Travel : "Break the jinx" mobike winter ride (Narkanda, Sarahan, Tirthan and beyond)

Prologue :

Tirthan is supposed to be the valley of spring. Ive seen and totally loved numerous TLogs about it, here at BCMT, mostly from that season. But I have a fetish for winters, I have a fetish for brown.

For someone travelling from Hyderabad, a lot of careful planning is required to complete a successful trip. It’s a completely different story when compared to folks doing these trips from around the NCR. For one, carrying saddle bags in an airplane does attract some weird attention, but that is the easier bit. Leaves, bike, weather, buffer days, company (in riding), last minute dropouts etc. it’s a very tight rope walk. When I came back from Sangla last July, I knew I would have to wait slightly longer for my next trip, compared to my usual 3-4 month period. And that was because I had been planning something on the professional front, which didn’t materialize. And so the trip had to happen in February.

 As for the destination, Im happy to announce that there are just so many places in the north-western Himalayas that I haven’t still been to, that choices are galore. I gave spiti, sach pass and Kumaon a thought, but somehow the very name of GHNP and SaiRopa evoked a strong sense of intrigue in me. I still wasn’t sure, and then I came across this tLog by Vinay_Sinha, where he talked about the twin towers of Chehni Kothi. That was it. I mean, that sealed it. It was going to be Tirthan valley J ..

The Chehni Kothi :

Preparations :

This was going to be a different trip, for me. This was going to be a trip on a bike. Not that I don’t ride a bike, and not that cold does me any major harm, but because I was also going to ride solo. I’ve never done that before (on a bike). That too for 8 days! I have planned a bike ride, a long one, twice before, but for some reason or another, it got cancelled (not the trip, the mode J ), and we ended up going in a car. I was determined to do it this time, to break the jinx. And I was sure it would be great fun, and that I won’t miss anybody, nothing. So I started off with looking for reliable bike rental options in Delhi. I contemplated transporting my bike via Gati, and/or travelling by train and taking my own bike along, but it appeared to be too much trouble, so I gave that option a pass. Coming back to rentals, I wrote to StoneheadBikes.com and got a quote from them. The charge was ~900 per day (tax inclusive) for Thunderbird. Rs 3000 were to be deposited in advance, and the rest (4,200) + 10K deposit + PostDatedChecque (of ~70K) were to be deposited when taking the bike (in case of major damage to the bike). Seemed like a fair deal, and the bike was booked, so were the to-fro air tickets.

I wasn’t sure what that side of the world had to offer in terms of weather and road conditions etc., so I started an itinerary post on bcmt, and after the kind suggestions posted by many folks here, I kind of had a rough itinerary in mind. There were some major points to be noted :

-          Jalori was out of the question – so I could not cross it from Sainj side to get into Tirthan valley. The other alternate was taking the Chd-Bilaspur-Mandi route, but that’s full of trcks and people :X, I wanted to ride alone, so upon suggestion by dear Anup ji, I decided to try out the Simla-Narkanda-Kumarsein-Sainj-Behna-Killodhar-ChailChowk/Rohanda-Sundernagar-Mandi route.  What Anup Sir probably meant was the Simla-Naldhera-Chindi-ChailChowk-Mandi route, but somehow I missed that, and mis-understood it to be the route via Narkanda, which as you’d see later I didn’t regret at all (or did I ?).

-          It was going to be terribly cold all throughout, more so because of our beloved western disturbance. I’ve known it up close and personal, because it often ruined my birthday parties during childhood (mid-late feb). A hailstorm/rain was a sure shot thingy that time of the year in DehraDun, it still is. SO therefore, I had to be cautious about the possibility of a bad weather and snowfall, potentially getting stuck for 2-3 days somewhere. Vikas Shokeen ji warned me about Chitkul side, and also very kindly offered me to use his riding jacket/gloves. Thank you Vikas ! Who does that in times like these for a stranger ? Since I had already bought the gear, I did not have to give Vikas any trouble J

-          The exact destinations and accommodation options were quite flexible, so I just noted the accommodation options from some posts from BCMT, and rang a few up just to check if they were open etc. Most people were open, except the FRH at SaiRopa. I mean they were open, but they didn’t respond :X.

So with all things looking good, I woke up early morning 16^th of Feb, and boarded the 6:30 am flight to New Delhi…

Unfortunately, Ive lost the data on my phone card. Since the phone does not have a body that opens up easily, the HTC folks say they cant get it from the memory card.  If I get it opened from a vendor external to the HTC service center, the warranty will be void. So its gone :( :( .. but the mistake is mine, I let it get exposed to rain, so here I pay for it ! I’ll carry on with whatever I have from the main camera (its teh substantial piece nonetheless).

Day 1:

The 6:30 am spicejet flight arrived at New Delhi airport with an announcement that the outside temperature is 15 degree C (or was it 10?). Anyways, a good relief from the already hot Hyderabad. The sky was overcast, and boy was I happy. There is every chance that rains would ensue, so would snow in the upper reaches, and I wasn’t complaining.

Cloudy cloudy


Onwards Gurgaon, and it is raining already !

I headed off to Gurgaon to drop some stuff at a friend’s place, where he took this pic of mine where I still look sane :)  .. afterall, for most people, mobike riding gear is something out of this world.

He had gotten fantastic aloo parathas already cooked, so while I gorged on a couple of ‘em, we discussed how cold it would be. He tried to scare me off (since I was travelling solo), that he had heard nasty stories of the village folk conducting some kind of black magic on outsiders, in/around some of the tribal regions of HP. Im sure these stories are true, but none of the places on my itinerary were thankfully of that sort, so I didn’t really give too much credence to this.

Anyway, the taxi for Vivek Vihar (from where I had to pick up the bike), arrived at 11:30, and it was already drizzeling.  40 minutes into the cab ride, it started pouring quite strongly. It was afternoon already, and I was now getting a not so good feeling about the potential prospect of me having to call off day one ride.

Reached StoneHeadBikes (it is in the lane just beside the Vivek Vihar PS), and checked the T’Bird. Paper formalities were completed, and I changed my clothes to the riding gear. By this time, the rain had subsided into a mild drizzle again, and I was good to go.

Filled up the tank, and took the way to ISBT (Kashmere Gate), from there on, it’s the NH that takes you to Panipat, Karnal and chandigarh. The rain stopped in sometime, and I was enjoying the bike ride fully, as the sky was still overcast, and there was cool breeze gently flowing through my face, throughout. The T’Bird ride was so comfortable that I didn’t have to stop anywhere for a butt break. I rode continuously ill 7:30 pm, when I reached Zirakpur, had food at a roadside dhaba, and checked into a hotel. The price was 1000 bucks for a night, and Im pretty poor at bargaining, so the price that was quoted, was the price I paid.
The hotel was not really worth 1K, but I was tired and it had started drizziling again, so I didn’t want to ride further.

Dinner

The hotel

What followed was some random hindi movie, and a comfortable sound sleep.

Note : pics for this day were lost with my phone :(.

Day 2 :

I woke up at 7am, and after a quick bath, headed out with my luggage.  The weather didn’t look good, and it looked like it had rained the whole night.





Anyways, it wasn’t then,  so I started off towards Panchkula. Withdrew some money from an ATM in between, and in no time I was crusing on the Pawanoo-Simla highway. The sky had cleared up, and it was a morning most beautiful. Have a look…

The Simla Parwanno Highway

The road was fantastic, the spirits high, the cruise was smooth and the sound of chirping birds announcing the arrival of morning sun was most refreshing.  However, the stomach was empty, and the big item on my agenda was to stop for a quick delicious breakfast. Many roadside dhabas came and went, but I was looking for a place where there weren’t many people, so I just kept riding. However, when I reached Solan, I decided to relax my requirement of a lonely dhaba, and stopped at this place where I had to compromise and do with tandoori paranthas and tea, Ive never liked them, and I didn’t like them here. The concept is bad to begin with. Anyways, I had no option as it was 11:30 already, and there wasn’t no point in postponing things further. I stretched in the sun for a bit, and lazied around in general. Things were looking great so far. The sky was clear, and it didn’t look like it was going to be the day WD announces its advent.

Breakfast at Solan

 

However,  I was wrong, totally wrong. When I reached Kandaghat, things began to change. Mist started to ascend on the hills, and the pines began to surrender their towering presence to it. There are very few sights as enchanting as the pines on the edges of mountains dissolving away in the mist. So I stopped and took a few shots.

Kandaghat/Shoghi

 

Crossed Simla

Simla ke Deodar

 

Before Simla, it became clear that I had snowed in Kufri, and I was now worried if I could manage to reach Narkanda today. Anyways, paid the toll tax and purchased a pair of woollen gloves and a woollen cap to wear inside the helmet. My tundra gloves were doing just great, but I felt a bit of restraint while using them, and I wasn’t that cold anyway, so I reckoned a pair of Rs. 50 woollen gloves would do just fine, and they indeed did fantastically well !

Crossed Simla, and reached Kufri. It was all white :rolleyes: ! It was snowing very sofly too. I was in love with the whole atmosphere, till I saw what all 2 wheeler drivers dread, black ice. I had no experience on a 2 wheeler with it, so I had no idea how to deal with it, except that common sense told me I had to ride slowly, VERY slowly, and that I obviously had to not break at all. These things come naturally with experience. Just as you learn to ride a bike, you  learn to ride a bike on black ice. As simple as that. It is your body’s natural instinctive response that keeps you ON the bike, when you react improperly,  have no doubt that you’d be ON the road in no time. My forclaz 500 performed fantastically well, as for the most part, where there was snow on top of the black ice, I was almost using both my feet as two auxillary wheels, to provide support as I rode. I mean, as I rode, both my feet were on the road too, making way, cutting across the fresh snow, and gliding on the hard ice underneath.

Kufri

 

Black Ice

 

There were many people on the road near some popular hotels, and most of them looked like they had gone mad, or toady was the last day of their lives. I mean you could make that out from their facial expressions.  They were so damn happy seeing snow.  I asked a few drivers about the way to Narkanda, and they advised me strongly not to go further as the condition of the road was already bad. Add to it, the weather was more unpredictable than it normally is – unpredictable.  Frankly, looking at the condition of the road, I would have probably dropped the idea of going till Narkanda, as it was ~3:30 pm already, and light was also fading fast, had I not been to Narkanda before.  Since I had been to Narkanda before, I knew that I would descend from Simla, which meant there would be no snow for the most part, and then would ascend for Narkanda again. Before Narkanda there is a Rest House (prolly at Matiyana), so if things got worse (Weather-wise), I’d stop at Matiyana.

With this plan in mind, I proceeded cautiously, and soon the bad stretch of black ice ended.  The sun decided to peep out of the clouds for  a bit, and it became sunny for a while.

Between Simla and Narkanda

 

However,  as I continued my journey towards Narkanda, and this is near Matiyana, when the ominous clouds descended again, and the prospects of  having to confront a nasty snow storm of sorts stared at me.  But I knew I was pretty close because I could almost see the Hatu peak hill (or atleast the adjoining ones) from here. Its another thing that they were silvery white ! It sure had been snowing at Narkanada.

View from Matiyana - Doesnt look too good ahead ...

 

I decided to try and reach Narkanda,  or to return to Matiyana, to check into the rest house, after having a word with the caretaker with whom I chatted briefly. He encouraged me to go to Narkanda as the way had been cleared.

Nearing Narkanda.

Finally, after a reasonably okayish and rideable stretch, I finally reached Narkanda ! My excitement knew no bounds as my itinerary was on track, and I had successfully negotiated black ice in my first attempt. I was confident I’d be able to complete the journey with 0 falls, and I was so wrong :p.

Anyways, I asked the PWD resthouse caretaker if there were rooms available, which was a pretty stupid question as it was a Sunday evening, and Narkanda was closed. The road was blocked till a few hours back. So it was all empty. The more appropriate question to be asked wa if water was available. Afterall, when the temperature is on the other side of the zero, pipes will freeze. The caretaker was kind enough to warn me that there was no water, and there was no food.  But I didn’t have no other option, so I agreed, and with a heater provided, it looked all good.

I relieved myself of some excess water in the frozen flush, and then went out for a stroll. Had a cup of tea, and chatted with a few locals who had come back from their skeeing spree. Everything looked so beautiful !

At Narkanda, finally

After the tea, I quickly went back to the rest house, and switched on the heater, for my clothes and shoes to dry. Slept for an hour or so, and then at around 7:30, went out to the local restaurant (the only one open and serving food), and had chana curry and roti. Pretty sub-okayish.
Came back and added another quilt to the 1 quilt + 1 blanket layer that was already there. Now it was nice and comfortable, and in no time I dozed off. I guess I dreamt of food that night :twisted:

To be contd…

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