"Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better."
The hectic schedule and the chaos of our daily lives, drains every bit of us, thus it is necessary to balance out the sinking sanity. I find my solace in nature, so the only way to prevent the eruption of negativistic thoughts oozing out of my mind, I decided to leave the hustle-bustle for a week and head to the Himalayas, the cure for my mental discomfort.
We started early at 7:00 am from Delhi and reached Kasol at 7:30, as we all know, once sheltered a large Israeli population and is famous for Hippie cafe hopping, and hosts a big market for trekkers and other tourists from across the globe, has now become a more chaotic town, with intractable crowd and unmanageable mess, which has gone beyond recovery. What once used to be a hippie paradise as become more of a stopover for the travelers, due to its strategic position.
Since we had already planned our days, we could not spare to halt at Kasol, and directed the vehicle towards Tosh, I personally never liked Tosh, which once used to be the habitat of the backpackers coming from Israel, the old Himalayan village could still portray, the glimpse of old Himalayan glory and rustic lifestyle. The the entire village is congregation of old wooden and stone house, which reminds many of us of old Himachali culture.
We stayed at Hotel Blue Diamond, which offered a beautiful panoramic view of the Buddhaban Glacier from the very room itself. Though we were tired but the splendid view did not allow us to stop admiring the weather and the gigantic mountain range ahead us.
The next morning the weather did not turn out favorable to reach Kutla, Or should say Mysterious Kutla, it was raining cats and dogs, the climate was extremely cold as it was early December already. Unfortunately we could not afford to spare an additional day at Kutla, though we were almost up for it, keeping in view the gorgeous rains seeping inside the room through the window, we decided to reach Kutla at any cost.
Kutla and Buddhaban are two adjacent villages, which are about 2.5 hour hike from Tosh. We had absolutely no idea, how trek is going to be, I had only gone through a few Travelogues on Kutla and abruptly decided to explore and research more about the Mysterious Himalayan Village.
We hiked through narrow stretch of forest cover, adjoining a few homestays and small cafes situated in Tosh, towards the beautiful Tosh waterfall,
We took a small break for Tea, while traversing through the hike towards Kutla, and asked the cafe owner about the exact time for reaching Kutla, he replied in a dubious tone, that it is going to take a while, so we decided to grab a few chips and snacks, as the trek was going to take sometime.
We witnessed the enormity and various shades of forest cover as we moved ahead towards the Mysterious Village.
As we crossed a few ancient stone huts, we could hear the sound of gushing river, we could have imagined that the river is going to be so alluring.
A few kms ahead, the stream and a small waterfall came out of nowhere, and Oh Boy! What a landscape It was! I could not believe the immaculacy of the water source. The water was bluer beyond any figment of imagination. We stopped for a while, and took a detour from the hike and involuntarily moved towards the stream and the waterfall above it.
We spent a considerable time glancing the stream and the sound generated by it, and found a few solo hikers doing the same, and got to know from one of them that Kutla is only 45 min away which gave us further motivation to continue the hike as we were already tired.
We decided to first reach Buddhawan and relax for 30 min and then reach Kutla,
As we started a few hundred steps ahead, the narrow forest expanded into a beautiful meadow, we were taken aback, the glacier seemed almost next to us. The diminishing distance was the ultimate motivation which assisted each falling step. The valley got magnified into a huge grassland surrounded by glacial mountain ranges.
About another 2 km, and the ascent converted into a flat trail which ultimately got connected to a bridge. The mesmerizing trail just came to a long hault, because all we wanted was to feel every bit of that place.
The water was as blue as the sky, we could never have seen this view had we not taken the detour towards Buddhawan, the time just froze.
We captured the two most cozy boulders and couched down to find a comfortable place in between them, and CHILLED for I don't know how much time. Indeed the time just FROZE.
I TOLD YOU ALREADY, IT FROZE FOR REALLY LONG TIME
The Sun started showing bad symptoms, we had to reach Kutla, it was still 40 minutes away, we quickly repacked the backpack and swiftly started the last ascent towards KUTLA.
The plain grasslands now started evolving into fairy land, full of flowers and small wooden cabins.
It was like, when God was painting this canvas of landscape, he used the best paint brush he had.
The village was indeed mysterious, there were only a few wooden cabins, and horses grazing the field.
We already decided the place, where we wanted to rest our backpacks. So we reached OLIVE GUEST HOUSE. As expected the place was cheap about 750 bucks, but we did not expect the package we were getting.
It started pouring again, and the place was full of puppies, it was the most beautiful feeling, the mist, the meadows, the glacier and the puppies.
The next few hours were peacefully spent talking with the locals, who discussed his entire matrimonial life over a few cups of tea.
As he was putting wooden pieces into the the furnace, his wife was preparing delicious chicken curry with local spices.
The ambience was so pleasant that we totally forgot that we had also taken rooms as well. The weather started dipping down continuously, which ultimately resulted into snow fall. We were at the warmest and the coziest place available, just beside the furnace.
The pitter patter of snow, the murmur of the puppies, the soothing symphony of country music with conversations and the unparalleled joy in the heart set the perfect ambiance for trying out some grappa, the local liquor of Kutla!
As we took the last sip, We remember the last moment of that night. THE NIGHT TO REMEMBER!
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