Adventures in India

From Netwar we want to reach Joshimath - a place which is located next to the highest mountain of India - the Nanda Devi (7,816m' ). The distance between Netwar and Joshimath is about 300 km, but due to the Indian roads it takes us 3 days and eight bus changes to reach Joshimath (Netwar -> Mori -> Prola -> Barkot junction -> Barkot -> Srinagar -> Nanda-Prayag ->Karan Prayag -> Joshimath). In one part of the way we are taking a local public jeep. The driver tries to squeeze as many people as possible into this jeep. In this jeep there is one seat next to the driver, and more seats in the back. As westerns we get the place next to the driver (we are two and there is only one seat). We think that we will squeeze and it will be OK, but... we have a surprise - the Indians put another person next to us.... We are three persons in one seat... you probably ask yourself how it can be. Well, the third person is actually sitting on the GAP between the driver seat and the passenger seat, while the driving stick (the gear) is between his legs... so embracing especially when the driver changes to the second gear (I can hardly stop my laugh....).

During this walk we cross several mountain-passes and climb about 1'000m' vertically every day. The trek passes by the villages of Pana, Gingi, Guni, Ali, Sutol, Kunul and Wan. One day we see many eagles in the sky, and we can't understand the reason.... Later on, not far from the village of Ali, we see an AMAZING view: more then 20 eagles are eating a dead cow. They are cutting pieces of its meat and are fighting between themselves for the best pieces, including some Arial fights... They are huge birds and all this scenery is really impressive!!!

From the village of Wan (2,600m') we start our climb towards Rup Kund. The climb is supposed to take three days. On the first day we arrive to Badni Bugial (3,350m'). On the second day we climb till Bhugu Basa (4,100m'), where we are supposed to stop overnight and continue in the following day. The weather is a complete mist. You can see nothing.... We are very tired, but decide to continue on the same day to Rup Kund due to the following reason: the weather pattern in the last days is clear mornings and cloudy afternoons. So, if we continue to climb now, we hope to get good visibility in Rup Kund in the next morning. We keep going tired and thirsty (no water along the way) alone (of course) towards the sacred mysterious lake. Snow starts to fall.... I start to think whether our decision to continue was right (we are all alone there, and if the snow blocks the way, we will have no chance of finding it... I also think about the 500 people who were lost there 700 years ago...). We continue walking slowly slowly. Then...., from far, I see few round things lying on a huge rock. I am not sure what I see (due to the poor visibility and the snow storm) but I suspect something... I ask Nir to be the first one walking.... Then we arrive to that rock, and discover that these are skulls of people. We, actually, have just arrived to Rup Kund which is, currently, mostly frozen. Skeletons of people are all around.... The dry and cold weather preserved the flesh on some of the skeletons! It is amazing and on the same time frightening. We are going to sleep here at night brrr....The only source of water around is the lake itself (where all the bodies are floating...) We break the ice and take water from the holy lake (I don't believe it is kosher...). Where can we pitch our tent? Yes, on the lake. This is the ONLY horizontal place in this rocky area. The upper layer of the lake is frozen and we decide to put our tent on it. Hopefully, it won't brake during the night... I am not relaxed in this mystic place... We are so tired. We sit in our tent, eat something and prepare ourselves to sleep. Then... the storm becomes harder. It is snowing heavily now. Oh no, if the snow covers the area we will not find our way down, and in 4 days we have our flight back to Israel... We hope so much that the storm will be over soon. The snow, indeed, stops after few hours and we are relieved. At night the temperatures drop to -15 degrees and we cannot sleep even a moment. We are hugging each other to gain heat, waiting for the morning sun (in this situation even to pee is a great mission as you can imagine...).

But eventually things went OK. We arrive at the pass above the lake. The views are amazing. The two huge mountains are in a touching distance from us, and we can see many more mountains in the far horizon. We feel so nice. What a great way to finish our trip in India!!!

The view from Jyuri Gali (4,620m') the pass just above Rup Kund. On the right is Trisul (7,120m') and in the middle, Nanda Ghunti (6,309m').

Here we finish our trip as well as this story. We really enjoyed India and hope to come back sometime !!!