Uttar Mahayatra

Bird’s eye view:  Today was a day trip to Badrinath, a 100 km round trip. There were a lot of imponderables in the trip - how cold it would be, how crowded it would be (being the opening day), how easy would parking be. But all in all it was a great trip. We left a little early, at 7.15 am, and we returned at 3.00 pm, including a few other stops that I will talk about. Weather was sunny throughout, except for a few drops near the end. Badrinath is at 10,000 ft, and driving in the lap of snow clad mountains all through was a different experience.  Leaving Joshimath (7.15 am):  We had debated long and hard yesterday as to when to leave. Should we leave really really early, pre-dawn, so as to have enough time for a darshan ? Finally, mentally at least, we had accepted that darshan may not be possible for us, since it might mean queuing for around three hours. A lot of weather sites, Accuweather included, were predicting 0-5 degC, and snow, which sort of put a da...

Bird’s Eye View:  Today is our rest day at Joshimath. That is to say, we aren’t going from A to B and staying there. That does not preclude travelling from A to B and returning to A. Which we did.  Leaving Joshimath (9.00 am):  Before these Cartesian cases confuse you, let me revert to our usual start to the blog, saying that the sky was overcast, but some of the peaks were visible. It had rained quite hard at night, and when we woke up, the sky was still leaking. I can use no other word because it was like one drop here, then another drop a foot closer, then somewhere else, like a cloud with a prostrate problem. It was 2-3 degrees colder than yesterday and we had to carefully consider our wardrobe before we stepped out to our destination for the day, which was Auli. We wrapped up, bolted our staple breakfast of alu partha and dahi , and started our day-outing.  Reaching Auli (10.00 am):  Auli is a hill station close to Joshimath, around...

Bird’s Eye View: As per Google maps, Karnaprayag to Joshimath is 80 km, and should take 2.5 hours. But frankly, I have never met the gmaps target time in the hills. My driving is always a couple of notches slower than the paharis . That said, we left at 8.30 am and reached at 1.30 pm, 5 hours total. We stopped at a scheduled stop, got diverted due to landslides, and chatted with some of the locals over tea. So, 5 hours was fine, what’s our hurry anyway? Roads were good, as long as it was NH7. Even then, we were diverted for 10-15 kms due to road closure on account of a landslide, and at many spots, we had to wait and be let through in single file where road clearing work was going on. Seems like yesterday’s cloudburst had done some damage. Weather was cloudy throughout, visibility good, and Ms Alaknanda our constant companion. Leaving Karnaprayag (8.30 am): There was nothing to hold us in Karnaprayag as such, since we had finished our local  sightseei...