[BackstraightBoy]

Most calls travel by sound. Some rise in silence.

And in the silence induced by COVID times, it returned like a pied crested cuckoo returning to dry shores, a harbinger of sweet rain.

It had been a full four years since I had visited Chopta – the same amount of time, you recognise, you may end up studying engineering, which can feel interminable.

So when the idea arose to return, I grabbed it, fed it, nurtured it, until it became a tree and began to flower, with a fragrance that made me a captive of my own creation.

The prospect of introducing to my wife this marvellous, soaring realm of the supernaturals buzzing with life, added the requisite fuel-air mixture. Not having picked up the camera to go on a wildlife photography trip since June 2019 kept the revs high. The wheels simply had to turn at the end of March.

Chopta is the base of Tungnath, the highest Shiva temple in the world, and Chandrashila, a peak that affords the most magnificent peek at some of the loftiest towers of Uttarakhand, including the fearsome Chaukhamba.

For the tourist, it’s the trite “hill station”, for the trekker a relatively easy climb with rewarding views; for the pious, a crucial finger of the Panch Kedar; for the musk deer, home; and for the backpacking hippie, just another attractive neck of the woods to score that which rhymes with ‘point’, if you catch the oversteer.

For a wildlife lover, the biggest draw of Chopta is its bird life.

Set in the exquisite Kedarnath Wildlife Sanctuary, it is a veritable haven for the nuts who know their chestnut-headed warbler from the mountain tailorbird, and are enthusiastic among other things about the chromatic variations of vents, breasts and rumps.

This alluring combination of avians, scintillating landscape wizardry, mystic spirituality and onerous adventure is one that I find incompatible with comparison.

But those who’ve been in the higher Himalaya know that any visit there is never a pleasure trip, and always an adventure. It isn’t that there’s no pleasure, of course; it’s just that there’s as much gauntletting as hedonism.

I know this by experience as last time, I was compelled to truncate my trip and return prematurely, after I slipped on hardened snow on the Tungnath trail while stalking a comely monal, and fell flat on my face – literally, mind you – cutting my cheek and breaking a brand-new lens – the price you pay for being cavalier enough to wear a pair of worn-out Woodland shoes with not enough grip for a Saturday-night pub visit. I was much better prepared this time, and desired a better ending.


A picture taken between Duggal Bittha and Chopta, from my 2017 trip

But perhaps because of too much of a heavy element called naïveté in my blood, I am magnetic to trouble, so I had the brilliant idea of doing the trip in a self-driven rental vehicle, it never occurring to me that there could be anything irrational about such an embarkation.

I completely ignored, for instance, the possibility of my receiving a faulty car, or a car that was poor at handling, or that it could snow all night and it wouldn’t fire up in the morning. Or that a car would even turn up in the first place.

In photography, I had regularly preached learners that a classic newbie error was to take an untested piece of gear on an important trip. That is precisely what I now ventured to do with a matter far more consequential, like a motor car.

But, but, in my rose-tinted mind’s eyes, all I could see were snow-capped peaks, a steering wheel to snake through rhododendron-lined twisty bits, bird calls for a soundtrack; and almost a cloud making a heart for me in the sky, beckoning me to take a sip of nectar from the air; in short, everything just shy of peaches and unicorns, but that was okay, for I’m not particularly keen on peaches, and among the mythical mammals, I prefer the Himalayan goral...

With this romantic and exhilarating idea I began the search, and since we were to land in Dehradun, I knew my options would be highly limited. So my delight was unbounded when I realised Mychoize had self-drive rentals from Dehradun!

Before the coffee could run cold, I had booked ourselves a Baleno (both because it was the cheapest option as well as its driving dynamics), but the first piece of trouble occurred when our flight was cancelled, and the rebooked flight would reach Dehradun earlier, necessitating me to extend our booking in the beginning to prevent the loss of a day. Unfortunately, though, the Baleno was no longer available, which meant handing it to the next cheapest option, a Tata Nexon diesel, to which I duly upgraded.

While this change was taking place, the Mychoize team committed two errors: first, they took the return time mistakenly as 6:30 p.m. instead of 6:30 a.m., a small matter of billing me extra for 12 hours, and secondly, the drop location as Chukkuwala instead of my explicitly requested Jolly Grant Airport, a difference of over an hour. I was told that these ‘minor details’ would be set right at the time of the collection of the vehicle, which, I was assured, would go flawlessly.

Come the day of the trip, I was strangely calm, despite there being no justifiable grounds for such admirable composure, considering how Mychoize had just got two crucial details wrong. Perhaps I was just too sanguine about travelling after 15 long months, or just my chemical composition again, for nothing clouds the sight as do the misty curtains of naïveté.


Colours before sunrise. Shot by my wife on iPhone 11.

So my wife and I step out of Jolly Grant, that portentously named airport, for we are quite jolly and have taken things for granted, and are greeted, perhaps well-deservedly, by nobody.

That’s nobody holding a placard with the Mychoize logo with our misspelled names, or dressed in a white hat and gloves; and nobody even snoozing with their feet up in the driver’s seat of a parked Nexon somewhere in our peripheral vision, with a Honey Singh number blasting through the bassy speakers.

Play the desolate soundtrack of the swooshing wind in a desert, with a couple of ravens crowing in flight for effect, and you might just espy the sprig of my bemused visage sprouting from the soil of your fertile imagination.

A call was made to Mychoize customer support pronto, which, mercifully, was up at the springy time of 8:00 a.m. I was given the number of the ‘operations person’ to call, which I duly did, and to my relief, didn’t find him operating in bed by the sound of it, but only asleep to my existence as his customer, for the blessed man was entirely oblivious to my booking.

“You have a booking? Today?” he convulsed, as though he was just handed the news of his own wedding, an hour before the fact.

I was obliged to say yes, despite hating to stress him out with my unreasonable need for service fulfilment. He complemented my breaking news with a little headline of his own in return: “I have no Nexons with me!”

Standing outside Jolly Grant airport with a trolley full of bags, I struggled to rally my Hindi vocabulary to manifest such a reprimand as may stand up to the need of expressing my vexation, but before I could conjure the words he muttered something about someone being on leave as the cause of the communication lapse, and furnished an alternative. “I might have an Ecosport,” he said, and before I could process how I felt about that, the prospect had already expired. “An Ertiga, actually,” he rejoined. “I might be able to get you a diesel Ertiga.”

A long UV for seating two-thirds of a dozen people for just us cosy couple seemed the dictionary illustration of overkill in the utility department, and the death of much joy in the sport quarter, but having no choice, I consented.

He said he needed close to an hour to drive it up from town, during which time he suggested we have breakfast. This we did in the way of a most delectable channa batura at the Jolly Grant circle. The owner of the restaurant was an energetic, friendly chap with excellent hospitality, and before we knew the hour was up, a brown 1.3L Ertiga pulled up at the door.

After completing the paperwork and picking up all of the car’s documents, I stepped out to inspect the car and the only mint its condition resembled was a chewed-and-expectorated one, for virtually every panel of the car had a dent or big scratch of some variety, as though the car had been a punching bag for other cars, thus abused for stress relief. I felt really sorry for this Ertiga and hoped to treat it better.

Fortunately, the tyres were in good condition and the windscreen was intact. It had a Punjab registration, for I was told Uttarakhand had ceased registering self-drive rental vehicles.

There was no remote locking, and worse, the key had to be inserted in a specific way for the door to open. Sajan, the ‘operations person’, was prompt to give me a tutorial. “Remember, sir,” he instructed, “While opening the door, make sure the Suzuki logo on the key is facing away from you, and while using it for ignition, keep it facing you.” This I found very surprising, as such diligence in orientation isn’t necessary even in my ancient Swift (I can insert the key either way), and at any rate, felt like reverting from USB-C to type 3.

Having thus opened the door by inserting the key the right way, it was time to behold the interiors, where the coup de grace awaited me.

The seats had large irregular black stains, as though the poor car had been used to transport liquid asphalt by a callous civil works contractor. The mats, if they had looked moth-eaten, I’d have been happy that the car had been in the service of wildlife, but these items of upholstery appeared to have been the dietary staple of an urban rodent. There was an aftermarket head-unit screen in the middle, which was barely readable from any angle other than from directly before it.

Wanting, however, to not be a sourpuss akin to a haughty saheb surveying a hut in unmitigated condescension, I let go of these to focus on the positives, shrugging off the demerits to the background.

There was, after all, an engine in the front, a transmission in the middle, and wheels underneath, nein? May not be teutonic in quality or condition, but what more does a roadtripper need? Only turns out, in my continued naïveté, I had assumed too much too soon, as we’ll see later.

After taking a video of the exterior to document its pre-drive condition, Sajan took leave and I got behind the wheel. What followed was an embarrassing illustration of how out of touch I was with the times, when I failed to fire up the engine despite twisting the key, until the friendly restaurant owner came to my rescue and enjoined me, if it pleased the master, to stomp the clutch pedal first.

In my mind I could hear him say, “Kahan kahan se aajate hain, yeh namoone,” but he was too nice a chap for voicing out his true feelings.

It was nearing 10, and without further ado we set sail, and the Ertiga got off the line smoothly without stalling. Coming from the extremely heavy clutch in our petrol Swift (2009), this one seemed weighted perfectly, particularly for a diesel. Sauntering forward at slow speeds, in about three-and-a-half minutes, I felt quite at home, and not at all at sea, as I had expected to feel in a UV, and remember remarking to myself how car-like it felt.

The first stop was a petrol bunk off the Dehradun-Rishikesh road, just a few miles outside Jolly Grant, and rather optimistically, I filled only 30 litres. Even more optimistically, the instrument cluster of the Ertiga projected a range of 600 kilometres for it, oblivious to where it had been woken up to do duty in.

The road until Rishikesh being a gentle climb, I barely needed the power reserves of the car, and we reached in good time, admiring the views to the west. But barely had we passed Laxman Jhula, that we were stopped by the police at a checkpost, to be informed that the road beyond 30 kilometres from there was shut for repair, and that if we wanted to reach Chopta, we had to take an alternative route, via Chamba and Srinagar, a detour that would be more than 30 kilometres longer.

30 kilometres may seem trivial on regular highways, but in the twisties of the Uttarakhand Himalaya, that is a straight implication of an additional hour’s drive; more if you encounter landslides.

Nor is it easy to find an alternative route, because for some reason Google Maps loses its competence seemingly with the depletion of oxygen, and the road signs are some of the most confusing I’ve ever seen.

This meant that we circumnavigated a certain square at least thrice; one more time, and I’m sure we might’ve begun wondering if we were stuck in Bill Murray’s Groundhog Day. Fortunately, an extremely polite and patient cop put us on the right track eventually.

Having finally found our way, we proceeded with gusto, regarding this hiccup as just another part of the adventure of touring, and self-driving in the Himalaya.


The Ertiga looking good just outside a tunnel in the outskirts of Rishikesh, before coughing up a massive unpleasant surprise.

But a few miles further, the hiccup turned into a severe case of asthma.

Wanting to overtake a vehicle, I loaded the throttle, and this was the first time I was demanding power from the car, as the road had been flat enough earlier for overtakes in higher gears and well within the low rev range. But here I could do with a dollop of the famous diesel torque, and because I know there’s a turbo in the station, I wait for it. The rev counter touches 2000, then 2500 – no turbo, not even a sign of it.

Having driven ‘Bob’, my friend’s diesel Swift DDiS, I know this can’t be it, so I keep the throttle pinned, and the revs breach 3000, and still no turbo! Instead, the engine flattens out spectacularly, like a tap run dry, emits nothing but air, falling into a strained wheeze as I hit the brick wall of power, and a terrific and perfectly abhorrent cloud of black smoke issues from the exhaust and the vehicle goes nowhere.

I am aghast! I give up the overtaking manoeuvre, pull over to the side and reflect on what just happened. And that’s when I notice it – horror of horrors, the engine light is on, glowing an unsightly orange! It had been in my face all the while, and I hadn’t noticed it. Talk about fatal newbie errors.

Any thought of calling the ‘operations person’ again quickly fizzled when I realised we had no network, and in any case, it was past the time I was given within which we had to raise any complaints. We were simply too far out and too late, and just too shortchanged. Chopta was still more than six hours away, eliminating any possibility of returning to Dehradun for an exchange, unless we wanted to lose a day. This meant only one thing – braving on with the crippled car hoping it wouldn’t stall on us completely.

So I say let’s see what we have here – an underpowered diesel car whose turbocharger has given up the ghost, which I’m proposing to take up a 3000m mountain where even a healthy car must do a Milind Soman to stay in the game, having departed nearly two hours late, with 30 more kilometres to do than expected, and no guarantee that the engine won’t go cold turkey.

If we wanted adventure, we just got a bonus load of it, but the rhododendron-lined twisty bits and nectar sips had never seemed farther away.

[BackstraightBoy]

At times like this, you tend to become either resigned and dejected, or, spurned by fortune and with nothing to lose, benumbed to your travails and forge ahead in a sort of tranquil acceptance that does not have a lining of resentment to it.

If you’re the very positive kind, you might even whistle and enjoy the setback, for what is life without adventure, and what is adventure without an unpleasant surprise? Nay, surprises are challenges, and to surmount a challenge is the essence of adventure, and does not the ice-cold water taste the sweetest after a sweaty workout?

With this spirit of adventure keeping any moroseness in check, we motored on at first in a gingerly fashion, and then settled into a fairly good rhythm. The handicapped motor was good enough for most normal situations, crippling me only when I had to execute overtakes, which I had to plan more in advance and pull off carefully, sometimes clutching the engine out of the power-pit. This meant overall that the car took more effort than normal to drive, but otherwise the dead turbo wasn’t bothering me much.

In fact, encouraged by the lack of severe body roll for a UV, I even began driving it enthusiastically wherever I could safely do so, but around corners, it was very quick to remind me how far away from our never-say-slide Swift I was. Even a handful more speed carried into a bend immediately caused the Ertiga to move its nose nervously about, and I could feel the front wheels all over the place, right on the edge of where I thought I couldn’t catch it anymore, which was frightening along those precipices.

After getting bitten thus a couple of times, I found a measure of how slow I had to be around corners, and backed off accordingly, braking well before the curve and guiding it, like a good samaritan hand-holding a visually impaired person across a signal crossing, through to the exit.

Driving a very different car from our Swift after a long time gave me an excellent and updated perspective of our humble hatch’s ‘chuckability’ and grip around corners, which, especially since the tyre upgrade six years ago to 195/65/R15 Yokohamas from the stock 165/80/R14 JK Tyres, reached supraphysical levels, eliminating the annoying tyre squeal theatrics that were incumbent with the stock rubber.

The Ertiga drive reminded me just how brutally demanding I am with the Swift in the corners, and yet, it never complains or spooks me with unpredictable behaviour or by biting back. It just sticks and goes, no matter how much I push it, and just grips, and grips and grips, with the front tyres glued to the tarmac, so that at any given microsecond mid-corner, I know exactly where the tip of the tread of that front tyre is, and all I need do is point, and shoot. With the 195-section Yokos on, I’ve yet to find the Swift’s limit within the boundaries of safety, and that’s an unbelievable amount of fun from a car for which I paid the sum that can barely fetch you a set of tyres and wheels for a luxury sports car.

As I was relating all this in prolix detail to my wife (S), who, despite not being a driving enthusiast is always phenomenally patient in listening intently to all my motoring raves and rants, she suggested, in honour of the unassailable grip our Swift offers, why not confer on it the moniker of Ibex, and I loved the idea. Thus our car was rechristened some 2500 kilometres away from it!

While I was thus ruminating over my regular steed in absentia, I was pulled back to the present by what flanked the road. We had traversed a few miles out of Chamba and were headed for Srinagar. It was by now about 2 p.m., and the sun was blazing overhead.

Down in the valley to our left my eyes met a turquoise pool. S had slipped to an exhausted shuteye (I’m totally used to this, so it’s never a problem), and I didn’t wake her up just yet. But a few yards further, the turquoise got more intense, the watercourse longer at the bottom of the valley, and I realised what I was looking at was not a lake, but the Bhagirathi river, and this stunningly coloured reservoir was the backwater of the controversial Tehri, India’s highest dam!


First view of the Bhagirathi just before the Tehri Dam

An involuntary expletive escaped my voice in stunned exultation, which awoke S to the spectacle before us. From then on we drove slowly along, enjoying the course of the beautiful, even if in some ways troubling, sight, stopping intermittently at vantage points to snap up a few glimpses in pixels. Eventually we turned left and crossed the dam, before which we were duly instructed by security personnel to not make any pictures or videos – which was a shame, for the view from the dam was breathtaking.

I honestly do not know what possessed me thereafter that evening, for I drove virtually non-stop, sans tea, let alone lunch, a limb-stretch, or fresh air, for the next six hours, stopping only at Chopta.

I have to give credit where it’s due: the Ertiga is simply a very comfortable car to be in, and this was despite being exasperated by the crippled engine from time to time. There is simply no way I’d have managed to pull off this feat in Ibex, for as much as I love it dearly, it has got on in years, and like the debilitating insidiousness of alopecia, its clutch has become tight enough to give me knee ache after a couple of hours of driving in busy traffic, the steering very heavy at low speeds, and nearly everything about it, a little less comfortable, so that I no longer regard with relish the prospect of very long or challenging drives in it, and only enjoy using it as a city runabout beater. This has left me pining for a touring car for some time now, but that’s for another post altogether.


Some pretty rugged, landslide-prone roads just outside Rudraprayag.


Meanwhile, as we turned away left from the Badrinath road, the sun had begun its slow descent behind the lofty towers, turning everything aureately beatific.


Sunset over the Mandakini



Some fascinatingly perched homes


Darkness finally descended sometime when I was just past Ukhimath, and an hour’s drive from there finally brought us to the destination for the night, a camp in Baniyakund, Dilangwar, a few miles south of Chopta. We were served hot water as a welcome drink as I idled the engine and killed it, and as I took the bags out of the car, little did I know that the day had hardly ended, and nor had its surprises.

As soon as we got off, we heard some loud music and the signs of raucous revelry. Now, this sort of thing is the worst nightmare for us, especially because S is a stickler for silence, and if we can’t get much of it in the city, we hope for it at least when out in nature, so when we sense that to be in jeopardy, we tend to get quite upset. Still, not having a hold of the situation yet, we proceeded with the check-in with peak skepticism.

As we were being led to our tent, we asked the ‘bellboy’ whether the source of the hideous cacophony was a nearby village, to which he said there was no village nearby, and wouldn’t say anything more. A few metres further we realised the reason for his abashed taciturnity on the matter, for the revellers were the camp’s own guests, and to our horror, drunk out of their wits, they were gambolling in ballistic voluptuosity, aided by a music player!

After all the travails of the day, having woken up at 1 a.m. that night to fly from Bengaluru, having faced all the uncertainty about the car, then a delayed start, the forced detour, the engine trouble, and an eight-hour drive, we had reached our quarters for the night 19 hours later, only to realise that we didn’t have a chance in eternity to get a night’s shuteye.

It wasn’t Murphy’s Law; it was like Lord Murphy had written the whole constitution.

To reach our tent we had to pass close to these ragamuffins, which caused them to temporarily lower the pitch of their laryngeal atrocities, but soon as we had reached our tent, they resumed their catcalls and off-tune musical performances as a perverse tribute to the gods of the hills. And the bellboy said contritely that they were “a little drunk” and should be done in a couple of hours.

Because the first part of that assertion was definitely untrue, and the second part was highly unlikely to turn out true, we began packing our bags even before unpacking them. We had little idea where we’d go at that time of the night in the desolate hills, but we knew staying there would be soul-crushing, for the revellers were practically outside our tent, and auditorily, they very well might’ve been inside, too!

The camp owner was gravely injured by our decision, and while we had dinner, to which he exhorted us, initially made great efforts to silence the ruffians, but no sooner had we swallowed our meals that they were at it again.

Realising that it was a lost cause, we loaded the bags back in the car. The owner was worried sick that we’d leave a nasty review on TripAdvisor, but we assured him we’d do no such thing, for we knew it wasn’t his fault, and nor did we want any refund; all we sought was a quiet place to rest for the night, and this wasn’t it, so we’d be back for breakfast and to take in the magnificent view we knew there was from the tent, which was the reason I had booked us up there for that night in the first place.

Reluctantly the owner let us leave, and we commenced doing something we never thought we’d do – more driving for the day! I was headed for Nature Nest, a little lower, in Duggal Bittha, a small camp with only five or so tents, of which I had sweet memories from my previous trip. What it lacked in the way of a spectacular view, it made up for with its humble and intimate feel, and I dearly hoped now that they’d have a tent free for us.

I wasn’t sure if Chopta had been like this the last time around. By all accounts I realised to my dismay over the rest of the trip as well that it had indeed turned more touristy. It didn’t help of course that we were there during the Holi weekend, but that was a matter I had no control over, for it was the only week during which my bird guide was free (to whose homestay we were to repair the next day for the following four nights).

Anyway, in the dead of the night, the obscure little camp soon came into view. I parked and talked to Pradeep, who runs the camp singlehandedly, and to our relief, there was a tent for the taking. As he was busy serving dinner to a guest couple, we left him in peace and checked in to the tent he indicated, and tucked ourselves in under several layers of its blankets. Although Chopta this time was significantly warmer than on my previous visit, the tents at Nature Nest tend to get freezing, so all the warm woollens were put to duty.

With the danger of losing the night to a troupe of berserk simians having passed, we put our heads to our pillows in relief, and just as I was about to slip into slumber, I heard some noisy neighbours checking in, and I remember thinking, the next thing we’d have to do is bury ourselves underground. But mercifully, the voices died about half an hour later, leaving finally the feather of the night’s silence to knock us out of consciousness in a totality that only hard-earned sleep affords.

[BackstraightBoy]

Day 2: Driving around Chopta and then to Ukhimath

I was awoken at dawn, as is customary in the lap of nature, by the frenetic orchestra of the avian musicians, and since S was still sound asleep, I stepped out of the tent on my own, with my camera.

It was my first sight of Chopta on this trip in daylight. The morning was bright and clear, the air crisp as a freshly roasted biscuit. Straight away, a movement on a rhododendron tree caught my attention, and to it I repaired directly, to spot a pair of striated laughingthrush feeding on flowers, and snapped up the first bird-pictures of the trip.



This marvel of the rhododendron bloom and all sorts of pretty birds on the spectacular flowers, was the speciality of Chopta in the spring (March and April), and if the initial signs were anything to go by, my timing of the trip was being entirely vindicated.

After the pair had left, I picked up some of the fallen flowers from the ground for S (she collects them – only fallen flowers, that is, never plucking them off a plant – to keep in her numerous books).

No sooner had the laughingthrushes made their exit than the call of a yellow-billed blue magpie beckoned me back towards the camp, where I found it perched at eye-level on a tree across the road. A second later, it flew right across, showing off its magnificent tail and colours, but not sufficiently warmed up, I wasn’t equal to the task of capturing it.

The morning was turning out to be very busy in this neck of the woods, as now the trees just behind the camp became abuzz with activity. Descending off the road, I made my way quietly, and was treated to a blast with a flock of white-throated laughingthrush:



This was soon followed by a fabulous close encounter with a rufous-bellied woodpecker:



By now S had woken up and emerged from the tent, and we had a nice round of hot chai in pristine surroundings, basking in the lukewarm sun, even as a Himalayan woodpecker hammered away at a bark.

Just then, having finished cooking breakfast, it was time for Pradeep to offer some crumbs to our winged friends, as has been the custom for years at Nature Nest. And this brought a bevy of birds attending to the free meal on the ready.

First to appear was the yellow-billed blue magpie, but since the way it perched didn’t lend itself well to aesthetics, I let it go. The next was a Eurasian jay, and it certainly struck a couple of curious and flattering angles, which I duly lapped up:



Soon the jay left and the magpie returned, and this time it was perched beautifully. I was about to get into position to claim the photo voucher, when I was almost shaken off my feet with a query seemingly addressed to me in the most gruff way. I turned around and there was one of the men from the party that had checked in late last night, rousing me for a while from repose.

“What a camera!” he exclaimed, in the typical fashion that people do when they see a telephoto lens, to which I'm perfectly accustomed. I smiled politely and turned back around to see if the magpie was still there. Unfortunately, the vociferous man had so startled the poor bird, it had changed its position and was no longer presenting an opportunity on a platter. I squatted there, hoping for it to return to peak photogeneity, but Mr. Curious wouldn’t leave me in peace. “Where are you from?” he asked. “Bengaluru,” I replied pithily. “All the way from there?” he quizzed, as though he was born in the preflight era.

“This camera here you have,” he continued, “does it photograph people, too?” he quizzed, drawing to right behind me, with complete disregard for social distancing (neither he nor any of his friends had a mask on, and nor had they brought one with them, I’ll bet).

“Hmm, hmm,” I nodded impatiently, pulling up my mask tighter in the hope that he’d get the message, and added that I wasn’t very interested in photographing people.

This last comment he ignored entirely, and got straight down to the predictable demand: take a picture of him and his friends, and make them look good.

With this done, mercifully they carried on, and the light now too harsh, and the hour of the day starting to tell on our bellies, with breakfast to be had up in Baniyakund as promised. Also, a fourth friend, who apparently had been still asleep, emerged from his tent and emitted a loud scream for no apparent reason, and we knew it was time to wrap up and check out of this lovely place, with a parting word of gratitude to Pradeep and the promise of a return in the future.

A couple of pictures of the camp, by S:





Driving on, I was hoping to show S the kind of view that is depicted in the opening picture of the first part of this post, but it wasn’t to be, as the weather had turned a bit hazy, and all the lovely, lofty mountains were obscured behind a screen of white. Nevertheless, we reached the resort that we had decamped in such a hurry last night, and settled down in their dining room for breakfast.

The ruffians were still very much in attendance, this time in the dining room, but the alcohol in their blood having thinned somewhat, their cacophony had reached tolerable levels. In any case, the aloo parantha we were served was so delectable, that even Vince McMahon Jr. screaming into our ears wouldn’t have distracted us from it!

After downing a couple of those apiece, with some truly delectable chutney and vegetable Maggi, and washing it all down with some saccharine but highly refreshing tea, we finally walked to our tent (which was still ours until 11) to enjoy the view that we should ideally have had by right first thing in the morning. And although the haze dampened the spectacle somewhat, it was still an exhilarating sight, especially in person and not so much in pictures, for although well may the camera be capable in many situations of seeing what the human eye can't, it fails often to perceive what’s readily before it, as evident from this comparison of before and after processing one of the images on Lightroom:


An illustration that also shows just how much detail you can pull back from a raw file in Lightroom, provided you haven't lost the highlights.


Still, managed to make this:



We recorded a few poetry videos for our Kannada YouTube channel, took a few touristy pictures, and just as were about to depart, I found a severed leg of a goat or a calf just outside our tent, leaving us thanking ourselves for shunning the misadventure of attempting to sleep in the tent the previous night!


S used the occasion to photograph the rhodo flowers I had picked up for her.

Then we drove towards Chopta, and found a lovely rhododendron tree in full bloom right next to a dhaba attached to a nearly invisible camp, and made a pullover to imbibe a cuppa (the tea being merely an excuse to stop and ‘smell’ the flowers, as it were.)


The rhododendrons were in full bloom. Photo by S


And they were everywhere! Photo by S

As we drove higher, closer to Chopta, we awoke to the full extent of the bloom. The valleys were full of it, the alpine meadows – bugyals – were full of it, the rocky nallahs were full of it, and the hill crests were full of it.

By and by we reached Chopta, which of course was smothered to the gills by tourists, and past it, into the heart of the Kedarnath Wildlife Sanctuary and back to isolation, the realm of Himalayan tahrs, monals, snow pigeons and wrens, and S snapped up this stunning and telling picture of the mighty mountainous road:


The rugged beauty of Chopta is evident in this stunning iPhone picture by S.

Since the plan now was to check in to the homestay of my bird guide, Dinesh, in Ukhimath, a drive of around 40 minutes downhill, we turned around at Bhulkan and started driving slowly back, stopping along the way close to Mandakini Camp at Buniyakund to enjoy some truly soothing views.


S taking in the view among the rhodos. Note the road sweeping around from the left to the right.


The Ertiga waiting for us to return from our pleasure jaunt.


And close to Ukhimath, I made this high-key image of a blue whistling thrush:



Thereafter we drove pretty much without stopping, reaching Ukhimath at around 1 and checking in to Dinesh's homestay.

After relating our experiences so far to him, discussing the immediate plan, taking a quick break to freshen up, and relishing a small plate of Maggi to kill the hunger pangs, we were ready to venture out at 2 p.m. in search of birds, and drove down to Kaakda Gaad in Chunni.

Along the way, S enjoyed speaking to Dinesh, who related how he was a chef in a big town, but had to return to town to be with his wife, and had picked up birding when working as a cook in a resort, and had come up the hard way. It was an inspiring story of how, if you pay attention to something and do it with all your heart, you can surmount any barrier and claw yourself out of any pit in which Providence may have installed you.

Reaching Chunni, we waited near a tree where a male yellow-rumped honeyguide is known to visit, as it’s at the nearer side from across a nallah, where massive bee hives hug a sheer cliff.

Unfortunately, despite waiting for a fair bit, the honeyguide didn’t turn up, but instead we were visited by a scintillating scarlet minivet, and the male sat beautifully for a moment, affording this picture:



Just after this, the weather turned sharply, the wind picked up and it began to drizzle, so my guide called it packup time, and we departed back for the homestay. Here, we were at complete leisure to nurse a slow, intense and exquisite sunset right from our balcony:



Meanwhile, S was busy photographing a couple of photogenic residents, who live next door to Dinesh's place:



By degrees it became darker, and eventually, all traces of the sun in the sky were extinguished, leading to a dramatic moonrise a few minutes later to the north:



Following a few minutes of futilely trying to capture the beauty and the magic of the moment, it was time to submit to the infinity of nature, eat some dinner, put the feet up, and call it a night in anticipation of what was to come the next day, in recognition of the kind of moment that makes you incredibly grateful to be alive and experience the magic of life on our planet.

[BackstraightBoy]

Day 3: Chopta and Chunni

The next morning we were in the car at the crack of 5:30, for it takes an hour to drive from Ukhimath to Chopta, and we didn’t want to be late on this crucial day of looking for monals and tahrs.

En route our paths crossed with those of quite a few kalij pheasants, but none could be photographed due to the light conditions being quite appalling. Further up, past the Sari deviation, and the first bridge thereafter, we saw a grey-winged blackbird flit across the road and take up a perch. To our delight, it stayed until I could get a portrait.

The rest of the drive up to Chopta, and past the Tungnath base, was uneventful, except on bad stretches of road, with four adults in the car (including Dinesh and his brother, Mukesh), I had to ride the clutch quite a bit to have enough torque to climb.

In good time we reached the little stretch past Chopta, where I had seen a tahr and several monals right on the road four years before. Dinesh spotted an Alpine accentor, which we promptly got off from the car and climbed up a rise to photograph.




Further up, we finally saw the first monal of the trip, high up to the left of the road, a female. And not far from her was a pair of Himalayan tahrs!

Neither opportunity was photographically satisfying, so observing them to our hearts’ content with binoculars, we moved ahead, to find a male monal this time, across the valley on a hill on the on the opposite side. Although far away, it made for a nice set of habitat pictures, such as this one:



With the number-one target species of the trip seen to the heart’s content, it was time to pursue the second – the koklass pheasant – but we didn’t have much luck with it, despite driving towards Mandal, and walking some way up the temple path at the hairpin along the way.

By now it was past 9, so we turned back and drove slowly back to Chopta, and along the way, couldn’t resist photographing this mountain, which looked gorgeous.



At Chopta we sat down to breakfast. Just as we were finishing downing our tea, Dinesh, who was already out and about, called out to us frantically, and we plugged the distance to him with a swift run, to find a pair of stripe-throated yuhinas flitting among rhododendron flowers:



Not far away, I found an incredibly bold rufous-gorgeted flycatcher:



Following this success, we got into the car and started driving back towards Ukhimath, and were stopped dead in our tracks betimes, by a yellow-throated marten who shot past the road and then assumed a rocky vantage point whence he watched us with keenness for sometime, before moving on:



Then, past Baniyakund, not far from the dhaba in which we had had tea the previous morning, we managed to make portraits of several species, including coal tit, rufous sibia and green-tailed sunbird, on a lovely rhodo tree:






With that, it was time to return to the homestay, but that didn’t mean there was a hiatus in the birding, with verditer flycatcher and Himalayan griffon photographed right from the luxury of our patio!


The incredibly comely verditer flycatcher

When we set out again that afternoon, the fuel reserves seemed to be depleting to dangerous levels, with the instrument cluster forecasting a range of merely 30 kilometres, so it was time to pay a visit to the petrol pump, in Chunni. While there, I was fortunate to find a slaty-headed parakeet.

Then it was time to go to the riverside, and bird from the bridge, where a female kalij pheasant was perched interestingly:



Then, on the honeyguide path, I managed to snap up this streaked laughingthrush:



Witnessing a dip in activity, we decided to drive back towards Ukhimath, and found this Himalayan bulbul perched beautifully:



There were a couple of great barbets decorating the trees, but none perched well enough for beautiful photographs. Driving ahead, Mukesh ordered the vehicle to a halt when he spotted a pair of common rosefinch.

Then we dropped off Dinesh and carried on further up just to see what else we could find, and this rhesus macaque was sitting dramatically on a precipice was the answer:



We pulled over at the Brahmakamal dhaba to end the evening with a cup of tea. Across the valley, on the opposite hill, a fire was raging, and the singed forest was rising to the sky. Forest fires are almost always caused by humans, and with deliberate intent, and having seen several such fires already on the trip was dispiriting. S made this image as a portrayal of irony that was rife in the moment:

[BackstraightBoy]

Day 4: Tungnath and Chandrashila

Day 4 dawned early, for this was the day for what is the highlight of any trip to Chopta – the utterly absorbing climb up to Tungnath and Chandrashila.

Once you park your car at Chopta, it’s a five-kilometre climb up to the Shiva temple, and a further two-kilometre ascent to the summit of Chandrashila. As much of it is uphill and as a photographer you’re laden with heavy equipment, it’s no walk in the park.

In fact the Tungnath trail is where you learn that the Himalaya makes you work for its carrots, and if you do, the taste is unsurpassed.

This mountain sure knows how to make you feel alive and lively. The carrot is always dangled high, where it isn’t reached cheaply.

This snowy abode of the supernaturals doesn’t need to demand your attention and solicit your attendance, because it commands them. And it shows you the peaks of life while also offering a helpful glimpse of what lies just beyond the heights, in the throes of its deep valleys.

You don’t tread the high Himalaya as much as you straddle an edge between extreme elation and potential despair. And you can’t take your foot off the edge, because the edge is all there is.

Of course we knew that the lack of snow would decrease the difficulty level of our enterprise, but in the Himalaya, you always respect the mountain.

With this preamble, the day started exceptionally early, when I awoke at 3, so as to be able to make the departure time of 4:30. The idea was to reach Chopta (an hour’s drive) in time to commence our climb at 5:30, and before the rising sun had the chance to rouse the many birds found here to a heightened enough state of activity for them to get away, for us to reach the middle reaches, for it is not just the early bird, but the bird that is at the right place at the right time that catches the worm.


S walking the Tungnath trail. Shot on iPhone 7.

Accordingly and gladly, we were on time, and by 6:00, had climbed high enough to be treated to the first view of Chaukhamba, that redoubtable peak that never fails to awe me. Owing to the generally indifferent weather and the prevailing haze, the view wasn’t very clear, but at least, there was one.

Just then a koklass started calling from our left, and while waiting for it would’ve no doubt led to a photographable sighting, I urged S on ahead, because I wanted beautiful views of the mountains in virginal light as much as the birds, and life and light wait for none, as they don’t say.


Chaukhamba rises, majestic and mighty, straight up, like a stolid Goliath.

Further up, we missed getting a picture of another koklass by a matter of metres, but I was confident that we’d get more opportunities, for the Tungnath trail is never short of activity.

Surely enough, we found a monal on a highly clement perch in the valley to our left, albeit a bit far, and made the most of it.



A BTS view of the picture, by S:



And the view of the snow-clad mountains was now like this:



Meanwhile, the call of some koklass or another was a constant, and we were constantly conscious of the hope of photographing one, as we had had no fortune on the trip with this beauty hitherto.

That moment finally came soon enough, for we found a male seemingly completely oblivious to his surroundings, as we crouched and crawled into position, making bunkers out of the recesses between the rocks, until he actually appeared fairly close to where we were, allowing us some intimate shots of his gorgeous plumage:



And then, in a case of granting the weary traveller’s serendipity, he called:



Being adequately satisfied that the morning was going to his plan and all was well in his world, he proceeded feeding and became obscure in the bushes in pursuit of grub, so we left him at peace and carried further on.

Not far away, we heard an olive-backed pipit calling from atop a tree, and the next moment the realisation of the moment’s potential dawned on us.

The pipit was perched directly before the mountain, allowing us this dramatic and ecstatic visual:



And here’s what the pipit looked like, up close:



Mesmerised by this triumphant sight, we carried on, and found several Alpine accentors dotting the snowless slopes to our left, which looked like this:



Meanwhile, the majesty of Chaukhamba had reached a peak, if you’ll excuse my entirely intentional pun, and because of the haze, it looked all the more mystical, as naturally, that which teases us fascinates us all the more.

Soon, we found a completely surprising species up here – a fire-tailed sunbird – in what was apparently only the second ever time Dinesh had seen it at this elevation:



And a rather beautifully perched stripe-throated yuhina:



Shortly after this, after what could be called a challenging, but not arduous, climb, we reached the sweet reward of seeing the Tungnath temple.


Taking the last few yards to Tungnath. Picture by S.

It isn’t open before May, but just being on its premises and absorbing the energy there never fails to evoke tears in my eyes.



After recording S reading out a Kuvempu poem right before it, we set forth on our next mission: the summit of Chandrashila at 4000 metres.

I had been unable to set foot on this peak from which the most stunning view of the Garhwal Himalaya is there to be taken, on my last visit, so I had been very keen to not miss out this time. Fortunately, S was, if anything, even more enthusiastic than me, which I found utterly admirable and laurel-worthy.

Although there is a path up to Chandrashila, there are places where climbers tend to take a shortcut, especially when there’s no snow, and what we realised is that when you do that, you end up expending more energy than you’d have by taking the longer route, since the latter is less steep and therefore not as strenuous.

It is interesting to observe these nuances and psychological intricacies when doing challenging tasks, and certainly, being in the high altitudes of the Himalaya is nothing if not a way of understanding oneself and the ways of the mind.

We were now getting to the heights where the coveted snow partridge resides, and Sandeep, one of the bird guides around us, decided to take a walk to the mountains yonder for a look-see for them, when the sight gave me a sensational perspective – but was I showing him or the mountains in scale? Now, that itself is a matter of perspective, and to be in contradiction and at the same time perfect harmony is the nature of the universe:


For the best experience, click on the photo and see the bigger version. And don't miss the human in it for scale!

And for those who prefer colour:



Unfortunately, try as we might, the snow partridge proved elusive, and thanks to the low levels of snow, perhaps, wasn’t to be found.

Before long we reached the summit, and we settled down in a quiet corner, away from anyone else, just watching the silence, and feeling the stillness.

The thing I love about reaching a Himalayan summit is not any egotistical satisfaction of having “conquered a mountain” (as though you could ever do that! – it’s the largesse and magnanimity of a mountain if it allows you to climb it), but the facility of quite literally being elevated from all the trivialities of life into a realm where there’s just pure life, without any of its accessories, distractions, illusions and lies.

Although it’s true that wherever you go, you carry the same mind with you, which means that you can be a prisoner of your own cell anywhere you are, just the purity and ruthlessness of the Himalayan mountains has the power to move you enough to help you look beyond the clutter and the din of everyday transactions which we mistake for what life is about, and come to be face to face with sheer existential fundamentals, and therein, transcend false knowledge into the rarefied atmosphere of a beautiful ignorance…


'A delicate balance': picture by S on iPhone.

Before we opened our breakfast packs, an incredibly bold accentor came to say hello:



Then quite a few jungle crows landed close by, cawing for their share, but needing every ounce of the food we had, for our high degrees of physical exertions, and to keep wildlife wild, we didn’t offer any.

Meanwhile, even as our palates feasted on paranthas, the sight directly ahead of us was this:



And to our left was this:



After recording another couple of poems, it was time to undertake the descent, which is often trickier than the ascent, as most trekkers know, for it places great stress on the knees and ankles, and often, exerting the requisite control over the speed of descent at high altitudes and down steep slopes, requires as much effort, albeit in an entirely different way, as does climbing up.

Taking frequent breaks, we took an entire 2.5 hours to return to the base, and here, I must document the extraordinary bundle of energy that Mukesh is. Dinesh had returned from Tungnath with another guest, and Mukesh had accompanied us to Chandrashila (apart from Sandeep, who had his own client). And this man...is...utterly indefatigable!

Apart from serving as a porter for the other guests who came until Tungnath, carrying their heavy telephoto lens, he had voluntarily tagged along to Chandrashila with us despite our insisting we didn’t need him to come. And how!

The man simply wouldn’t give up! It was his first time climbing up Chandrashila, so he was in fact grateful to us for having given him an excuse to climb, and just wouldn’t stop looking for birds wherever he was! He never sat down for a moment to rest, and I never saw him for one moment lost in thought or nursing any sign of fatigue or disinterest. Having been a bartender in Delhi, he has recently returned to his humble hometown to work in wildlife tourism, and S and I earnestly wish him the very best in making it big, for he deserves to!

Nearly at the end of the Tungnath trail we were blessed by the sight of a spotted treecreeper, but I couldn’t make a great picture.

Instead, we sat for sometime before this plaque:




A rhododendron tree at the lower reaches of Tungnath. What a bounty of nature!

As we were driving back to Ukhimath, Mukesh still wouldn’t give up, and kept looking for birds, and fetched us this lovely sighting of a white-tailed nuthatch:



After taking a brief breather in the homestay, we were off again! – this time close to Ukhimath itself, and a pair of common rosefinch and russet sparrow kept us busy running from tree to tree:



But it was with a great barbet that I spent a lot of time. This one was feeding for quite some time, and I got to witness all sorts of behaviour, as for some happy reason, it ignored me completely (I’ve never been happier to be ignored!) and went about its business. Having nursed the dream of photographing this beauty for a long time, I thoroughly enjoyed this session.



Then an Asian barred owlet sat stunningly on top of a tree:



And so did a slaty-headed parakeet:



Then what looked like an upland pipit made an appearance, although one of our guides (Ankit) insisted that it was an olive-backed:



With that splash of colour in the retiring sun, it was time for us to return. There was another car with us with the other guests staying in our homestay, and we thought Mukesh got into that, and we carried on, only to realise that he hadn’t, and we had left him behind, and the poor fellow had to walk back all the way, hours after having climbed up and down the highest peak in these parts! After all the energy he had exerted for us, we felt terrible about it, but as all nice men do, he had a laugh about it and forgave us our folly.

[BackstraightBoy]

Day 5: Makkumath

We had deliberately timed the Tungnath-Chandrashila day as the penultimate day in Chopta and not the last day, for the deleterious effects wrought by the precipitous ascent and descent would’ve wreaked havoc on the lower limbs if they were subjected to the abuse of driving for a full eight hours in the twisties the next day to Rishikesh.

Thus we had a ‘cooling-off’ or ‘comfort’ day in the form of day five, on which day we decided to bird on the Makku route. This serpentine road climbs up towards Chopta, then takes a deviation a few kilometres before it to the right, and drives through a most delightful, very free road flanked by the most beautiful forest teeming with life. It then descends sharply and lands on the Ukhimath Road, a few miles short of Kaakda Ghat.

Our main aim on this day, in Makku, was to find the elusive scarlet finch, and to that end, we started nice and early, nearly ignoring the several kalij pheasants that crossed our paths.

But a nicely perched grey-winged blackbird was too much to ignore:



This piece of munificence was quickly followed up by the most invigorating session of birding a little further down the road, once we had taken the Makku deviation from the Ukhimath-Chopta road.

The calls of a Himalayan shrike-babbler brought us to a halt, and we parked the cars aside and looked down at the trees in the valley, and a veritable smorgasbord of offerings was spread out.

First, the shrike-babbler itself lent itself kindly to some pictures, however crummy:



Then there appeared a maroon oriole, with its sonorous calls:



Then a grey-headed woodpecker added itself to the mix:



Amid all this, a green-backed tit came and went but I couldn’t manage a picture of it.

We could’ve pursued more, but I was told that the scarlet finch is something of a spotlight-shy character, and to catch it, we must intercept its visit to the roadside trees before the flaxen rays of the sun became incident on their verdant leaves. In short, we had to get a move on.

Moments later, driving further down, a Himalayan goral stepped onto the road from nowhere, crossed it, and leapt off into the valley as though it was the backyard play-bunker, all in one fluid motion, and it was just impossible to match its speed and agility with stopping the car, taking the camera out and firing away a few pictures, so the sight remains only in my memory, disabled from being shared with the wider world.

Reaching Makku, we found this Tickell’s thrush posing beautifully on an open perch:



At the next village, a small niltava arrested our progress in an adorable fashion:



From thereon, we drove continuously, consciously resisting the temptation to stop anywhere else. Soon we reached the stretch of road that is known to be haunted by the scarlet finch, and we duly parked the cars aside and started looking for them.

This was also the realm of the speckled wood-pigeons, and we saw quite a healthy number of them.



Meanwhile, an ultramarine flycatcher had perched practically overhead, completely unnoticed for some time:



There was also a long-tailed minivet:



We waited around for quite a bit, and Dinesh finally seemed to have found a pair of scarlet finch, but by the time we could run over to where he was, they were gone.

It was quite sunny by now, so we gave up the pursuit and moved on further down.

Just beyond the terraces of some houses in the outskirts of Makku Math, we saw some greenfinch and stopped for them. A little further we saw black-headed jays.

Further down a blue whistling thrush was perched beautifully, and although it is exceedingly common in these parts, we could never tire of admiring this songster's splash of brilliant blue on the wings and subtle streaks and dots of white on its face, neck and breast, finished off with a yellow beak.



Then after navigating via a pair of kalij pheasant, a plumbeous water redstart and a barred owlet, we reached a stream in the neck of a settlement, sadly, highly polluted. Everything from biscuit packs to old shoes had been dumped into it making it a sorry sight, but incredibly, that didn’t stop the birds from being all over the place.

Stopping over, we quietly slipped ourselves into the midst, and here were the birds that graced us with their views, in order of appearance:

Spotted forktail:



White-capped redstart:



Chestnut-headed tesia(!)



Streaked laughingthrush



Seeing these birds peck away at grub brought to the fore of our minds the time of day and the fact that our bellies hadn’t seen breakfast yet, so we repaired to a dhaba in proper Makku Math, albeit in the hope of having a more hygenic repast.

While there, S made these lovely portraits:




The dogs in Chopta are decidedly good-looking.

Across the road, a common house sparrow perched on a Pulsar, appearing to ride it:



After a leisurely breakfast and tea, we continued on, and at first found a rusty-cheeked scimitar babbler:



Then a grey bushchat couple perched rather artistically:



A few miles down we encountered a few common rosefinches and this chestnut-bellied nuthatch:



This done, we descended the long and winding road to Kaakda, treating ourselves to views of some lovely-looking grey langurs along the way.


A beautiful and beautifully located temple.

It was now pushing 12 noon, so the light was harsh and the temperatures were soaring, but we stayed by the river, watching the activity unfold.

A crested kingfisher caught a fish. A russet sparrow showed off his beautiful russet, and S took a little walk down to the Mandakini for some time with the pebbles on the beach.

I, meanwhile, descended the ghat and walked under the bridge, where I happened to espy a plumbeous water redstart. What was unusual was that he was exceptionally bold, and allowed quite an audacious approach. It appears that he was perhaps getting ready to mate for the season, which is usually when animals and birds of various specifications tend to lose their customary rationality and cautiousness, which isn’t very different from how we as apex apes behave.

After finding a comfortable position, I was able to line him up against the tiny waterfall behind him to get this habitat shot, with the turquoise water showing through. I employed a slow shutter to blur the water and achieve the silky effect, but this was woefully tricky because I hadn’t carried my tripod down from the road with me, and had to rely on a pair of stable hands and also hope the redstart doesn’t move much while the mirror was going up and down, causing a whole deal of vibrations. Tall chance, especially at a long focal length as 200mm, no matter what generation of image stabilisation the lens is equipped with, but amazingly, I managed to pull off a couple of frames sharp, one of which was this:



Here’s a close portrait of this looker. Redstarts get their name from Middle English ‘stert’, meaning ‘tail’, in reference to their red tails. Their close genetic relation to flycatchers is evident in this closeup:



Having been blessed with a good time, I left him in peace and returned to the road where I was joined by S. It was by now sweltering and we dearly could’ve used a cold drink, but being completely averse to using plastic bottles, we desisted. Unfortunately none in these parts seems to stock tin cans, and it’s either plastic or nothing, while it’s precisely in such places that it’s of critical importance to shun plastic, even if it costs a little more. For now I can only hope this changes in the future.

We waited at the honeyguide tree for quite a while again. Ankit saw a male appear briefly, but slipped away before we could spot him, let alone photograph.

By and by we began a slow ascent back towards Ukhimath, and were treated to some views of a black bulbul, before returning to the homestay.

It was by now around 4, and we decided to take the evening off for some well-earned hedonism in a lovely café we had been seeing every time while driving up and down the Ukhimath-Chopta road, called The Bunker House. Driving up, we reached there just after 5 p.m. Straight away we loved the decor and the ambience inside. The seating was on the floor, on mattresses and low coffee-tables, which we found refreshingly different, delightfully ergonomic and entirely relaxing.

Soon we were attended by the founder himself, Sparsh, a young man all of 23! He told us the story of how he had fallen in love with Chopta when he first visited, and despite being an engineer, wanted to do something different and opened this café-and-homestay, and was heartily supported by his father in the enterprise, saying he was young enough to recover even if he failed – a refreshingly liberal approach.

We got talking about trekking, and he turned out to be something of an absolute goldmine of knowledge in that department! Being from Uttarakhand itself, it seems he was a boy of the mountains, and had already completed some 52 treks in Uttarakhand and Himachal, the details of which he could furnish off his fingertips with stunning clarity. We picked his brains quite a bit about scenic drives and treks in Himachal, and then helped ourselves to some delectable pasta and black coffee, finishing it off the main course an hour later.

It was deathly quiet outside when we finally left past 8:00 p.m.

[BackstraightBoy]

Day 6: Ukhimath to Rishikesh via Makku Math

And so our last morning at Chopta arrived after all, and having packed our bags early, we checked out at 5:45. The plan was to drive via Makku Math instead of straight down to Kaakda and thence Rudraprayag, so as to take another chance with the scarlet finch.

We were, however, conscious of the time, for Mukesh had got news that the road at Rudraprayag would be shut from 11:00 a.m. for some repair work.

Ankit decided to accompany us for a change, and after saying our goodbyes to Dinesh and Mukesh, we drove up the familiar road, taking the deviation before Chopta for Makku. This time we were lucky to see a chestnut-bellied rock thrush in Makku to open the account:



We reached the scarlet finch haunt quicker than the previous day, but had no luck with it whatsoever. A female pink-browed rosefinch, and a rather bold one at that, did visit us, though:



And as we approached the dirty nallah, at the previous bend, Ankit saw from the corner of his eye a streak of yellow, and shouted – honeyguide!

Getting off the car, we realised there was a whole flock of them, perhaps all females, but the light still being low and their being very fast, getting any sort of serviceable pictures wasn’t feasible, and I just enjoyed watching them.

A little further, a long-billed thrush proved to be the last new species we were to see in Chopta, and after that, it was a straight descent to the Ukhimath-Rudraprayag road just past Kaakda, where we dropped off Ankit to be picked up by the other vehicle, and drove away from Chopta a last time, not to return to its ave-filled valleys until next time.

We made it past Rudraprayag by 11, and feasted on a truly scrumptious breakfast, before again driving non-stop to Rishikesh, which we reached by about 5 p.m., checking in to our hotel, The Peepal Tree. Parking the car and freshening up, we wasted no time in scurrying up to the terrace of the hotel, to enjoy this view just before darkness prevailed:


Ram Jhula lit up for the night.

Just as we climbed up to the terrace, we also saw a pair of Indian grey hornbills perched spectacularly out in the open, but alas I wasn’t carrying the telephoto lens, and by the time I could run down and fetch it, they were gone.

For dinner we went down to the lovely café downstairs, furnished very nicely and serving some excellent pizza and espresso. It was nice to have these urban luxuries after a week.


Some lovely motorcycle posters in the café

Sleep came easily that night despite the hustle and bustle of the main road of Rishikesh, as well as the din raised by the picnicky neighbours on our floor, even if only because the trip was over and we didn’t have a dream to keep us up.


Day 7: Laxman Jhula and back to Dehradun and Bengaluru

With the return flight at 4:00 p.m., we had plenty of time this morning, so we took it easy and had a leisurely breakfast. Then we set out to Laxman Jhula, a walk punctuated by a surplus of wall art, and shopping.



We reached Laxman Jhula but didn’t venture across it because it was too crowded, and social distancing would’ve been impossible, and just returned after taking this picture:


'Photography'

We stepped into a general store that had all sorts of imported goods, including tobacco and exotic confectionery, for a cold drink, and overheard some ahem-ahem going on between a couple of foreign nationals and the store owner, with innuendos to a certain special kind of cigarette stuffing, if you’re fluent between the lines.

Inwardly smiling at this prominence of smoking-up culture in what is the hotbed of yoga and spirituality, we walked back to the hotel and checked out.

We reached Dehradun in just half an hour, well before 1, and had to wait for a good 15 minutes for Sajan to arrive to collect the car outside Jolly Grant airport.

The first question I asked him was why he gave us a crippled car if he knew there was a problem with the engine, and to this he had no answer, not even an apology. In fact he felt free to inform us of the charges for a car wash, which would be deducted from the refundable deposit we had paid, which was ironic.

But these trivial things did not detract from the epic experience we had just enjoyed, thanks to having a car at our disposal. Our perception of events – whether successes or mishaps – are shaped by their outcomes, and as Shakespeare said in different words, so long as the end is in our favour, with the middle being robustly full of memory-making material, no matter how much of a digression a sequence of events has taken from the design of the beginning, given all are safe and content, all is indeed well. Distance from the past makes any travail seem trivial, even likeable, liable to be missed, and for us, the lofty mountains of Chopta, the snow-clad heights of Chaukhamba, and the streams and the rivers and the valleys teeming with life, already seemed like a treasure left behind, to be recalled into reality again, with another adventure if permitted in the framework of the future, for the place we inhabit as much as the present is the memory of it, and it is in the nature of memory to beget the making of more.

---

Statistics:

Distance driven: 878.1 km
Fuel efficiency as indicated by the MID: 12.8 kmpl
Fuel expenditure: Rs. 5000
Tolls on the route: none
Punctures: none
Turbo: also none!

[Aditya]

Thread moved out from the Assembly Line. Thanks for sharing!

[abhijeetd_swift]

The Ertiga drive reminded me just how brutally demanding I am with the Swift in the corners, and yet, it never complains or spooks me with unpredictable behaviour or by biting back. It just sticks and goes, no matter how much I push it, and just grips, and grips and grips, with the front tyres glued to the tarmac, so that at any given microsecond mid-corner, I know exactly where the tip of the tread of that front tyre is, and all I need do is point, and shoot. With the 195-section Yokos on, I’ve yet to find the Swift’s limit within the boundaries of safety, and that’s an unbelievable amount of fun from a car for which I paid the sum that can barely fetch you a set of tyres and wheels for a luxury sports car.

Fully understand your feelings!! I have second generation 2016 petrol swift in VXi avatar, which means no ABS or Airbags, but that thing is so damn fun.
Everything is stock just the tyres were upgraded to 185/70 R14 Michelins and that's all I need to put a wide grin on my face everytime I take her to spin! All this for 6.25 Lakhs on road at that time.

Only problem is Safety, but the fact that I'll be paying more than 50% of car's total cost as taxes to government in one form or the other makes me not want to upgrade it. So I have mastered the art of defensive driving and made my right foot even more lighter to act as safety feature in itself!

[whitewing]

Wonderful pictures. Especially liked snap of the pipit with the mountains ranges shimmering in the background.

[Behemoth]

Lovely pictures and nice style of writing! You are truly adventurous to take a rental Ertiga with problems to such terrain - the risk of getting stranded was also very high. Your better half must be quite supportive to allow you this liberty!
Amazing trip and really nice pics of the birds too.
We in Gurgaon are just craving to head to the hills but now with Covid cases exploding again and now touching 2,00,000 per day, it seems like we are soon going to head into another series of lockdowns soon.

[Maverick Avi]

You have a flair for writing and those pictures are just wonderful!!!

Its also surprising to see that a new generation Ertiga with the famed DDIS engine was behaving this way. But I would say that it would have been a better choice than Nexon in first place due to its comparatively supple suspension on those treacherous roads where a stiff setup like Nexon might not have been comfortable.

[Prowler]

Nice travelogue loaded with excellent photos and verbose write up. I have to hand it to you in taking this adventurous trip in a mountain with a blown turbo Ertiga. I like surprises only in movies.

[Drive Head]

A daring trip to the heaven with a pounding heart expecting a stalled vahan through out the trip, which got completed with the divine blessings, and carried more memories than a normal trip.

I never have and never will be bold enough to depend on a car which I don't know of to take so much risk. The whole purpose of seeking peace in the mountains would turn opposite with such an endeavor .

Glad that you two had a safe trip and now have much more to talk about than the trip you planned.

Also I must say that you have a flare for writing and reading the whole post at one go made me getting lost in between in finding the context of the place, the car, in those poetic words.

[matchvan]

You sir, have beautifully penned down an excellent travelogue.
And great photos add a world of charm to your writing skills.
Thank you.