Uttarakhand trip during covid

We boarded flight to Dehradun from Hyderabad. Once we reached Dehradun airport we realised that the airport is strategically located between Dehradun, Rishikesh and Haridwar. If we had known that before we started we might have booked our stay in Rishikesh instead of Dehradun.

There are no city buses from airport to Dehradun, there is a pre-paid taxi stand where we went and took a cab to our stay in Dehradun. It cost us around 1k and the travel time was around one and half hour.

We booked a home stay in Dehradun on Airbnb and the stay was the best. We had a private bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and balcony. The host were really friendly and helpful. I would certainly recommend the stay at thier place.

https://abnb.me/mRBi2jtBucb

We wanted to watch sunrise and checked Google, it showed that sunrise at dehradun was at 7:10Am but actually the sunrise happened at around 7:45Am ( guessing Google shows at what time sunrises over the horizon but due to the mountains it happened later )

It was very beautiful and clear view from our terrace.

We decided to prepare all the meals by ourselves since we had access to the kitchen, instead of depending on outside food.

Once we are done with our breakfast we booked a cab to Robbers cave which was around 5kms from our stay.

Robbers cave is a much visit place in dehradun with water flowing under the cave.

The rest of the day we just stayed inside and worked

Day 3

We had booked a 3 day 2 night trip to Auli from a tourism company called "Travel Ride".

Note: There are 2 places called Auli in uttrakhand, the one tourists are interested in visiting along with the snow activities is actually called "Auli laga joshimath".

We started our journey to Auli from Dehradun at 6:10am and reached at 6:30pm to Auli. The travel which was supposed to take around 7-8hrs took us 13 and half hours due to breaks for breakfast and lunch and also they are converting the road from Rishikesh to Joshimath to a national highway and there was lot of construction work going on. At multiple places they stopped the traffic for around 20-30mins to do construction work and then allowed traffic to flow for sometime. This added a lot of delay in our journey. So please plan accordingly.

On the way we visited "Mala Suspension bridge" which was very picturesque and photo worthy spot.

The whole trip from Rishikesh to Joshimath was along the banks of river Alakananda river. We learnt that Alakananda river and river Bhagirathi river merge at Devprayag to form river Ganga. In Hinduism Bhagirathi river is considered as the main source stream of Ganga but as per hydrology, Alakananda river is considered as source due to the discharge of water into Ganga.

We reached our stay at Blackberry cottages at around 6:30pm, the journey was very tiresome. We checked into our cottage and took rest for sometime. There was a heater in the room but the room was not pre-heated, so everything in the room was very cold including the bed and beddings. The management arranged a born fire and we spent some time in front of it ( suggestion: Don't turn off the room heater when leaving the room, the room will get very cold ). After sometime in front of the born fire we came back to our cottage and felt very very chill as the cottage was very cold. We somehow slept covering the 3 blankets they had provided and an additional blanket we had gotten. In the later part of the night the cottage got warm enough to be comfortable.

The plan for the day was to explore the peak of Auli. There are two ways to reach Auli: 1) Ropeway and 2) Chari Car. You have to take the Ropeway from Joshimath and the "Chari Lift" from Auli. After a lot of discussion we decided to take chair lift as it was during the Christmas weekend and there will be huge queues for the Ropeway. We felt it would be better if we spent more time on the peak of Auli rather than the queues.

By 8:30am we finished our breakfast and got into the cab to the starting point of chair lift, we had to climb few steps to reach the chair lift. The ticket costs 500rs per person and after 20mins or so in the queue, we got to get on the chair lift. The chair lift is nothing but a row of 4 chairs which carries you to the top of mountain. The ride in the chair lift was nice and it felt safe, we enjoyed the views

Once we got down the chair lift we went to Artificial/Man-made lake (auli lake) and took some photos and we could see a layer of snow here and there. There were 2 options to get to the peak where all the snow activites were there: 1) Trek and 2) Ride a Mule, we choose the 2nd option since we didn't want to get tired trekking especially since the concentration of oxygen reduces as the altitude increases. We bargained and paid 700rs per person for going on the Mule to the top. The ride was bit scary at the first but once you get used to it, it gets fun. It took about 20mins to reach the final destination.

Once we reached, we could see large areas covered with snow. The first activity we did was skiing. They gave us different boots and instructed us on how to get on and off the ski. Once we were on the ski, they took us to a slope and pushed us gently down the slope, you are supposed to maintain balance and at the end of the slope you have fall on your side to stop, they allowed us to do it around 5-6 times. At the end we wanted to take video of us skiing but it became difficult as lot of people had come by then and people were just standing or posing on the path down the slope. We wished we had taken the video before it had gotten crowded.

The next activity we did was tubing, you have to sit on a tier and they will pull you down a slope, it was a bit fun but nothing compared to skiing. There were people selling Maggie, so we went there and had Maggie ( 80rs per plate ). After that we went and played with snow and took some pics. We were tired by 2:30pm or so and we started back. After a 1hr trek down little slippery path we reach the chair lift point. Once we were down, we got into our cab and started back to the cottage, on the way we called the cottage staff and asked them to turn on the room heater so that the room would be warm by the time we reached. There was a traffic jam in between and we reached our room at around 4:30pm

The rest of the day we just took rest.

It was around 8am by the time we started our journey back to Rishikesh, on the way we stopped on the way to get a view of "Dhari Devi Temple" which is located on a concrete platform on the Alaknanda river. Goddess Dhari is considered as the guardian deity of Uttarakhand and an incarnation of Goddess Kali. The story is that in 2013 the original temple had to be removed and shifted to the concrete platform to give way for the construction of Alaknanda Hydro Electric Dam. After hours of removing the idol from the shrine, there were multi-day cloud bursts which resulted in floods and landslides killing hundreds of people. This was the worst natural disaster after the 2004 tsunami in India. The new temple is now constructed at the original location on the elevated platform.

Then we stopped at Devprayag the place where river Alaknanda and Bhagirathi merge to form Ganga. From the view point we could clearly see the colour difference of both the rivers as they merged.

We reached Rishikesh at around 7:30pm, the homestay that we had booked was not clean so we checked-in at a hotel nearby as we were fully tired. We decided to search for a better place the next day.

We found a new stay at Tapovan area called "Tapovan vatika resort" and shifted to that. It was situated at about 500m from the main road, it had it's own garden where we could just hangout, chill, sit and work. They grew lot of vegetables like cabbage and brinjal in the garden along with lot of flowers and there is also a shed for cows and buffaloes . They had 3 buildings situated around the garden and the rooms were very neat. Due to COVID, there were only around 4-5 rooms that were occupied in both the buildings. They had a cafe attached from which you could order food.

We decided to stay inside work and take rest for the whole day to recover from the tiresome journey of Auli to Rishikesh.

We had booked a slot for 16kms river rafting which consisted of 9 rapids and cliff jumping. We had two options for choosing, they were 10am and 12pm, we preferred the 12pm slot as the temperatures will be less cold. We bought nylon pants and slippers from local shops.

We had breakfast and started around 11:30 since the pickup point was about 1km from our stay. Once we reached there we had to wait for about 20mins for our pickup. Once the jeep came, we started to our starting point which was a 15mins journey.

Once we reached the starting point, they provided us with life jacket, helmet and a paddle to row. There were 8 people in our group plus an instructor. The instructor told us four commands and what to do when each of the command was given. He showed us how to hold the paddle correctly, how to row with paddle and how to sit on the raft. The instructor had a GoPro attached to his helmet for video and photographs. He initially quoted 2k for the whole group for photography but the people in our group bargained and got it down to 800rs for the whole group. The instructor had a "dry bag", which is basically a waterproof bag in which you can put your things like cell phone, wallets, etc. The instructor asked each of us to get on the raft and allocated positions such that the raft will be balanced on both the sides. At last instructor got on to the raft and sat at the back so that he can control the direction of the raft with his paddle.

We started our white water rafting in the holy river Ganga. We enjoyed a lot riding the rapids, there is no way you can stay dry, the water splashes into the raft. After sometime at a certain point where currents were not strong, we got down on the water and took pics and videos. The water was cold at first but slowly the body temperature got accostomed to it.

We went further and stopped at the bank of the river where they sold Maggie and tea. While they were making Maggie, the instructor took us to a cliff for cliff jumping. The cliff was about 18 feet high

( the height depends on water level ), and he instructed us to hold the jacket, tilt our face in the upward direction and jump. Once you jump from the cliff you splash down into Ganga and get submerged fully inside the water for about a feet and then come up. Once you are up you can swim back to the coast. Cliff jumping was a different experience to itself and had quite a adrenaline boost. After the cliff jumping, our bodies became very cold and started to shiver. By the time we were Maggie was prepared, we had it and continued rafting. Once we were back in raft our shivering reduced.

Once we reached the end we took photos and videos from the instructor with then help of OTG which he himself had. Our jeep also had come to the endpoint and picked us up and dropped us back to our initial pickup point. Since our stay was near by we went to our room and changed our clothes. On the way itself we called up the cafe in our stay and ordered food as we got hungry after the activity.

Rest of the day we took rest and worked.

We stayed inside and worked

We worked till evening and at around 5 we started to Lakshman Julaa to witness Ganga Arati. Ganga Arati generally starts at around 5:30pm.

Lakshman Julaa was around 15mins walk from our stay and Google showed us some shortcuts for walking. As we got on the Lakshman Jhula, we could feel the suspension bridge sway a little as people were walking on it. At the other side of lakshman Julaha, there were small road side shops with clothes, puja items etc and also food. On the way back we choose to come back via the main road, which had eateries, handicrafts, ladies bag, etc. We found a musical shop on the way which sold interesting, non-traditional musical instruments. They also sold copper bottles with different finishes on them. We bought 3 copper bottles as the price was way reasonable than what we found at Hyderabad.

As the Sun set it began to get chiller quickly. We walked back to our stay and packed our bags as the next morning we had to start to Jim Corbett.

Our Jim Corbett was a three day trip, as we had booked a new year package at Clarissa Resort near Ramnagar. We contacted Mohit from "Travel Ride" and he gave us a quote for a cab to take us to Jim Corbett and bring us back to Rishikesh. We immediately confirmed the trip with him mainly because he was very responsive and that gave us a lot of confidence that he is there to solve any problems we run into and he is very trust worthy.

We got up and started our journey at around 9am towards Jim Corbett and reached there at around 3pm. Overall the resort was good.

We checked into the room and went for lunch. The lunch was a buffet system and we had quite many options to choose from. Once we were done with lunch we came back to room and took some rest and worked for sometime.

At around 7pm we went to the common area where the resort management had arranged many born fires and chairs around each one of them, there was also DJ and snacks. We sat by the born fire and had a nice chat with each other. There were people around who came at regular intervals to put more wood and pour Diesel. The born fire gave us the much needed warmth in the very cold weather. At around 11:30 we went and had our dinner and were back by 12am to celebrate the new year and to witness the crackers as part of the new year celebrations. Once everything had settled we went back to our room and slept.

Jim Corbett is the oldest national park was built in 1936 to protect Bengal tiger. The park was named after Jim Corbett who was a British hunter and naturalist. The park covers an area of 520 sq kms.

We got up at 5:30am as we had booked for a safari in the Dhela zone in Jim Corbett at 6am. We got ready, we wore thermals as we were sure that it would be very cold. Our safari jeep came to pick us up at our hotel. By 6:15am we were on our way to Jim Corbett. They asked us for our Id proofs at the entrance of Jim Corbett and there were people who were giving binoculars for rent for 200rs, we took one but never really found a reason to use it. A guide joined us at the entrance and we started our Safari.

We went through the forest and saw teak wood trees that were around 300 years old and saw cactus that grew to about 10 feet in height.

As we went around the park, we saw fresh tiger paw prints on the road in many places but couldn't spot a tiger, as the area is huge and there are lot of trees for the tigers to hide/lazy behind. Deers were a common sight and we learnt the the male deers have antlers where as the female deer don't have antlers. Other animals we saw were Jackal, eagle, monkeys, peacocks, jungle fowl etc.

There were areas which were covered in mist even at 9:30am. We even saw frozen dew drops on few of the plants. We stopped in middle at a watch tower and took pictures. There are 2-3 buildings in which the anti-poaching team stays and monitors. All these buildings had electric fences around them.

We stopped for around 20 mins in between to enjoy the nature sounds without any disturbances and looked out for any commotion among the animals that indicated presence of a tiger.

As the time passed even though the temperature around rose, we started to feel very cold. The cold creeped into our shoes and reached our feet, it slowly began to creep even into our thermals. At around 10am our Safari ended and we started back reached our resort.

Once we came back, we spent some time in front of our room heater, had our breakfast and took a nap. In the night around 9pm we went and sat in front of born fire and there were songs being played in the music system. The crowd seem to more active than the new year eve and were dancing around the born fires. We had snacks and dinner by the born fire and came back to room and slept.

We started back to Rishikesh, on the way we covered Haridwar. Haridwar is where pilgrims start there journey to visit Mount Kailash and is one of seven places where Moksha can be obtained as per Garuda Purana.

First we visited Chandi Devi Temple, where we bought combo ropeway tickets for both Manasa Devi Temple & Chandi Devi Temple. The ropeway ride was very scenic. After Chandi Devi Temple, we went to Manasa Devi Temple. We had to enquire around to locate the ropeway to Mansa Devi Temple. We could see the entire city from the ropeway.

Har Ki Pauri is the most sacred ghat on the banks of Ganga, it is believed that a drop of Amrit fell at this place when it was being carried by Garuda. We witnessed Ganga Arati here at 5:30pm which takes place everyday evening. We also filled our bottles with Ganga water and continued our journey to Rishikesh.

We had booked a slot for Giant swing and Flying Fox from jumping heights website. It was located 20kms from our stay and had to be there by 9:30am so that we didn't have to wait in queues. We couldn't get a ola so we took a scotty for rent. The weather was quite chilly and the route was a ghat section. Jumping Heights is managed by Ex-Army officers. Once we reached there, they gave us few instructions and we then went for flying fox. During flying fox we reached about 140 Kmph and covered 1km, the view of the valley was very scenic. After flying fox we went for Giant rope swing. We jumped from a platform which is located at the height of 83 meters. The experience was very thrilling. They take all videos, and if you like your video you can pay and take it.

After the activities we had food on the way back, and visited Neer waterfalls after that we came back to our stay and took rest.

At that ended our trip.