HOUSE OF THOUGHTS (HOT)

My recent trip had been to Rishikesh and Musouriee in Uttarakand (Uttaranchal - depending on which faction you belong too!). I went with my team mates and had a blast of time. This blog is about my experience!

Day1:

Our team assembled in Noida and we used four buses as transport. It took almost 8 hours for us to reach rishikesh. The section in which we were to do rafting had a rating of 3/6 in toughness scale - for first timer it was exciting! I wanted to keep my stomach light, so had couple of bananas and some chai - man for that weather, the chai was GREAT! (I prefer coffee over chai but here the chai was superb). I guess the weather should have been around 22′c - which is cool!

The guide told us that we have to go further up the mountain to do the rafting and it was 30mt drive. There we go again on a slow but marvelous drive; it was just like doing a River Trail. All the way up we saw Ganga following down stream towards Haridwar. All along the trail, one could see myriad temples and houses. Man - one should see that place to absorb the beauty! We had another excitement in waiting for us - there had been a landslide and I had the opportunity to see how the clearing happens! BRO people were very quick in clearing road and the traffic was back to near normal. After this minor trouble; slowly, we reached the camp point and we were asked to take rafting gear!

We could hear the roar of Ganga flowing near by; the whole team was excited to get into the action! We had roughly 8 rafts for us and each raft had 8 people on it. After the safety and operational instruction from our guide, we jumped into action! I took position in the front and people that’s the best place to be in - especially in rapids! Pure adrenaline rush! There were brief plains and we were allowed to jump into Ganga - do I need another invitation! I just jumped from the raft into the river - praying that life jacket works! - the water was cold and the experience was awesome! PEOPLE, I WAS OUT THERE IN THE MIDDLE OF GANGES SWIMMING!!! Thank god, I got into the raft on time, we were approaching a rapid - oooshhh!!!

The rafting went on for 1.30 to 2 hrs. We came back to hotel - all dead tired but full of excitement - and lunch was ready for us. I devoured the food and took siesta!

We started to musouriee in the afternoon and reached in the evening!

Day2:

We reached musouriee and from there we had go further up (around 14km) to a place called Hathipaon. We had omnis waiting for us and we went to the camp place. This is my first experience with a nature camp - no creature comforts!!! More than any inconvenience, the beauty and joy of being in sync with nature was the best part.

We spent couple of nights in Hathipaon and the time was fabulous. During the day - we would go for trek, rappelling and rock climbing. During a short trek, I happened to see the observatory used by Mr George Everest (the person who measure the heights of almost all the peaks in Himalayas). Valley after Valley..and complete silence!!! Around of 10 our team had decided that they wanted to stay away from leeches and play cricket all day long (yes, they did play cricket all day long)…the leeches scared the heck out off them!!!

The second night was more eventful than the first one, we had plenty of people singing old soft English rock and some Hindi songs. The going was good and all on a sudden the rain started pouring - it was a literal down pour! I had never been so close to a cloud like this before! It was 4.30am and I woke up with a jolt, jeez the booming sound of thunder over my tent, damn loud it was. I wanted to see how heavy the rain was, since it was pitch black, I could only feel it!

Day 3: We started early in the morning and reached Noida around 430pm. It was very long drive but once again it was a memorable one, ‘coz of dum-charades! It was pure fun!!!

Day 4 and 5 - Meeting!!! Boss back to job again!!!