Kedarkantha trek
In this blog, I disuss about the itenary, activities that encompassed our trip to Kedarkantha peak. This marks my second trek to himalayas and the first trek in the state of Uttharakand The land of Gods. Do read if you want to live through the experience of Bungee jumping, rafting and hiking in a single post :).
It’s a dream come true for people who love hiking to trek in the Himalayas. Our plan to trek started last year way before our innocent mind knew nothing about the deadly pandemic which ultimately thwarted our plans and shifted everything by a year. We planned to include as many activities like bungee jumping, river rafting in the Mighty Ganga before the commencement of the trek. This trek of nearly ten days was one of the best things to happen which without the organization of my closest friends Ganesh, Deepak would not have been possible.
- Day 1 - Leaving to Dehradun
- Day 2 - The Bunjee Jumping day.
- Day 3 - Rafting in the Mighty Ganga
- Day 4 - Travel to Sankri
- Day 5 - First day of trek
- Day 6 - Trek to Kedarkanta Base Camp
- Day 7 - The Summit day
- Day 8 - Descending to Sankri
- Day 9 - The long travel back to Bangalore.
Day 1 - Leaving to Dehradun
I Started from Shimoga on the 12th of March and reached Bangalore the next day morning at around 6:00 AM. Our flight to Dehradun from Bangalore was at 12:30 PM. So, I had to reach the airport by at least 10:30 AM. As soon as I reached Bangalore, en route to my home, I picked the camera from my cousin’s friend. After freshening up, I left for Maiyyas to get a good breakfast and ate their popular Idli and Vada. After waiting for 45 minutes at Jayanagar 4th Block bus stand, I left to Airport via Vayu Vajra at 9:00 AM.
Group pic before leaving to Dehradun
It took around 2 hours and 30 minutes for us to reach Dehradun. After reaching Dehradun, we booked a cab to Rishikesh as we planned to spend two days mainly for Bungee Jumping and River Rafting. We Stayed in GoStops Rishikesh, a zostel. After reaching, as some of the people were new, our mutual friend Ganesh gave an intro about everyone to everyone. After having some light snacks, we left to explore Rishikesh where we saw LaxumanJula and spent some time taking pics. The next day was the D day, anxiety was slowly creeping in throughout the night. However, Bharat’s birthday allowed us to forget all those as we slept the night peacefully without thinking much about the challenging task which lay ahead of us the next morning.
Day 2 - The Bunjee Jumping day.
The D-Day was here. We had to get ready for Bunjee Jumping and had to reach GoStops as early as possible.
Group pic before the challenge
I still remember the day as it was yesterday, my appetite had gone south and I could not eat much before the jump as I was too stressed out. I ate three spoons of Maggi nearby Jumping heights and was getting ready for the jump. After getting briefed on the specifics of the jump, we started walking towards the jump site. I had to jump after 3 of my friend finished theirs, hence had an ample amount of time to retrospect each jump. As soon as I came to the stands, the Instructor started asking me about my profession and other things, just to calm me. But deep down I knew all these tactics would not work as I answered his questions subconsciously. The only mantra I had was to somehow push myself from the podium and the rest would follow and that’s what I did! The acceleration in the initial two seconds blanks you out as I could not comprehend what was happening. Only after the first jerk, I remember screaming my lungs out with pure joy as the experience was surreal. After the rope stops swinging rapidly, the support crew would then provide a pole to hold so that they can bring me down while I hang heads down, with all the headrush. After removing the harness, they make everyone rest for a while and provide a badge for the feat achieved. After seeing two more falls from a different perspective, the small group started hiking back the 83m we innocuously fell. As the anxiety of the jump was over, my stomach reminded me about the empty tummy which was then satiated with a Veg sandwich while we watched the rest of the people Bungee jump / Giant swing from the jump point live in the jumping heights premise. After everyone was done with their jump, we took a pic with the badge on and started discussing the scream from one of our friends when he jumped. Legend has it that the scream can still be heard occasionally till today.
Group pic after conquering the height
The rest of the evening was spent once again roaming across the Lakshmanjula and some other shops where we hogged a little and explained the experience to other people who had not come to jumping heights.
Day 3 - Rafting in the Mighty Ganga
After an amazing previous day, we were all set for the next amazing thing in Rishikesh, The River rafting. As we were a large group, we got a sweet deal from the zostel we were staying in as they booked the river rafting for us. The Red Chillies(The Rafting org) asked us to be present at the venue by 9:00 AM. Our Rafting was from Shivpuri and was supposed to end in Lakshmanjula. The Journey was around 16kms and they asked us to store all the nonessentials in the bag which then would be transferred directly to the destination point of our rafting. We were all set and they briefed us about the types of commands, the role of kayakers and some specific instructions if things go wrong.
Group pic before rafting in Mighty Ganga
There were three commands that we were asked to follow in addition to one to just duck into the boat if the rapids were too strong. There were just level 3 rapids as we went during the end of the winter season. The experience with rafting in level 3 was thrilling and it used to drain a lot of energy while navigating in those. As soon as we were done with 7 of 8 rapids of all levels, there was a popular cliff point from where people were allowed to cliff jump. The height of the jump was around 25 feet. We had 3 GoPros with us, which we planned to use during our rafting. After most of the cliff jumping videos were recorded, we handed the GoPro graciously to one of our instructors to record the final jump. However, as soon as he jumped, he lost the grip of GoPro and lost it. We were devasted by hearing his words and the thrill immediately went from 100 to 0 real quick. After passing over the last level 1 rapid, we tried to cheer ourselves hoping that the crew can recover back the lost GoPro. However, deep inside we knew that the chances of getting it back were slight to none.
Group pic after 16kms of rafting in Mighty Ganga
We then returned to our zostel to collect the main luggage that we had left. As the rafting had enervated us, we decided to have a sumptuous lunch at GoStops and then left for Dehradun in a TT for the day as a long journey to sankri was awaiting us the next day early in the morning. As soon as we reached, we went out to explore Dehradun and decided to stop at Kumar sweets. As it was already very close to its closing time, all the items that they gave were done hastily and it did not match the expectation we had. Some of us even named it The A2B (Adyar Anand Bhavan) of Dehradun. As most of us were still hungry, we decided to stop at another Momos point which was just over the building and this is where all the fun started. Along with the momos being tasty, the Bluetooth speakers that they had provided us lifted our moods and helped us forget about the incident which happened at Rishikesh as we started playing Kannada songs and danced to the tune of it. Overall it was an extremely memorable day after which we left for the hotel and slept early to get ready for the early morning travel to sankri the next day.
Group pic after the dance at the momos point
Day 4 - Travel to Sankri
Our TT came at around 5:50 AM on Tuesday, 16th of Mar. After getting ready, we had a cup of tea from the nearby hotel stall and started our journey at 6:00 AM. The roads along the way were narrow and the cliffs were steep which made the views even more breathtaking and terrifying at the same time. We stopped for breakfast at Mussoorie and had the famous north Indian breakfast, Aloo paratha. Before lunch, we stopped at a rock point which was on the banks of the river Yamuna and took several pics. For our lunch, we stopped at this extremely lovable daba by an aunty who won our hearts as we ate our hearts out in Harki dun valley. later, we reached Sankri at around 4:30 PM - 5:00 PM. We got freshened up at the rooms given and assembled at the dining area where our Trek leader Mannu bhayya briefed us about our trek guide team consisting of himself and two others: Sanjeev bhayya and Ms. Sunita. He also enquired about our fitness level and briefed us on the itinerary of the trek, the do’s and don’ts on the trek, the clothing required, etc. After the meeting, we had our dinner and we were extremely surprised by the taste and quality of the food given by the TTH people. After dinner, while shopping for some of the forgotten/needed items, we got to know about a cafe that provided wifi for people who bought drinks/food from them. We utilized this to send messages to our family and informed them about the possibility of having no signal for the next 4 days. As the temperature had started falling, we layered up and went to bed after segregating the only essentials required for the next 4 days of the trek and separated the other items as “left luggage” which then had to be dropped off before leaving early the next morning.
Scenic view along the route to sankri
Scenic view along the route to sankri
Scenic view along the route to sankri
Day 5 - First day of trek
The plan for the first day was to have our tea at 7:00 AM. While sipping the lemon tea, the scenery just outside the dining camp at sankri camp was nothing short of magnificent, we were able to see some of the most beautiful valleys, snow-covered top of several summit peaks. Our trek was scheduled to start at 9:00 AM after the 8:00 AM breakfast. However, we started 15 min late and we were on foot at 9:15 AM to reach the first campsite Juda ki Talab from the sankri base camp.
Group pic from Sankri base camp on our first day
Our first day of the trek was nothing short of breathtaking, the route with which we had to travel was covered with beautiful pine trees. Our guide Sanjeev bhaiyya throughout the trek was interacting with us explaining about different types of flowers in these pine forests and also was educating us on the do and don’ts as we trekked through the thick patch of forest. We reached Juda ki Talab at around 2:00 PM and saw the glimpses of snow near the lake. The travel distance was close to around 5-5.5 KM with a good ascent.
View from the first day hike
After a good lunch, we started the acclimatization walk. After reaching the higher altitude where snow was plentiful, we played cricket with our hiking pole with snowballs as our trek leader Mannu bhayya explained about the naturally formed rock caves around the place.
Natural rock cave on our acclimitization walk at Juda ki talab
Day 6 - Trek to Kedarkanta Base Camp
As the distance to the Kedarkantha base camp was less, our trek started a bit late as we had our tea at 8:00 AM. Everyone was up and as the temperature was around 0-5C, it was extremely difficult to use the water to wash our face or even brush our teeth. Also, everyone felt victorious after attending their first nature call in the woods XD. After some warmup and breakfast consisting of pasta, we started to Kedarkantha base camp at 10:00 AM. The path considerably was much steeper than our first day and the snow patches were starting to get noticed more and more as we were covering altitude. Also as we started climbing the density of pine trees started reducing. We reached Kedarkantha base camp very early as the distance was just around 2.5kms. As there were fewer pine trees at the Kedarkanta base camp, we were able to witness the complete 360\(^\circ\) view.
View of Kedarkantha peak from base camp
Scenic view from the Kedarkantha base camp
After a good lunch, the scenic view of the campsite urged evryone to take 100s of pics with the background. After a while, for our acclimtisation walk, or trek leaders took us to a place which contained a large patch of snow and for us that definetly was like giving a candy to a child. We started playing with snow, some also created snowman, some played snowball targets.
Large snow patch where we spent time on our acclimatization walk
Low budget Snowman at the snowpatch
Day 7 - The Summit day
Ah the summit day, we had to wake up as early as 1:00 AM so that we could leave the Kedarkantha base camp at 3:00 AM. The weather was brutally cold, probably near the 0C range. There was tea at 1:00 AM and Maggi was served at 2:00 AM as our breakfast. They also provided Frooti and energy bars to assist our summit climb. We started the summit a little late at around 3:15 AM. As my head torch was extremely unreliable, I closely followed behind Megha till dawn. We had three break points along our summit in which the second one was in an abandoned hut where we started breathing fumes due to the low temperature. We traveled around 3.5 - 4 km from where we started to witness the early dawn and the Kedarkantha peak at around 5:00 AM and Oh boy was it not stunning!
Kedarkantha peak at the early dawn
Even though the peak seemed near, it was not so near as one thinks. We had still around 45 min of climb left. We slowly climbed the peak savoring the moment of sunrise and it was around 6:30 AM when we reached the peak and the view along the final push from the shoulder point was nothing short of enthralling.
Sunrise from the Kedarkantha peak
Solo pic at kedarkanth peak
View at the top of Kedarkantha peak
Group pic after conquering Kedarkantha
The descent from the peak was altogether a different experience. We were not able to predict whether our next step down would bury our feet two-three feet into the ground or slide us across the patch. We truly understood the necessity of spikes while coming down as the initial part of the descent was completely covered with snow. When the descent slope was not so harmful (not with boulders) our instructors allowed us to slide through the path. As I was new to this, the initial attempt was horrible as I rolled over due to incorrect form. Also, I had not worn any gloves, and stopping my acceleration with my bare hands caused some bruises on my palm as I skid through the snow.
Scenic view of snow covered path while descending
After descending to Kedarkantha base camp at around 1:30 PM we had our lunch served at 2:00 PM. All of us, as we were tired slept peacefully in the tents for a couple of hours and assembled in our dining tent. The dining tent at various campsites had become a pub house for a couple of days as we started playing music and dancing for them. This night was one of the most memorable due to two things, one is the couple dance from all the boys and the other is the Jamoon that the TTH served us for the dinner that night. Overall it was an amazing experience as we slept thinking about the long descent to sankri the next day.
Day 8 - Descending to Sankri
As there were some water issues in the intermediate camp, we had not descended on the summit day, and hence the next day after the summit, we had to descent till Sankri, our starting camp and it was a descent of 6-7kms, the longest distance, and the longest descent of our trek. We started at around 8:30 AM as we had to reach the camp by 1:30 PM. We had found a left-out frisbee in our campsite the previous night, which we used in our rest point while descending to play frisbee.
Scenic view of pine forests while descending to sankri
After half the distance was covered, I started to feel irritations in both of my feet due as blisters were getting formed due to improper fit. As I decided to descend slowly to avoid further bruise, Aashish helped me tightening the shoes properly so that the shoes would not slide and cause more irritation when I descended slowly. As we reached the point where it led to the main road leading the sankri base camp, we were filled with mixed emotions, the happiness of the successful summit, the sadness of the trip coming to an end, etc. However, that did not stop us from doing our version of “Pawri” at the end, which for obvious reason, cannot be shared XD. The realization that the trip is to come to an end made some of us emotional and together with an awesome dinner (as always) by TTH helped us cope with the emotions as we slept peacefully before the complete traveling the next day.
Day 9 - The long travel back to Bangalore.
We planned to reach the Dehradun airport by at least 4:00 PM. Accordingly, we had our morning tea at 5:00 AM to accommodate our departure by at least 5:30 AM. It was around 5:45 AM as we left Sankri, bidding goodbye to the lovely team who accommodated us for 5 days. The Journey was nauseous as we did not have anything to eat before the trip and as it was early in the morning most of the restaurants en route were closed. As soon as we reached Mussorie, we started our hunt for the restaurant / Dhaba, and fortunately, one of the Dhabas had the items ready for paratha, and boy those parathas were heavenly!. After everyone got their energy, we played dumb charades on our way. We had our lunch at some city which was borderline awful!. As we left cursing the restaurant, we spent most of the time rejoicing what we did the past couple of days and sang together some of the old Kannada songs. We reached the airport at around 3:45 PM. After spending some time freshening up, we bid farewell to Rohan who had his flight a little bit earlier than us.
Farewell pic at the Dehradun Airport
Our layover was in Delhi and the type of flight was of turboprops. The experience with that was quite funny and scary at the same time, the sound and the turbulence it made, while it flew, was memorable. After arriving at the Indira Gandhi Internation Airport, some people went to the lounge to get some good food whereas some settled to eat at McD. Our flight to Bangalore was at 10:45 PM. We reached Bangalore at 1:45 AM and it was around 3:00-4:00 AM when most of us went home with a heavy heart full of memories from the trip.