while helping a porter and was surprised as how light they were and could have been easily carried. Offloading does make few locals earn money but if you are looking to trek you should carry your own weight. We noticed few giving unnecessary importance to the way they look or dress up, in mountains no one cares about your beauty as so much natural beauty is there to see. One should be fine with three pairs of clothes and warm layers to assist. Do the trek not for facebook profile pics but for the experiences and unmatched beauty mountains offer.

 On the trek got to meet new people and hear their inspiring stories, Anya and family, Niramalata and her daughter trekking together, Sahyadri trekkers finding their feet the Himalayas, locals like umesh bhai, all these experiences make this a perfect trek

chopta camp