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17/10/2010: From Hardwar to Ukhimath
Our plan was to arrive at Hardwar by noon of 16/10/2010. Then we
could relax for the rest of the day and start for the roadhead
at Uniana early at dawn. But thanks to Duranta, we could reach
Hardwar only in the late evening. And this meant no time to
relax, and what is more serious, no time to buy our rations!
We have to start from Hardwar without rations, and hope to
buy them somewhere on the way, possibly from Ukhimath.
 A dingy ghat in Hardwar
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Those of you who have trekked in Garwahl know well the route from
Hardwar that goes past Debaprayag, Rudraprayag etc. It
is like the main artery leading into the trekker's paradise at
Garwahl. The road branches out in various directions, serving
various trekking heads. Some go to Gangotri, some to Kuanri
pass, some elsewhere. The road is long, and it is rather
important to start early, lest we arrive too late in the
evening. The general routine is this: arrive near the trek head,
make a night stay at a roadside hotel, take a car to the actual
trek head on the next morning, and then start the trek.
Debaprayag from the road (the
prettiest of the Prayags, in my opinion)
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Well, partly due to the exhaustion of the yesterday's trip, and
partly due to lack of punctuality on our part, we started rather
late from Hardwar, at 10:15am. Our destination was Uniana (or so
we thought). Little did we foresee what awaited
us that evening. So we were all very merry.
Our car now is a smaller one, and the driver grumpy. He was
already grumbling about the late start. But we paid no
attention.
We are now speeding down a beautiful road. There are many
ashrams (some clean, some dirty, but all holy!) on either side. And some hotels, that look much like the
ashrams. Some of the ashrams, I am told, are actually hotels in
disguise to avoid paying mundane taxes. Chintamani ashram, where we
stayed, is a glaring example.
Tubu-da and Ruma-di are carrying mugs just in case the kids start
vomiting. But the kids are quite sturdy. In fact, as the trek
proved later, they were the sturdiest of the four!
11:00am. We are now passing through a pretty forest road. The
temperature is going down. Ah, we are now passing through
Hrisikesh. A little official passenger
registration at 11:15, and the much awaited hilly roads
started. If you have ever been to the Himalayas, you immediately
know the beautiful narrow metalled roads winding up the hairpin
bends. If you have never been to the Himalayas, then do not even
try to imagine, just read on! You cannot imagine such splendour if you have not
seen it! Just get to the Himalayas in the first opportunity you
get.
Now we are about to cross a little bridge over a rivulet. The
entire hilly region is dotted with these
bridges. This one is a weak one, cannot hold too many vehicles
together. So there is a little traffic jam. "What a donkey!" I
hear the biology teacher grumble. It is not clear which useless
biped she
compared this useful quadruped to!
I have been to these places many time before. I never tire of
seeing the old sights again. But there is
something new this time. The large number of land slides. We
encountered the first one at around 1:30pm. Part of the road is
buried in the debris. The entire place is filled with swirling
dust kicked up by the passing wheels.
Even the roadside eatery where we stopped for lunch fifteen
minutes later was full of dust. Not much was to be had by way of
variety. The enter community was still reeling from economic
depression, I was told.
The eatery where we decided to fill our empty stomachs was a large
one. The large roughly constructed wooden tables can accommodate
about a dozen people each. But business was clearly not at its
best. Frequent banging sounds were heard from the tin shade above
as monkeys jumped on it from the trees. People not acquainted
with the source of the noise would look nervously up at the
ceiling, wondering if a fresh land slide had started! The four
ceiling fans, however, did not pay much attention, and kept on
turning nonchalantly. A TV set perched on a protrusion from
the wall was showing the movie Sholay.
Lunch break
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I am very wary about roadside eateries, especially when there is
a long car ride ahead. I morbidly avoid dal on such
occasions. But not much else was available. So I finished a
meagre lunch on chapati dipped in as little dal as possible.
News about land slide victims are in the air. Ballu's kids study
at a school near Song (the 'o' is to be pronounced as in
'more'). 18 students in that school were killed in a recent land
slide.
The lunch was over by 2:35pm. We arrived at Srinagar (no, not the
capital of J&K, it is a different Srinagar) at 4:15pm. It was
barely half an hour later that I saw the first land slide in
action. The slide seemed to have started only recently. No police
vehicles were yet around. Only three or four cars like ours, some
motorcycles and bare-headed locals on either side of the slide was
contemplating how to cross to the other side. A serene Mandakini
meandered past the place in graceful indifference. Nothing but
her steeply sloping
bank was on one side of the road. On the other side of the road
was this mountain intermittently bombarding its payload of rolling
stones. The stones were mostly of the size of cricket
balls. Occasionally stones as a large as (or slightly larger
than) bricks came tumbling down. The smaller stones gathered in a
gently sloping heap on the road, the rest precipitated down the
steep bank into Mandakini, disturbing her otherwise smooth
flow. Absolutely nothing, neither tremour nor sound, seemed to
account for the intermittence of the slide. Stones simply rolled
down for some time, then stopped, and then fresh stones will get
loosened unaccountably from the top. For some time we looked
agape at this caprice of nature. In the vast panoramic background
that stretched over the undulating hills reaching up to the sky
it looked as if this was a child's play for Nature. But a crumpled
up car that stood near the edge of the road bore grim testimony
to the vagaries of tyrranical giant.
Apparently the car had met its fate in the same land
slide some time back. What had befallen its hapless passengers? We
did not dare to ask about the state of their fate!
The crumpled car
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You may call it dangerous, or amazing, but the local people
seemed to take it as a kind of game. They would come as close as
possible to the slide, wait with eager eyes cast upwards for the
slide to stop for a moment, and then would rush to the other
side. They wore no helmet. The smallest stone hurtling from that
height would mean instant death if it could
hit the head. But the risk seemed to add to the joy of
the game, as we heard peals of triumphant laughter as each group
managed to cross the slide. Motorcyclists followed suit, infected
by the same spirit of nonchalance, by
rushing over the slide as fast as their wheels would carry them.
Next it was our turn, the larger cars. The car ahead made a dash
at the right moment, cleared the gap. The vibration caused by its
rushing wheels loosened a fresh barrage of stones. We waited with
bated breath as the second car took its stance. A moment's pause,
a dash, and a loud hurrah from the other side as it greeted the
second car into its fold. Now it is our turn. Our car rolled to
the very verge of the slide. We are all straining our eyes as
best as we can manage to monitor the stones coming down. Once the
car was going to start, but stopped as a stone of respectable
dimension was seen rolling down. And then there was quiet. A smart
press on the accelerator, and we had made it! A quantum leap, indeed!
I am afraid that my overstrained nerves have registered the entire
incident as more dramatic than it really is, but it is an
experience that is hard to forget.
6:20pm. We have already crossed a place called Agastya Muni. Now
we are filling petrol at a pump. The journey ever since the land
slide has been an uneventful one. But there are a couple of
points worth mentioning.
We are following the river Mandakini. At one place we are almost
at the same level as the river. Nandita-di, the biology
teacher with a sharp eye, had noticed one curious fact.
The river banks were
overgrown with trees and shrubs. At a height of about
5 feet above the fast flowing water lots of colourful tidbits of plastic hung from these shrubs and tree branches. Curious
as to the source of these colourful pendants, she she attracted the driver's attention.
"That's the height up to which Mandakini swells in the
monsoons", the driver explained, "the floating plastics get
caught in the submerged shrubs, and remain hanging when the water
level falls."
The second point of interest was the large number of marriages
that were taking place. With the monsoon over and the winter yet
to come this is the ideal time for marriages in the locality,
explained the driver. During the day's journey we had seen at
least twenty sets of decorated cars labelled "X weds Y". Each
such car is followed by other trailing cars containing (possibly)
the dowry. After some time these cars became a positive source of
annoyance for us. "Oh, yet another marriage car!", we would groan,
as a new "X weds Y" will roll slowly past while car could only
progress at a snail's pace down the narrow road space that is
left to us. Of course, we wished them all good luck in their
married lives. But our blessings would have been given a bit more
freely if they would only had allowed us a little more
speed. However, God speed to all the couples!
We had already started late from Hardwar, and now thanks to this
cavalcade of marriages, we are running really late. It was 7:30pm
when the tired wheels trudged into the market place at Ukhimath.
Ukhimath is a bustling little township in the lap of
Himalayas. Such hilly townships grow predominantly around a
road, much like ancient civilisations growing around a river.
7:30pm at such a place is almost the dead of night. All shops are
shut. A few locals loafing around or looking for liquors, and a few street dogs
curling themselves into a cosy corner by some dying out fire
adorn the surroundings. A starry sky looks down upon the few
parked vehicles as the township prepares for the night folded up
in cold.
Such was the scene of the marketplace where we alighted from the
car. Only a single shop was still open, and was actually
preparing to call it a day. We were supposed to reach Uniana
which was still some distance ahead. But a trouble occurred.
The driver, as I have already mentioned, was never a
particularly friendly one. The late stat, the long ride, the land
slide and the marriage parties had not helped to improve his
mood. He now flatly refused to go any further. An inevitable
quarrel followed. The driver called Dipu-da names, which
infuriated the latter so much that things threatened to turn into
a hand-to-hand fight, each trying to drag the other to the police
station (whereever that might have been)! The local people
loafing around were mostly drivers themselves, and so they took
the side of the driver. So for the next fifteen minutes the
cold, sleepy late evening of Ukhimath was rent with shouts and
oaths and threatenings, with the loafing locals heating up the
driver (who, however, hardly needed any heating), and we the poor
jaded travellers were trying to back up Dipu-da (and all the time
whispering into his ear that a fight is not going to mend
matters). We badly needed some heat in that cold evening, but
this was certainly not the most desirable way to get it.
It was at this juncture that the biology teacher sprang into
action and saved the day. With superb play acting she worked
herself up into a fine hysterics, and started railing with so
much feminine gusto at the driver for unfairness to the fair
sex, that the belligerent parties of the unfair sex quickly came
to a stupefied halt. The locals patted our driver on the back and
requested him to make it up. Promptly a treaty was arranged to
the following agreement: that we should make a night stay at
Ukhimath, and the driver would take us to Uniana the next
morning. This arrangement made Dipu-da so very happy that he
immediately made full payment to the driver. All this looked
very good. And in the middle of the night the driver took the
good opportunity to quietly drive away...for good!
We put up in the hotel Dev Villa that was standing a mute witness
to the proceedings so far. I was put in the same room as the aged
couple. I thanked Nandita-di for the very timely
intervention. "Oh, it was all play acting", she said with a
deprecatory gesture of her hand, "You know in our youth we had to
travel to far flung areas by train. Such play actings always
proved handy." I only hope that she does not hone this skill at
home as well!
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