Kedarkantha Trek

For many years, I wanted to go to the Himalayas for trek. The time was never right for it. Finally this year, I made up my mind, to touch the Himalayan base. I had been hearing about the trekking programs conducted by Youth Hostels Association (YHA). This year YHA had a new program to kedarkanta peak (earlier the same trek used to get extended up to Harkidun). We made our bookings for the trek from May 1st to May 12th. The group was set. Padmanabh, Nanda kumar, Vijay, his wife Geeta, Raghavendra (Rags) and myself registered ourselves for the trek from Bangalore. Our friend Chaitra too registered for the same trek from Hyderabad.
Summers are very hot in North India and thats why decided, NOT to stay at Delhi. So, we booked our evening flight from Bangalore to Delhi. From Delhi, we had booked a cab to Mussoorie, Uttaranchal which was our reporting camp.

Day 1

We were on our way to the airport to catch our flight when we received a call from the airlines telling us that our flight was canceled and we had to take an earlier flight departing to Delhi. Upon reaching the airport, the lady at the counter told us that our flight was delayed by an hour. After checking in our luggage we were relaxing at the lounge when we received another call from the airlines telling us that the flight might get canceled. We rushed to the lady again who told us that the flight is just delayed by and hour. When we told her about the phone call, she spoke to someone on the other phone. Then she asked us to go through the security check and meet another gentleman. Without a clue on what was happening, we cleared through security checks and met the person whom we were asked to meet. He asked us to proceed towards the aircraft. When asked if the flight was on time, he, without replying to our question, just asked us to board the flight which was ready to take off. The scene was like any city bus stand, where the bus conductors look out for passengers and pull them in to their buses. Without much choice, we boarded the bus which would take us to the aircraft where, we noticed that there were atleast a 100 people fighting with the flight attendants. Upon inquiring, this is what we found. There were 2 aircrafts departing to Delhi, of which one was delayed. So, the airlines was trying to fit all the passengers in to a single plane. One of the flights was supposed to fly via Ahmadabad. So the airlines wanted to fly this aircraft via Ahmadabad. But, the passengers to Delhi were not allowing it. Also, the passengers to Ahmadabad were fighting to take the plane to Ahmadabad. Amidst all the confusion, one airline attendant asked us if we wanted to fly to Delhi and upon nodding our head, he quickly ushered us in to the plane. There were no seat numbers. Just like a city bus, one could occupy any seat that was vacant.
The fight continued outside the plane. The angry passengers wouldn't let the plane take off. Some of the passengers inside the plane were watching the fight (fun) happening outside and meanwhile, the plane was filled with tons of mosquitoes. Now all the passengers got busy swatting the mosquitoes in the plane. What a comic scene it was. It was good 2 hours entertainment for us as we had decided to fly in a low cost airlines.
The rest of the journey was less eventful. We reached Delhi and waited for Chaitra who was supposed to join us from Hyderabad. She reached at 12.30 am and we took a taxi to Mussoorie.

Day 2

We reported at Youth Hostel,Mussoorie at 9.00 am. We took some rest, and then headed towards Mussoorie shopping area . After having heavy brunch, we bought for gloves, monkey cap, Rambo knife (!!) etc.
In the evening, myself, rags, chaitra and vijay went Paragliding. Later, there was a briefing session conducted by YHA. There were a total of 29 participants in our batch. Out of this 29, atleast 23 were from Karnataka (from Bangalore, Mysore and Shimoga) and 17 were school boys (8th to 10th std). We chose a team leader and an environmental leader. 'Yours truly' was chosen as the Master of ceremony for the programs to be conducted at the camp fire every night.

Day 3

We were served breakfast and our lunch was packed by YHA. We departed to our base camp at Sankri, which is around 175 kms from Mussoorie. It is 8 hours journey by bus to Sankri through the ghat section. We reached the base camp by 5.00 PM. Sankri is a small village surrounded by mountains. Ours was the first batch for the trek. After evening snacks and tea, we settled down for some rest. We were served dinner at 7.00 pm and later we had camp fire, where I had to call up on people to perform.

We were informed about everyday timings.
5.00 a.m. wake up. Bed tea would be served.
6.30 we had to return the sleeping bags and blankets provided to us.
7.00 a.m. break fast
7.30 a.m pack our lunch
8.00 a.m. departure
5.00 p.m Tea/snacks
6.30 - 7.30 p.m Dinner
8.00 a.m - camp fire, Milo/Boost served and then go zzzzzzz.

This is generally the practice in most of the YHA camps. This being the base camp, we had to spend one day getting acclimatized to the height. Sankri is at a height of 6470 ft (1970 mt). At higher altitudes, some people develop breathing problems and other high altitude sickness.

Day 4

We were woken up by a familiar tone shouting 'baeteeee .... baeteee', which was to be understood as 'bed tea'. We woke up and got ready for morning exercises. At 8.00 a.m we were off for a small trek and rappling course. After coming back ,at 1.00 a.m, we had lunch followed by orientation program. By evening, the second batch arrived at the base camp. Together we had a camp fire and later hit the bed.







Day 5

This was the big day. We had to start our trek to the next camp Juda Talao. Talao means lake in the local language (Pahadi). The trek distance was short. We had to cover only a distance of 4 km, but a steep ascent to a height of 8465 ft (2580 mt),i.e., a height gain of 2000 ft. The route was very picturesque with lots of greenery around. There were some small streams and meadows on the route. During summer, the snow melts and many streams get formed. Also, it was raining every day from the day we landed which added up to more streams.
As it was the first day, we trekked slowly. We took a lot of rest in between as there was no hurry to reach the next camp. Some of the boys were facing problem climbing. After around 4 hours of climb, we gave a break for lunch on one of the meadows. By the time we finish our lunch it started raining. From that point onwards, we did not stop anywhere and completed the rest of the 1.5 kms of steep ascent in less than an hour to reach our camp site. Camp site was located in a beautiful meadow with a small lake by the side. We saw some hail stones around the camp site. Our camp leader told us that there was a hail storm the previous day and the hail stones hadn't melted still.
By evening the sky cleared. Some people stayed back in the tent while others went out for an evening walk in the forest. Rags got busy with his bird photography, while we were busy with landscape photography.

Day 6

We were woken up by the sounds of birds. We started our trek at 8.00 a.m. after a nice breakfast (Upma). The next camp site was kedarkanta which was at a distance of 7 k.m. We had to gain nearly another 2000 ft. The camp was at a height of 10,032 ft (3058 mt). The trek was relatively easier than the previous day as the gradient was lesser. On the route, we encountered snow. This was the first glimpse of snow during the trek. We all dropped our bags and started playing in the snow. We reached the camp site by afternoon. Rains were holding up, but it was very cold. The camp site was on another huge beautiful grass land. There were beautiful mountain peaks in front of the camps. Behind the camp was the kedarkanta peak. The valley in front of the camp was facing Mussoorie/Dehradun. Mobile signal was available from Himachal Pradesh as we were on the borders and everyone got busy calling their family and friends. How often in a trek do we get mobile signal :)

We played cricket at a height of 10,000 ft. It was fun playing with the boys who were very friendly and easy going. We were finishing our game when a hail storm started. It rained heavily for more than half hour, after which the lush green meadows got converted to a sheet of white blanket. The entire place was covered by hail stones. During the rain, one of the boys who was venturing out and did not come back to the camp. His brother went in search of him. There was no sight of both of them for quite some time. The camp leader went in search of them and brought them back. They both were shivering as they were drenched in the rain and hail storm. The temperatures were close to 5 deg C. Both were in a state of shock. Cold temperatures and icy winds added to their misery. They were taken straight to the kitchen and made to sit in front of the fire. After a while, the weather cleared up and it was time to click a few more pictures.

Day 7

It was a beautiful morning. Kedarkantha peak was in sight. We had to climb around 2,500 ft to reach a height of 12500 ft (3815 mt) on a steep surface. We started climbing from the word GO. In between, we had to cross small stretches of snow. After 3.5 hours with sufficient rest in between, we summited the Kedarkantha peak. From the top we could see a lot of snow peak mountains. It was a breath taking view. After spending half hour at the peak, we started our descent. Our next camp was at 'Lohasu Thatch' (Thatch means grass land) which was at a height of 9481 ft (2890 mt). There was a 100 mt stretch of snow which we went down sliding. After this point we were caught in hail storm again. The hails were hitting us like bullets as we marched towards our next camp. The route was slippery at places as the snow had melted in many places. Rains had stopped by the time we reached our camp. We were It was quite cold as we were closer to snow peaks. All our warm clothing came out. Few people were wearing 6 layers of clothing. Sky cleared up and we had one of the most beautiful view of the mountains. We had a 180 deg view of a lot of peaks which included Kala nag, swarga rohini and Har ki dun. We could witness beautiful sunset.

Day 8

We were heading towards Dhundha which was the coldest camp of our trek. Dhundha is around 5 kms from 'Lahosu Thatch' and at a height of 10100 ft(3078 mt). The weather was very y pleasant. We had a cross a few glaciers and grass lands. As the trek was quite easy, we trekked slowly enjoying the view and stopping often for photographs. We reached the camp quite early in the afternoon. The camp was surrounded by snow. It was another day of hail storm which was quite heavy. Again the entire camp site was covered with snow. There were pipes getting water to the camp site from a near by stream which froze. Luckily we had filled drinking water in bottles earlier. I wore all my warm clothing and got in to my sleeping bag in the night waiting for a long trek ahead of us the next day.

Day 9

We were informed earlier that this was our longest and toughest day of trek in the entire program. Initially, it started with crossing a few glaciers and then we started climbing up. The route was very similar Tadiandamol in Coorg district in Karnataka. The route was very foggy and the visibility had dropped to around 50 mts. We had to ascend to a height of 11,500 ft before reaching the next camp. We were on our way to the top when it started snowing. The icy winds from the snow mountains around, took the temperatures to below zero degrees( may be to -5 or -10 deg C). Al l our shoe was wet with ice cold water. Fingers were freezing. To avoid frost bites, we started marching in the same place, waiting for the blizzard to stop. After half an hour of continuous pouring the sky cleared up. People sighed relief thinking that now things are under control. Little did we know that this was just the beginning. What we experienced from here on, was an experience of lifetime (atleast for a few of us).
We started marching forward when we came across snow mountains which we had to cross. None of the participants knew for how long they had to cross the snow. There was no way we could stop or even head back. So we formed a line and started walking on the snow one behind the other. It was quite difficult to walk there as most of us were walking on the snow for the first time. Due to every day rain/snow, there was a few feet of snow. At every step, our legs would go 2 to 3 feet in to the snow and at places more than 4 ft. We had a few experienced mountaineers as our guides. With their help, we started walking steadily, but slowly. People were getting tired. The children had started experiencing high altitude sickness like breathlessness, head ache, giddiness, etc. Couple of people even started fighting. Some boys were crying to go home calling out for their parents. Bulk of our group constituted of young boys. Some of the senior trekkers started helping the junior members. We would hold their hands and guide them through or talk to them continuously to cheer them up. For the seniors, holding hands and guiding others was more tiring than actual trekking. It was around 2.00 pm and we had still not taken a lunch break. Lunch break had got canceled because of the blizzard. The only thought on everyone's mind was to reach the next camp. After a long march, we crossed the first mountain and were relieved thinking that that trek was coming to an end, but only to find that we had to cross another mountain, where we had to walk on a 60 deg steep slope. On one side, there was a deep 1000 ft drop. There was no support and the snow was quite slippery. Our mountaineer guides quickly put anchors in the snow and tied ropes. Then we crossed the 50 mt stretch on a steep slope holding the ropes. We crossed the slope only to find another similar one. There were no ropes here for support. We had to wait for all the members to cross the previous mountain slope, so that the ropes could be brought on to this slope. Again the ropes were tied and we crossed the peak. While crossing, one of the boys lost his balance and started sliding down. We were all shocked and thought that we lost him. He had gone down by atleast a 50 mt, when two guides from two different ends quickly went down to grab the boy. Luckily the boy did not hit himself against any rock. They helped him back to the track. When this was over, another boy and later even vijay lost balance and started sliding down, but were caught by our guides quickly. When we were all done crossing the peak, we dropped our bags to relax. Soon, one of the trekkers went ahead to see the route ahead. He came back and informed us that there were atleast 3-4 slopes that we had to cross. Some people were having blisters on their feet due to long walks on the snow.

By now, people had got a hang of walking and balancing on the snow. Now, we didn't wait for the guides to make route for us in the snow. We started making the route and others followed. At one point, my legs went 4 ft in to the snow and when I pulled out my leg, I didn't have my shoe, it was stuck in the snow. I couldn't even turn back to pick it up as I was balancing my rucksack weighing close to 10 kgs on a 60 deg slope. I called out for the guide, who pulled out my shoe. I had to sit on the snow to wear it. After one more hour of trek, we reached a clear spot where there was no snow. It was close to 5.00 pm. We had taken 5 hours to cover 3 km trek in the snow.
It was finally the time to breathe easy. The view was awesome - clear blue sky, snow peaked mountains, grassland and eagles hovering over. From that point, the camp was just 0.5 km and there was no hurry to go there. Though others rushed to the camp, some of us stayed back to enjoy the beautiful weather and scenery. After all, this what we had come for . We reached the camp by 6.00 p.m to be greeted by nice cup of tea and hot Alu Bondas. This camp - 'Talhouti' is at a height of 10,000 ft, surrounded by more snow peak mountains. We finished our dinner by 7.00. This was the last we saw rain

Day 10

Next two days to the base camp was very relaxed trek, mostly down hill. We had to descend 4,000 ft to reach the base camp at sankri. Camp leader had informed us that we could relax till late in the morning and head towards the next camp at our own convenient time. So, everyone woke up late. By the time we had our tea and breakfast, the news broke out that the route to the next camp was damaged, as a bridge on a river was broken. So we were cut out from the base camp and had to head back the same route we came from - i.e. the snow route we took the previous day. There was a panic in the camp. No one wanted to go back in that treacherous route.Some people started protesting that they would stay back in the same camp till the bridge was re-built. The guides were getting ready. There was a big reluctance to start the day. One of the ladies - Mrs Rama Joshi ( an actress, who has acted in many movies and plays. She has also acted as the mother of Urmila Matondkar in 'Ek Hasina Thi') started crying in her camp. Camp leader thought that it was enough and told us that it was a prank. The route was clear and we could go to the next camp 'Giangad'. Everyone was happy with the new.The route was mostly descending, passing through the villages. The villagers met the trekkers to ask for medicines like crocin and other pain killers, which our trekkers gave them.

Day 11

Another boring day of trek. The trek was on a jeep track from Giangad to reach the base camp Sankri which was quite boring. After walking through some of the beautiful routes, it was a bad feeling walking on the road. We reached Sankri by noon and took rest till evening.

Day 12

Another boring day's journey back to Mussoorie in a bus through the ghat section. After reaching Youth hostel at Mussoorie, we went to Mussoorie town for dinner.

Day 13

We started early from Mussoorie to reach Dehradun which is 25 kms away. We left our luggage in a hotel and went out to see the Forest Museum at Forest Research Institute. After that we shopped in Dehradun. We took the evening bus to Delhi and reached Delhi by 3.00 am

Day 14

We took our early morning flight back to Bangalore

All pictures - CLICK HERE


- Nagendra HK