March 30, 2014
Phone
ringing
"Hello,
bro where are you?''
''I'm
at home.''
''Come
to my home and let’s plan something.''
''Ok,
I'm coming''
I
got call from my cousin Prince & I told my grandpa that I'm going to my
cousin's home. I started my bike & reached there within 15minutes. Everyone
was at home like every Indian family.
Sunday:
a day when everybody is free at home, available for tour, where to & when
doesn't matter. Summer is coming up & weather is in its full color to show
us some dazzling shows around the mountains around our area. We started our
planning to catch nearby places at first so that we can go by early morning
& can come back to home by evening. We planned to go to Parashar Lake
situated in Mandi district. My cousin Upender turned down the idea & said
hold on this plan for tomorrow & let me assure you by the evening or
tomorrow early morning whether I can make it with you or not. After long
discussion I & Prince were left alone for the tour, for sure. As we called
Upender at evening to ask him about his plan about tomorrow but still there was
no clarity in his answers. Without being so panicking about this we posted our
plan for tomorrow morning & slept.
March 31, 2014
As
the night came to end, we woke up at 5:45am. Seriously it’s very tough to wake
up so early but we did, proudly. We discussed again about our plan of Parashar Lake,
decided to go on a long tour & finally came up with the idea of touring
either Chamba or Kinnaur. Its spring & keeping in mind the shooting locations
of movie Highway, Kinnaur district was decided as final destination for
touring.
Kinnaur;
a mountainous area, ranging in altitude from 2,320 to 6,816 meters (7,612 to
22,362 ft), is surrounded by the Tibet to the east, is in the northeast corner
of Himachal Pradesh. Kinnaur district was opened for outsiders in 1889. The old
Hindustan-Tibet Road (NH-22) passes through the Kinnaur valley along the bank
of river Sutlej & finally enters Tibet as Shipki La pass. The high terrain
here facilitates adventures & sports. Trekking routes include the
'Parikarma of Kinnaur Kailash (Kinner Kailash)'.
We
packed our bags, left home around 6:15am & told our parents that we are
going for tour to Parashar Lake & we will stay at our relative's home when
we were back from Parashar Lake. There were two bags full of summer as well as
winter cloths, two helmets & of course the bike, Yamaha FZS. On a lighter
note if you want to go to Parashar lake then there is no need to pack bags or
took load of cloths, summer as well as winter cloths you just need one day to
go there in the early morning, reach Parashar lake in the noon, climb the
highest peak over there, do your photography & get back to home before
night. Finally we were away from home, no tea, no breakfast & we were on
the way for our much awaited long journey.
We
started our journey from our home to Kinnaur & our first stop was at
Rampur, District Shimla. The route to Rampur from our home is via Sarkaghat,
Jahu, Sundernagar, Jaidevi, Rohanda, Karsog, Luhari & finally alongside the
Satluj river on NH-22 comes Rampur. Roads are the most crucial department which
plays vital role while touring in Himachal Pradesh. If roads are good whether
they are state highways or national highways then you can cover a long distance
in one day, if not then you can cover small distances in too much time.
Unfortunately the roads were very bad when it comes to state highways as
compared to national highways. Since there were not enough national highways in
Himachal Pradesh so one can easily understand the situation of travelling on state
highways in Himachal Pradesh. Though national highways were in good condition
but NH-21 is disappointing. On the other hand NH-22 handles more traffic as
compared to NH-21 but it was way better than NH-21. As a result we completed
263km in approx 12hours & that time includes our stay for breakfast, lunch
& for photo shoots. Finally we were at Rampur around 6pm after a journey of
266 km in 12 hours along with 508 photos & 13 videos.
We
booked a hotel room, took bath & came out to explore market of Rampur. It
was a healthy market as compared to market of Mandi, Sundernagar or Karsog.
There were no girls in market but what only we can se is an apple with her guy,
an apple with her husband, an apple with her brother, an apple with another apple
& a family of apples. An apple in Rampur is equivalent to a girl, a newly
married girl, aunty or any female we have seen there. So there were no girls,
only apples. Prince donated his every single hair on head as well as moustache
& beared to barber while I was busy watching apples of Rampur in the
market. After looking up every corners of market we took a memory card for our
camera & that’s it, no more shopping & we were back to our hotel room.
We did dinner & slept around 11:00pm.
Good
night Rampur.
April 1, 2014
We
woke up around 7:30 in the morning. Weather was clear & sun was shining. We
got refreshed & after taking bath we did breakfast & packed our bag for
the journey. We checked out & thanked the hotel staff for their
hospitality. Our next stop was at Reckong Peo. Reckong Peo was 98km from Rampur
via Dhar, Jeori, Chaura, Bhavanagar, Nichar, Wangtoo, Tapri, Karcham, Rali,
Shonthong, Powari, Reckpngpeo, Kalpa(12km from Reckong Peo, 24km from both
sides) & then again back to Reckong Peo.
We
started our journey from Rampur around 9:15am. Again there were number of
apples going to college by road side. Sun light was doing the icing on the cake
magic on apples & they were shining magnificently. Finally we were out of
town. Even though we were on NH-22 but it wasn't wide enough to maintain a
constant speed. Prince was doing all the photography work for coverage of our
tour. NH-22, somewhere it was broken by holes, somewhere by land sliding below
the road as well as from above the road. The height of the road was deep enough
to scare us when we looked down to the left side of road. Even the mountain to
the left of us was too high & black color of mountain was making it too
scary. The road on that mountain looked like a single line & height of road
was so high that if any vehicle accidently goes off the road then there was no
possibility of finding every part of it & after this there was no need to
even talk about human life safety. Prince kept saying, bro no matter what
happens please don't go off the road or if you get uncontrolled then hit the
bike with another vehicle but don't go off the road. Even the flow of air was
too dense that bike kept flowing with it from one side to other side of road.
35kmph was the average speed with which i was riding the bike.
Finally
we came to go through the most exciting rock cut road in Himachal Pradesh
nearby Bhawanagar. As the name specifies that rock cut road is the road made by
cylindrically cutting the rocks of mountain, leaving rocks by the both sides of
road, mountain as road cover & making the NH between rocks. It was the hard
work of workers who worked for it & made it so awesome that everyone will
gonna stop here & look at its class of beauty. There were bridges too on
the road but every bridge was given a curved shape in spite of its being
straight. Every bridge was built differently & curved shape was increasing
its beauty way better than a straight lined bridge.
Houses
in the villages were first difficult to built & then secondly difficult to
live as well as show us the art of building the house. These houses were built
on cliff of mountains making a face of wall on a rock which was too high from
plain area and on that face of wall windows was too scary. Houses were built
according to the shape of cliff of mountains no matter how scary the cliff was
the art of these houses will always attract you. The whole village was almost
built on cliff of mountains.
Our
next station was Wangtoo, well known place for Karcham Wangtoo Hydroelectric
Plant. The dam & power station are located between the villages of Karcham
& Wangtoo from where the plant also gains its name. This hydroelectric
plant generates 1000MW constructed by Jaypee Karcham Hydro Corporation Limited
of Jaypee Group on Sutlej River. Just upstream of the Karcham dam is the 300MW
Baspa II Hydroelectric Plant & downstream of the Karcham Wangtoo is the
1500MW Nathpa Jhakri Dam.
Our
next stop was Powari. In between this roads & tunnels built by Jaypee Group
is height of work everybody can see among these high & scary peaks in
Himachal Pradesh executed by hard work of workers working under this group.
Somewhere there were river silt on the road & road was too slippery to ride
the bike. Since the mountains were full of water the tunnel & road work was
making road too slippery & somewhere there were so much water that we were
feeling like riding the bike into the river.
Even
though the road was one sided & we were riding the bike slowly but the
public transport & personal cars were still going like the wind.
Just
after this there comes a bridge which was constructed by BRO (Border Road Organization)
& after this bridge every bridge was constructed by BRO. The thing we loved
about the bridges was first some bridges was made of wood & iron, second
some bridges was made according to nowadays & third but most important
uniqueness was that every bridge was given a name i.e. Shongtong Bridge. Even
the color of bridges was military green that makes these bridges more beautiful
as well as effective according to the standards. Bridges play vital role in
hill areas because if there is no bridge then there is no connection to other
areas of state, country or world. BRO is playing its role effectively in
construction of these bridges as well as the roads. In some time here comes the
headquarters of BRO.
As
we were reaching Powari the road was becoming too narrow, too scary to ride the
bike. Somewhere i rode the bike alone while Prince wearing his helmet was
walking on the road with one bag on his back, one bag in his one hand & camera
in his other hand. Rock fall, landslides were making it difficult to ride bike
slowly, to cross the muddy road while Prince was walking towards the muddy road
end & making it more & more difficult to stop beside the road. Funny
thing was that our bike is the only two wheeler vehicle while there was no
other two wheeler vehicle. Finally we reached Powari which work as a divider
for road to Reckong Peo & Poo. To the straight the road was for Poo(60km)
& the road towards upper side was to Reckong Peo(6km) & Kalpa(18km). As
we were coming near to Reckong Peo the mountains towards our left were becoming
too white because of snow on them, the real beauty of Himachal Pradesh. The
road again was one way as well as too bad to rode the bike.
Reckong
Peo, at the height of 2,290 metres(7,512 ft) we were here. Reckong Peo is the
headquarters of Kinnaur district. From here Kinnaur Kailash, locally known as
Kinner Kailash at height of 6500 metres(21,325 ft), considered to be abode of
Lord Shiva, can be viewed. Again we continued our journey towards Kalpa, 12km
away from here. Road to Kalpa was one way but well maintained & again it
was upwards to the mountain. The road to Kalpa was surrounded by jungle &
higher altitude was making it more & more cold to ride the bike. Even
though the sun was shining above us but snow-capped ranges were making it too
cold. Kalpa is among apple orchards, pine-nut (chilgoza) forests & stately
deodhars. Kalpa is famous for production
of high quality apples, pine-nuts (chilghoza). All the area in Kalpa is apple
growing ares, which is the main cash crops of the people who live here. In
winters all the villages are covered by about 5-7 feet of snow & the
temperature can drop as low as -20degrees, heavy woollen are required even most
of time in summer. Before Reckong Peo, Kalpa was the headquarters of Kinnaur
district. The view from Kalpa is beautiful giving us a feeling that we are
sitting in the lap of peaks bearing visible. Also visible from this place was
the sacred Shivling rock on the Kailash Mountain that changes its color at
different points in the day. We clicked lot of photos & we decided to stay
at Kalpa. Since it was too cold here so we changed our plan & decided to
stay at lower altitude in Recong Peo so that we can wake up early in the morning
& start our journey to next station as soon as possible.
We
came back to Reckong Peo from Kalpa & searched for PWD rest house. When we
reached the rest house they told us to take permission from DC, Reckong Peo for
our night stay in the rest house. Then we went to DC office & inquired
about the procedure of permission for stay in the rest house. The concerned
person told us that there was no room left for us since every room was booked.
But he called someone via phone & told them that some relatives of DC are
coming to your rest house for night stay, they agreed. All thanks to him to
find another rest house for our stay. We went to another rest house, checked in
& after refreshing we went to market of Reckong Peo.
Market
of Reckong Peo is good enough to make you search for new thing over there about
their clothing, living standard & culture. The people were so helpful &
calm that if someone says he/she is down to earth then people over there were
in the earth. The traffic police was very active as well as very helpful. They
told us about DC office, how to go there & where to park our vehicle
without getting damaged. They told us about Reckong Peo, about the way to our
next station & how to reach safely there. We looked for various things over
there, explored every corner of market. We looked for a Kinnauri topi which is
famous in Himachal Pradesh but it wasn't ready yet so dropped the idea of
buying it. Finally we were at Reckong Peo after a journey of 122 km in 9 hours
along with 824 photos & 13 videos.
It
was 7pm & night has come. We sited in the market for another half an hour
& then came back to the rest house. They served us local Rajmah with rice
& vegetable with chapattis in the dinner. Dinner was too delicious. We
finished our dinner & went to the room. We watched movie Andaaz Apna Apna
& then put every electronic device on charging for whole night. We slept
around 12:15am.
Good
night Reckong Peo.
April 2, 2014
We
woke up at 5:30 in the morning & dry cleaned ourselves. We checked out
& thanked the rest house staff for their hospitality. We were not sure
about the petrol pumps on the way or in Poo/Pooh so we filled petrol from
petrol pump in Reckong Peo & started our journey to Poo/Pooh. Poo/Pooh was
66 km away from Reckongpeo via Powari, Ribba, Jangi, Labrang. Ribba is the
famous village of Kinnaur district for its grape production in huge amount. As
we reached Powari to catch up with NH-22 to Poo there comes too much water in
the road that it seems like river on the road. I told Prince to walk to other
side of water while i'll cross the water on bike. Half of the tyre was drowned
in the water & thats too on the road.
After
crossing the water hurdle here comes the real challenge as the road was too
difficult to drive because of the continuous rockslide & landslides.
Landslides & water made it too scary as well as diffcult to riode the bike.
We were talking about the road & how to handle the situation as if
something happen with us, suddenly just after 15 minutes (3-4km approx) from
Powari the road was blocked completely by rocks. The road was blocked in such a
way that even two-wheeler cannot cross the road to other side; there's no need
to even talk about other vehicles to cross the road. We passed every vehicle
lined on the road to the very first position nearby the landslide. Everybody
was talking about how to deal with this while two people brought the long iron
rods from their vehicles. There was a long line of vehicles waiting to cross
the road so there were enough human hands to deal with rocks on the road.
Everybody was helping to restore the actual road & put away the rocks. The
fight with rocks was very difficult because of continuous landslide &
rockslide. Sometime we have to leave our work & wait for stopping of landslide.
Look out, work & stay away was our policy to deal with rocks. After
fighting for one & half an hour we pushed them away and road was again in
ready to go position.
4km
ahead there comes another beauty of nature in form of natural hot water supply.
Either temperature is negative, zero or positive there's always supply of hot
water. Wash your face, take bath or just to maintain body temperature natural
hot water supply is always there. Going ahead of natural water supply there come
the danger as well as the beauty of roads Himachal Pradesh. Road was again rock
cut road where the height of road was not too much, it was just 18-20 ft high
from road. If you see the road from some distance it looks like after some
distance the height of the road was going to shrink eventually resulting into
end of road. Unfortunately that was just the illusion of the road. Water was
falling from these rocks, somewhere it was raining from rocks, somewhere it was
a river & we have to cross the bridge & somewhere the road is in the
river because of too much water. Load of construction work was also responsible
for the bad condition of road. The road was on the banks of river Sutlej &
the Sutlej was doing icing on the cake magic. Even though the road was scary
but river Sutlej was giving a feel good factor. As we were reaching Poo/Pooh
the road was becoming too narrow & in very bad condition due to excess of
landslides, rockslides & construction work. Since this road was full of
snow in winter thus there was lot of water flowing along with the road or on
the road. The mountains were black because of absence of trees on them. As we
were reaching Poo/Pooh we were coming closer & closer to snowy mountains
around it. Poo is situated 2 km above the NH-22. We rached there at 11:15am,
clicked load of photos a & then did the breakfast over there. Market of
Poo/Pooh was very small in size as well as shop wise. There were 4-5shops in
the market & thats it. Finally we were back from Poo/Pooh.Our next plan was
to go to Sangla valley, 91km from Poo/Pooh via Powari, Karcham.
When we were coming back from Poo/Pooh as we
crossed the natural hot water supply area we were again on the road which was
blocked in the morning due to landslides as well as rockslides. There was a
security guard for instructions to drivers. If there was a landslide then there
was no road crossing below that area. Road can be crossed when landslides stops
temporarily. We were crossing the road after stoppage of landslides, suddenly
stone slides on us. But it hits the right side of bike nearby the headlight
& luckily we were safe. Headlight, indicator of the bike was totally
damaged.
One
more interesting thing here to share was that we decided to stop by the road or
wherever we want to take load of photos when we were going to Poo/Pooh &
when we were coming back from Poo/Pooh we decided not to stop anywhere until we
reach the road to Sangla valley as the landslide & rockslide can block road
anytime. This decision saved our lot of time whene we were coming back to
Sangla valley. Weather played very important role in our journey till since it
was sunny all the time. But when we reached Powari weather changed totally. As
we crossed Powari, it was raining. We decide not to stop anywhere before Sangla
valley & continued our journey in the rain. As we reached Karcham we asked
gatekeeper about the weather in Sangla valley & whether to go or not to go
in this weather. The gatekeeper said if you have an important work in Sangla
then you must go but if you are going only to tour Sangla valley then this is
not the right time because it’s raining & in Sangla valley it’s time for
snowfall. Snowfall will result into blockage of road for 3-4 or more days. We
appreciated him for his suggestion, discussed it again & decided not to go
to Sangla valley. Finally we were on the way to Rampur for our night stay &
it was raining cats & dogs. We were in hurry to cross Wangtoo because upto
that road can become muddy due to sand & rain. Unfortunately we were on the
track again but hevy rain made it difficult to ride the bike. We were wetting
as well as our bags resulting into too much cold.
We
reached Jeori aroung 4:30pm & stopped for tea because of too much cold.
Waiter brought us tea in big steel glasses & we took some fast food to eat.
We asked the hotel owner about stay in Jeori & he told us about rest house
2 km away from Jeori towards Sarahan. We thanked the hotel owner, decided to
take room in the rest house & visit Bhimakali Temple later. We went to rest
house & booked room. The room was giving competition to 3 star hotels. We
were wet & it’s still raining so we told the receptionist that we were
going to Bhimkali Temple.
We
were on the way to Bhimakali Temple, 21 km from Jeori & 19 km from rest
house. We reached temple around 6pm in the rain. Electronic devices, leather
things, shoes & socks are not allowed inside temple area. We locked our
electronic devices, shoes & socks in the locker & went inside the
temple. The temple is in Sarahan, known as the gate way of Kinnaur. The temple
is dedicated to the mother goddess Bhimakali situated at 2150 meters. With its
unusual architecture & wealth of wood carvings, this temple is the major
monument that is duplicated nowhere else in the erstwhile hill states. Artifacts
associated with the heritage of the place have been carefully preserved in the
temple. We were outside the temple, took photos & we were back to rest
house. It’s raining cats & dogs whether we were on the way to Bhimakali
temple from rest house or back to rest house from Bhimakali temple. Finally we
were at Jeori after a journey of 235 km in 13 hours along with 735 photos &
7 videos. We reached rest house at 7:15pm. Every single cloth from head to toe
on our body was wet & we were feeling too much cold. We asked receptionist
for some fire or heat arrangements & he gave us a two rod room heater. He
fixed this & heater was on. We changed our clothes & took hot water
shower. Heater was in full swing so we did dinner & warmed ourselves.
Heater was on its work before 7:30pm & we switched off the heater in the
morning at 8:00am. We dried our wet clothes on heater & finally slept
nearby 1:30am.
Good
night Jeori.
April 3, 2014
We
woke up around 7:30 in the morning, dry cleaned ourselves. We checked out &
thanked the rest house staff for their hospitality. After yesterdays too much
rain, today the sun was shining & we started our journey to home at 8:00am.
We had decided not to stop anywhere for photo shoot, so we focused only on
reaching home as soon as possible. We stopped at Luhari around 9:45am for
breakfast. We ate paranthas with butter & milk & we were again on the
track to home. There were no stopping until we were tired of travelling. When
we were tired we take a break for 5-10 minutes & then again we were on the
road. After breakfast we stopped nearly about 40-45minutes until we reached
Sundernagar. We were very tired after too long ride, we reached Sundernagar,
went to lake & slept on the grass for nearly half an hour. We decided to
replace the broken headlight in Yamaha showroom with new one so we decide to go
to the showroom nearby Mandi. But when we reached Yamaha showroom it was
shifted to another place & as the shifting process was in progress so there
were no work for another 2-3days. Then we were back to home from Mandi &
decided that if Yamaha showroom in Jahu will be open then we will replace the
headlight of bike there & if not then we will head towards our home.
Luckily the Yamaha showroom was open in Jahu, we replaced the headlight of bike
with new one & went to home. Finally we reached home at 8:00pm after a
journey of 289 km on that day.
The
whole journey was of 4 day with bike ride of 912 km in 44 hours along with 2108
photos & 40 videos.
Distances:-
- Sarkaghat to Sundernagar is 45 km
- Sundernagar to Karsog is 100 km
- Karsog to Rampur is 80 km
- Rampur to Jeori is 25 km
- Jeori to Sarahan is 21 km
- Jeori to Karcham is 54 km
- Karcham to Powari is 13 km & Sangla is 18 km.
- Powari to Reckong Peo is 6 km & Reckong Peo to Kalpa is 12 km.
- Reckong Peo to Poo/Pooh is 66 km.
Suggestions:-
- Stay only in rest houses of PWD or HPSEB or Circuit houses.
- Don't forget to carry woolen clothes with you.
- Take enough water as well as eatables with you.
- As you step into Kinnaur you are overwhelmed by the sight of snow-caped mountains, even in the summer.
- Photography enthusiasts carry electronic devices with load of battery backup & don't even talk about mobiles.
- Is is the ideal place for those wanting to escape from the oppressive heat of the plains and the noise of cities.
- If you are going on bike then the expenses of 4 days tour including food, stays & fuel is Rs 4,000 for two persons.
- We sure about weather or rely on accuweather app for weather forecast else its too dangerous to ride as well as to tour.
- Bike riders please ride it safe, if you see road is plain from some distance even though its well maintained it's not plain, its full of up & downs.
- Bike riders please wear helmets; ride the bike in between the road, neither towards right nor towards left because use of too much landslides & rock slides.
