Tungnath-Chandrashila Trek

Its been a while that I haven't gone to any of the treks after my solo trek. So, this year in April , I decided to go for Tungnath- Chandrshila trek in Chopta (Uttarakhand).

Luckily, this time ,2 of my friends decided to accompany me. So, I researched about the trek and made an itinerary for 4 days .

First Day -April14

Delhi to Rishikesh

We boarded our bus to Rishikesh from ISBT. I tried to ask the uttarakhand bus dept people about the details of the bus , but they refused that this is not their bus and then I got to know that I booked a UP State transport bus which will take us from Delhi to Saharanpur and then to Rishikesh. But more important is that we boarded our bus on time@ 8 am . As there was a bit of rush due to highways being constructed in saharanpur, so we faced heavy traffic jam which inturn delayed our bus to reach rishikesh on time. We reached 2 hours late , i.e, @ 5:45 pm @rishikesh bus stand. Since I know that we won't be able to get any bus or jeep to Rudraprayag( our next stop) as they go in before 4 or 5 pm, so we decided to take a room in rishikesh and spend the evening there. Took a decent room near triveni ghat in 500 bucks. Then we went to see aarti  at triveni ghat, spent some time there by sitting beside the river on banks. When we immersed our feet in water, it was too cold but after some time, we got accustomed to it. We clicked some selfies and photographs and then @ around 8:45 , we headed back to search for some decent restaurant to fill our bellies. We had our fill and then we purchased some snacks and drinks for tomorrow hectic travel journey and got back to our room.

I got to know from hotel caretaker that we could easily get a jeeep to rudraprayag from here @ around 5 am tomoroow morning and he can fix one for us. So, he called the jeep owner and fixed 3 seats for 4:30 sharp tomorrow morning.We all slept early so as to get up at 3:30 in morning.

Day2 -April 15

Rishikesh to Rudraprayag by bus

We got ready @ around 4:15 in morning, waiting for our jeep to come . We had tea from the stall near our hotel and ate some biscuits.  We waited for around 1 hour for the jeep owner, but he didn't respond positively to our calls , so inturn we tried searching for other jeeps and buses. But we weren't able to get any jeeps as april is a marriage season there and most of the jeeps are there and the rest are prebooked by rafting camps .

So, finally  as we weren't able to get any jeep, so we decided to go by bus to Rudraprayag as we were losing time and we need to cover a considerable distance to reach chopta by 3 pm.

So, we boarded bus @ 6 am for Rudraparayag costing 200/head.  I met one of the locals in the bus and he told me that he was returning from delhi as all his luggage and money was stolen at ISBT and he  wasn't bale to get it back. He went there for a job, but the person who need to ascort him didn't reach there. I felt sorry for him that such innocent village people are being cheated by the goons in town. He told me that he went by himself to Madhmaheshwar ( can reach there by reaching Ukhimath- then to unaina and then a 2 day trek through different villages to reach this abode). He offered his services as porter if I wanted to go to Madhmaheshwar, though I was tempted but I need to cover Tungnath first, so I declined that.

We reached @ 8 am in Devprayag ( 70km from Rishikesh). It is where the two rivers meet- Bhagirathi and Alaknanda with a beautiful temple of Rama -Raghunath Temple.

Then @ around 11 am we reached Rudraprayag (140km from Rishikesh). Immediately, we boarded a jeep from there to Ukhimath . We met several people here and they suggested different places like Gopeshwar, Annuisui Mandir etc. that can be in our list. So finally, we reached @ 1pm at ukhimath.

But real problem started here as we got to know that there is no vehicle going to chopta from here due to all jeeps being deployed in marriage and the bus was also not available. But , kudos to our luck , that we find 5 fellow travellers who have alreadt arranged for a local jeep that could take us to chopta @ 90/head. So, out of them 3 were locals , which later became our trek buddies. One of them was from garhwal and the other two were from Rudraprayag. So, we recahed Chopta @ 3pm and then to our surprise, found out that the place was a little crowded . We  were finding it difficult to get rooms but somehow, we manages to get a room where 6 people could fit in @ 200/head. We had our lunch and then we roamed to the beautiful meadows to click some shots. We clicked some selfies and group photos. We watched the sunset from there and I clicked some panoramas.

Then as the evening started to fall in, it was getting colder n colder. We reached the local shop , whose owner rented us the room and he lit a bonfire for all of us and  we enjoyed its warmth. There , we met one of the person, who was travelling from Sari village (Deorari tal) 8am through Rohini Bugyal forests to reach chopta @ 3 pm. HE told us that he camped yesterday @ Deorari tal and started early morning for chopta. Deorari tal is a lake whose depth can't be measured by anyone till now and you could easily see the reflections of the mighty mountains in its waters and enjoy the night there. We went to our rooms then and wrapped jackets to protect from cold. We could easily see the constellations and the bright stars sparkling from our room .We easily spotted the Dhruv Tara. We all engaged in  conversations in our room accompanied by room owner. Then at around 11:30 pm, we went to the local shop to eat dinner and we got some cold rice and dal @ that time also, thanks to the  hospitability of the locals. I could see the mountains from the shop drenched in white moonlight and I took a moment to capture that as I was mesmerized by the beauty .

We all decided to start trek by 3:30 am or 4 am if  we got up early as we wanted to see the sunrise from chandrashila top.

Day 3 - Trek to Tungnath -Chandrashila

As we all slept late at night, so we were not able to start trek at 4 am, also it might not be possible at that time as we were not equipped with warm clothes and the temperature was low. Also, we would also need a guide as it would be dark and we could easily lost our way. But , we all started our trek at 6:30 am morning .

We just took the essentials with us and left the rest in the room. It was still cold at that moment and we were not able to see the sun yet and the moon is still visible as we were starting our trek.

The mountains, the valleys , the weather , it all appeared to be perfect and I was tempted to click some pics .

We didn't follow the paved path instead we took some shortcuts at starting of our trek which saved our time but it also drained our energy. As we were ascending slowly, we were able to see the mountains clearly drenched in white snow. The rays of the sun on the mountains made them look majestic.

…….To be continued