Day 5
The atmosphere is cool….peace and tranquil…too quite though! Woke up yet again by 5 am! And again saw the first ray of sun illuminating the snow on top of the mountain! Thought of taking a snap of that scene but lo, camera didnt switch on…changed batteries but in vain…i thought that the circuits must have froze. Oh well, we started to Causani, the Switzerland of India as said by Gandhi. We traveled and traveled and traveled. I heard sound of electricity passing overhead through the power lines. The traffic discipline in a place called Pandukeshwar is worth a mention here…amazing! Remember the gate i mentioned in my previous past??? Pandukeshwar is mid point. There is just one line! Sooo unlike Chennai! Well, it maybe because of the presence of military there that they stick to the discipline! The route from Badrinath to Causani, we had to go through Gwaldham, a big town/city there. Tranquil again and the pine trees..wow..erect and tall. The roads were perfect..no bumps…Cool!
Songs that matched perfectly to the weather and other conditions there
Dr.Alban – It’s a beautiful day
And just as a cold breeze swept by, the song on my ipod switched to Malai Oram Veesum Kaatru…what a coincidence!
And “ada paavingala” I muttered as the song switched to “Guess who is coming to dinner” by Dr.Alban….Why? Listen to Carolina from some Vikram film and you’ll understand! And again, after listening to Enemies by Dr.Alban, same thing…listen to some tamil song copied from this!
Reached Causani by 4 pm and the people at the hotel were LAZY! No English again. Even the Tv telecast were in hindi…NGC, Discovery, CN….everything in Hindi! From the hotel window you can see the valley, with mountains as backdrop.
Day 6
Woke up by 5 am once again.(what is it with 5 am and me?!?!)Planned to leave by 7 am to Nainital but left only by 7:30. Its a 4 hour drive and we reached by 11:30. Once again, strict traffic discipline. All yellow board vehicles are thoroughly checked. No vehicle is allowed to park on the road. Along with a person who was working in the hotel, I searched for some shop that can fix the camera. Another friend of his joined and he said to me “You are not from this country are you?”
hahaha…Regarding the car park..they have two vast open areas…free for parking. Round the clock service. Later that day, went to Eco Cave Park…climbed into Tiger den, Panther den and saw Flying Fox cave, Bat cave and two others. A different experience. Next up was boating in the lake…Huge one! Takes about 40 to 50 minutes for one circle around the lake.
Finally…after sooo long, saw lots of stars!
Day 7
Got up yet again by 5 am..weird!! Went on a winch ride. If i had not been on the Joshimath – Auli winch, i would have said this one was satisfactory. Uptil this day, view from the hotel room on the scenery was just tooo great. But the best was from Badrinath! After one week, I read newspaper.hehehe…Once again, No one spoke English but understand it if spoken to. That night, we had a musical dinner. A guy was playing an acoustic guitar. Not to my surprise, rotis are cheap here but 3.50 a piece?!
…!! Road side dhabas make rotis right in front of your eyes. Most of the restaurants are vegetarian here.
Day 8
Woke up a bit late, by 5:30 am..
. Saw TV and at 9 am, we left to Jim Corbett National Park. Its a two hour drive from Nainital. Temperature is a bit hot. The driver overshot the hotel we were to check in by at least 25 km!!! One hour wasted there. TV isnt working in the room…no current and generator is running! There are two types of jungle safari in the national park: core and buffer. You have to book 10-15 days in advance to go into the core part. Tickets werent available to the core part and so we tried the buffer zone.
Jim Corbett was a hunter turned tiger saver. He built India’s first ever national tiger reserve.
Day 9
Woke up at 4:30 am to compensate for the late waking up for the previous day
. Started at 5:20 am to the buffer zone of JCNP. All We saw was two peacocks, three spotted deers, one white tailed deer, a langur. Oh yeah,..how can i forget…I also saw LOTS of Inchara and Harikumar(donkeys and monkeys
) . We then started at 10:45 to Delhi and were help up about 150 km from Delhi (from 1:30 pm tp 2:30 pm) due to roadside protest(saalai mariyal). After my dad said that we had to catch a plane at 4 pm twice(though the plance we had to catch was not until a day after
), he let us take a detour through a village….lots of vehicles followed from the back of the line! And arrived at Delhi. Searched for the hotel and checked in. Never have I been so tired till now. I dozed of without eating the instant i lied down.
Final Day
Woke up at 5 am AGAIN! Went for some shopping and saw some places. Then left for airport. Spent one hour at the airport’s food palace, passing time!
and saw some planes taking off.
What would you do at 31000-32000 feet??? TAKE PHOTOS!!
Took lots of snaps of the cloud’s shape, size ans color.
Came back to Chennai airport and just as i got down from the plane, I heard something which confirmed that we wee in Chennai…”avan periya parupu madhiri pesaran” hehe.
North India has something that Chennai will never have…Ganges….water source…! Besides that single point, Chennai is good enough!
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