Snow Adventure in Chakrata

Winters are coming (yes, yes, it's overplayed), and it's the perfect time to start planning a trip into the mountains. If you're someone like me, who can't wait for the winters so that you can get away to some beautiful, cold places, you must have started your research.

"Where should I go to get away from the madness of the city? Which is that place that's going to make people drool over my Instagram stories?"

Let me help you out. Go to Chakrata in Uttarakhand.

I started planning my trip to Chakrata one week before I actually went, and in all honesty, I purposely planned my trip on the days when my weather app said - Snow - 100%.

I got all excited and started running around looking for all my winter essentials - thermals, thick socks, moisturiser, down jacket. My list was endless. "One can never be over-prepared", I thought. I was wrong.

I was going to travel with my college friend, whom I have taken several trips with in the past. We looked at hotels and home-stays, trying to figure out which would be the best place to stay. I'll admit, I was totally judging each place by the snow picture they had put up of the previous years. I finally came across a place that looked cosy, and had a nice view, and booked it. Little did I know that I wasn't going to have internet signal, thanks to the snow storm I was driving into. The next morning we left the house at 6. Dehradun to Chakrata according to Google Maps that morning, was supposed to be a three hour drive. It was a good drive up to Kalsi. The roads were relatively clear and smooth. We listened to music and talked and we started up the hill. I could feel the air getting cooler as we drove. Around fifteen kilometres before we reached Chakrata, it started raining. We rolled the windows up and kept going. As we approached Chakrata, it started sleeting. Snow was falling but would quickly melt into water. I could feel the excitement rise in my stomach. We reached the Chakrata check post and stopped to buy a bottle of water. The shopkeeper told us to get to wherever we were headed to soon because there was a snow-storm approaching. Having never lived in a snowy area, that meant little to us. We drove for what felt like an hour, though I am pretty sure it wasn't, to realise that it was properly snowing around us. There were no bounds to my excitement and I rolled the window down. We drove through the winding roads, getting closer to the hotel location until, because of the snow storm, we lost network. There were barely any people moving around on the road. We found one person and a dog standing near one of the bends. I asked him how far ahead the hotel was and he pointed us in the right direction saying it was "only two more kilometres". Just as I thanked him and was rolling the windows up, he quickly said, "Your car won't make it ahead of here. Park here and walk." For a minute I thought he was joking. There was no way I was going to park my car on the side of the road, two kilometres from where I would be living for the next two days. We ignored what he said, and started driving, downhill this time.

We should have listened to him.

One bend later, the car slipped on the ice, turned 90 degrees, and stopped. It took me until then to realise that there was already two feet of snow on the ground. We looked around us, shocked, scared, and disoriented. 'What had just happened?' On a normal, straight road, this wouldn't be as scary but as I looked to my left, I saw that the car was at the edge of the road, beyond which there was a steep drop of at least 200 meters. The way the car had slipped and turned, it had blocked the entire road. No one could go past us. I got out of the car, looking to see how much space we had and if turning the car was an option. Clearly, it wasn't. There was a Bolero full of locals coming up the opposite side of the road. We asked if they could help us. Getting help from locals for most part is a good option. They know the conditions and what to do better than anyone else in that area. They brought out a rope from the back of their car, tied my car to theirs, and manoeuvred my giant car into the direction it was supposed to go. Eight men and twenty minutes later, we were facing the right direction again. But at this point, both of us were too scared to drive. Even if it was just two kilometres away. Putting your foot down on the break when you're going down hill on ice is a huge no. One of the locals told us, "aap aaram aaram se le lo first gear mein, kuch nahin hoga." (Take it down slowly on first gear, you'll be fine.)

"Uh, no."

We asked one of the locals to help us get there, in exchange for some money. He finally agreed, but only if he could get two of his pals to come with him so that he didn't have to walk back up alone. We got into the car and started down the hill. I didn't even realise until we reached the hotel, but, I was praying the entire time.

Finally, we parked the car near the hotel, off the road, got off with our bags, and went into the hotel. I parked myself next to a small fire that was burning at the entrance of the hotel. My fingers had frozen and I needed to get them back to life. We thanked the guys who helped us get to the hotel safely, and went into our rooms. The room was a cozy cottage with wooden walls, and a slanted tin roof. The windows faced the opposite hill which was white with snow. I couldn't believe how beautiful it looked. What I thought would be a holiday, turned into a sort of staycation. But I was loving it. We ate a filling lunch of hot Rajma and Rice as we watched the snow, slowly settling around us. It was so quiet and peaceful that, I swear, you could hear the snow falling. We sat there for a while, watching the snow, and watching life come to a standstill. The owner of the hotel told us it was going to snow all night. I was excited. Tired from our travel, we decided to stay around the property, have an early dinner and sleep.