Vaishnodevi Memoirs

(This is a travelogue which I wrote about my Oct 2003 trip to Vaishnodevi and Uttaranchal cities in India)

I thought I'd pen down my recent trip to Vaishnodevi and other places, from where I've just come back yesterday. I seem to be still in a daze so please excuse my angrezi incase it slips. I thought it would be a good read for people who'd like to visit these places and also just after a trip, your views and fact & figures are still correct on each place.

The trip was adventurous to say the least. I, my parents and my cousin sis went together and we ended up using all kinds of means of transport from cycle rickshaws, to a/c cabs, planes to horse rides, rajhdhani to khatmal state transport buses. And that's what makes the trip more interesting. Besides visiting Vaishnodevi which was the main part of the trip, we visited hill stations, pilgrimage areas and a city.

Now I can really say India has a lot of work to do as far as promoting tourism is concerned. We had a tough time and I was wondering what foreign tourists might have to go through to move around the various places other than the expensive taxis!

We started with an a/c cab to the airport (hear! hear!) and a flight to Jammu. We didn't want to get tired out by a train journey so opted for this.The flight was via Delhi, Srinagar to Jammu. At Srinagar airport we could see the snow clad Himalayas, and just wonder at what beauty we were missing out on thanks to the sad state of affairs there. There were security personnel who actually came to each passenger asking whether the cabin baggage they could spot all over the plane, belonged to someone or the other. We reached Jammu in 30 mins from Srinagar.

Vaishnodevi
Vaishnodevi is approachable from a small town at its base called Katra (the 't' is tamatar(hindi) ka 't', I realised this only when I went there :)). There are ample hotels there, all very affordable. Its a clean and neat town, serving only veggie food without onions! Each hotel includes services such as buying the required items for the puja during the darshan, providing the yatri slip (govt issues slips for a group of pilgrims to start their trip to Vaishnodevi, and having this is a must), and taking the hotel guest to the base of Vaishnodevi in their vehicle to start the journey. Atleast in off-peak seasons bargaining for a good deal on the hotel room tariff is a good idea.

The temple is open for darshan 24 hrs a day, so you would see people being forever on the road! The place is pretty systematic (save for the clamour for the cloak room to put in your belongings before the darshan right at the top). They have numerous police checking points where your bags are checked completely and each one is completely frisked. J&K hasn't still seen the light of mobile telephony as yet, so mobile phones are confiscated on being found. (Better not to take these as they don't work in J&K anyway, for atleast another few months). My dad's cell phone had to be given to a local shop selling darshan items for safe keeping until he got back to the base! It felt like a great risk to give to someone you don't know at all, but thankfully people seem quite honest in the area. Unfortunately the administration there does not have a nice centre there to keep such items in safe keeping in their hands. Cameras are allowed, but leather items are not allowed while entering the temple, so its better to have the least amount of them on person. The entire stretch is about 13Km to reach the top. The initial 7Km is pretty steep with loads of shops selling bhajan cassettes, food, etc along the walk. The path is completely paved, each point has steps to climb incase people prefer that to climbing slopes. they have options to use horses to reach the top and even a palanquin for aged people. the whole path is well lit, many places having small tea stalls, clean drinking water coolers everywhere, places to sit all along the way.
We started our journey at 8pm. Reached the top at 12 midnight. In between for about 20 mins the lights were out, we were nearly at the top that time. It was wonderful walking under a starlit sky, the paths were painted with white paint at the edges, so it was easy to be on track everytime. The darshan took about 3 hrs. including the clamour to reach the cloak room. The facility there unfortunately didn't have a nice place to keep shoes and bags etc. Such things like pens are also confiscated during frisking before the darshan, so I suggest having as little as possible with you. Before queuing each are allotted a group number, queuing is based on that, though they aren't very strict with the group numbers. Climb down was 3 and half hrs from 3am to 6.30am by when I was dead tired. My parents had taken a partial horse ride upwards and down as well, while I and my cousins treaded the whole way. They have started a new route from about the mid point of the path, this new path is slightly less steep, and though we thought it would be longer as a result, its about 1 Km less that the old one! And surprisingly its less used so its less crowded. Amazing how people prefer to use the older, steeper and longer route rather than this one!

Jammu
Once back down, we went straight back to the hotel and tried to sleep for about a few hours until Breakfast and then again until 2pm. Check out times in these hotels are 12 noon, but we requested for a little more time. 8pm was our train to Shimla from Jammu.So we visited a few temples in Jammu while we were there. Also a nice museum called the Amar mahal museum. Though small, it was neat looking. I think it was a building owned by the present royal family and it was quite ornate. Jammu incidentally is called 'City of temples'. At Jammu Tawi, the railway station in Jammu, there is even a baggage scanner to actually X-ray our bags before we enter the station!!!! Ofcourse its not very well checked, so many people are able to get through the gates without having their bags scanned. The waiting room was in a barely-ok state, and toilets ... Let's not get into that now!... Before our train left from the stations, there are sniffer dogs that go through the entire train with police personnel !!! That was a thrilling experience, since we've never been in such 'sensitive' area before.

Shimla
This hill station and capital is approachable by road and rail from a place called Kalka in punjab. We took the train route. Its a narrow gauge train winding its way through towns in small and large hills in Himachal Pradesh. The journey is about 5 and half hrs long and is quite picturesque. It crosses about a 100 odd tunnels during the course. Shimla is a taxi drivers haven, or should I say heaven. The means of transport there is either the local bus or taxis. They have unions of cab drivers there and so you have to pay through your nose to get anywhere around. Our resort was in Kufri a small place in the hills about 23Km (literally this long only from the station, we checked the Kms traversed by the car's reading!) from Shimla, and it costs us Rs. 620/-. Criminal is what I say. Food is one plus point here. It was really very good. Places are picturesque and though there aren't many places to actually visit and have fun, its a good place for treks and walks. Unfortunately with parents around one can't do much. And also recovering from a 26Km trek to Vaishnodevi, walking was a real effort! :) Places is full of tall trees and unlike most other hill stations doesn't have green lawns on the hills. The hills here are totally covered with either rocky exteriors or 50-70 feet tall trees and monkeys ofcourse!
We visited some places around Kufri, on horse back. Had our snaps taken in the traditional attire of HP. Bought apples for as cheap as 10Rs. per 4 apples!!! Visited a institute of Advanced Studies. This was the place British Viceroys had built and stayed when residing in the then Summer Capital of India. Now its a residential study center for research in Human sciences. A very good looking building of Scottish architecture, Burmese wood etc. They have a small guided tour of some of the rooms of the building. The place has nice gardens as well. Not big but good.

Chandigarh- Mussorie
We tried inquiring for transport options to reach Dedhradun and we could come up with nothing other than taking a state transport bus or a private taxi. Deluxe buses only ply on the Chandigarh route. Taxis are as i have said really costly. The taxi unions there seem to really loot people with their high rates! In hope that we should get a good bus from Chandigarh to Dedhradun, we took a state transport bus to Chandigarh. The bus was in a barely decent condition. But since it was only for 31/2 hrs journey, it was bearable. Reaching Chandigarh I found it to be a really beautiful city. About the greenest possible that I have ever seen around the world(literally). Very nice wide roads, with separate lanes for the slow moving cycle rickshaws, auto rickshaws, cycles, etc. Trees and lawns all around the roads, wide pavements and railings everywhere. Working signals all over the city. Traffic really following rules (unlike all cities in India, with an exception of Mumbai) !! The major disappointment was no presence of tourism information at the main bus depot. We had to depend on the local rickshaw drivers, who charged a very nominal fare for the transport but brainwashed us to lodge in a very ugghhhh hotel nearby. We stayed there only for 1 night. This was Sector 17. The busiest commercial area of the city. The place is thronged with garment shops, restaurants, etc. We found out later in the day that Chandigarh has a hop-on-hop-off bus to sight-see the city and the buses are really in a good condition and well maintained !!!! Since we were ready to tour the city only later in the day, we found it economical to use local transport, which consists of auto rickshaws and cycle rickshaws. The drivers don't ask for unaffordable prices and 4 of us could be comfortable in a single auto rickshaw (which is bigger than our normal rickshaw in Mumbai). Main attractions here are the Rock garden, the Rose garden, Sukhana Lake and the City Museum. We didn't visit the Rose garden as many tourists on the way said it wasn't the season for flowers and the garden wasn't in bloom. The Rock garden is a large place with good landscaping done up with use of various kinds of rocks, scrap like broken glass bangles, cups, saucers, broken sinks, even electrical bulb sockets! Though I thought the idea very good and the kind of landscaping, its not as imaginative as can be. Its made by a Mr. Nek Chand. But its a good place to see as it has many man-made waterfalls amidst the rocks etc. The Museum is very good, an Art gallery and Natural history museum. We saw only the Art gallery which housed a whole lot of great paintings by Indian Artists, lots of handicrafts used by Maharajahs (genuine antiques)and many sculptures of Buddhism and Hindu fame. The Sukhana lake was a 3 sq. Km lake, quite a large one ! Besides the normal boating trips, they have motor boats and even a rowing and yatching club which is one of the best in India!

We took another state transport ordinary bus to Dehradun the next day. The state of which, I don't want to get into. By the end of it, I swore that I'm not going to take a bus ride any more on the trip again! Dedhradun, though a new capital of a new state, is really struggling to even reach the status that its been given. Its really a small town. Since we were not in the mood for more sight seeing here, we took a taxi to Mussorie. On the way to Mussorie, we saw a large waterfall called Sahastra Dhara, literally a large number of small streams raining down. Unfortunately its surrounded by a lot of shanties now, which has robbed the place of its beauty. There is a Tapkeshwar temple there dedicated to Lord Shiv.

Mussorie was really a place we enjoyed a lot. Possibly because we ended up employing the same taxi to sight-see and take us to our next destination :) !!! Thanks to my dad's wallet! Seriously this hill station is worth a visit. Very green and chilly weather. A nice place for a walk, drive etc. We visited a Kempty Falls, which is a splendid waterfall. It seems to just pour right out of the center of a hill, which seemed amazing to me. The water is crystal clear and you can actually see the bed of the stream with its wonderful round rocks and stones of different colour. Another place we visited was Dhanolti, a small town about 25Km from Mussorie, which also is home to the 'Sarkhanda Devi temple'. This is another mini-Vaishnodevi which is really very short in comparison but also very steep in comparison trek. Since it was located at a very unexpectedly high altitude, my mom and cousin backed out. My father and me treaded the whole way and it was really worth the walk. Its the highest hill around Kilometers and Kilometers stretching all around you. The Devi is one of the forms of Durga Devi and is one of the places (along with Vaishnodevi) where when Sati (Lord Shiv's wife) self-immolated herself, pieces of her body fell on this hill, among several other hills where temples were built to worship her. Very few people know of this temple, making it a least crowded place. Anyone can go here and peacefully pray for however long and feel great. There is absolutely no hill as I said higher than this one, and whenever it snows this hill is the one that gets snow clad the first! We can see Badrinath, Kedarnath and other such snow clad mountains from here. They seem to hang in the distance, with their bases not visible and only the snow clad portions visible. People here are really nice, though poor. My mom and cousin spent the entire hour and half, outside a hut of a poor old lady a few meters up on the hill. The lady only grew her vegetables and survived alone. Seems they migrate to other towns when the hill experiences snow. She offered apples and food without any request and was very hospitable.

Rishikesh-Haridwar
Next was the taxiing to Haridwar, along the way we visited a Shiv temple where there was a large shop selling precious stones. Needless to say we spent quite a while here! :)
Rishikesh seemed like a town with narrow roads and hoards of tourists/pilgrims. We saw the Laxman Jhula and Raam Jhula. These were spots where its believed Laxman and Ram meditated for penance after they killed Ravana(believed to be a brahman King). The Jhulas are actually suspension bridges, very well made. They keep moving when you walk on it. Various temples along the way here. I found a lot of architecture students come from Ahmedabad here, who were talking to tourists to do a survey about the facilities available and town planning problems in the area. I poured my heartfelt suggestions to one of them. She seemed to feel I'd find Haridwar the same, though after I visited Haridwar I didn't feel so.
We stayed at a Math (Its not arithmetic! please), in Haridwar. Rickshaws to take us to all the possible temples there. I even found several Thematic temples !!! Many of them were like a gallery where there were large creations of scenes of various important hindu stories. Some of them electrically mobile as well. Some of them tried to re-create the atmosphere of a pilgrimage to other important temples like Vaishnodevi, Badrinath etc. This was something I had never imagined existing until I saw them. Very interesting some of them were. The Ganga was not in its full force. Since the Kumbh is going to start early next year, there is a lot of work going on to build bridges, roads etc. But whatever little I saw of it, it was beautiful. Very light ice-blue water. Very clean unexpectedly! Two Main temples ChandiDevi and Mansa Devi are on high hill tops and they have cable cars to reach the hill tops!!! Very well maintained system, only the monkeys are a pain!
And although I swore never to climb a bus again, I guess God had something else in store for me after all ! Another state transport bus to Delhi from Haridwar! But this time (possibly because of all the blessings of the Devis) the bus was good (Maybe i should say great! :)).

The Rajhdhani back was good as usual. I somehow love it when people spoil you with food at repeated intervals so.... :)