It was around 5 that we set out to explore the meadows and glacier area
There is a checkpost saying "no vehicles" but they allowed us through, and later we had to pay 50rs entry fee at another checkpost.
We learnt that at all tourist places in JK you pay 50rs/entry
But without much ado, I will post the first pic of "green"
At the glacier parking we were attacked by hundreds of horse/A$s drivers. Everyone wanted us to ride their beasts to the glacier.
First of all, with my bad back, it was a no go, and secondly, to me animals are for 2 reasons.
Poultry, Beef etc., for food or drink and others for wildlife shooting. No riding animals for me!
These guys kept hounding us as we started climbing. Later we would experience this problem everywhere. But if they were stubborn, we were even more stubborn.
It was raining, but still we will do it on food.
So pardon the less number of pics. I had to keep wiping the camera due to rain
What you see in these pics upwards is the Sonmarg Glacier. In June its truly magnificent, but now its was a sorry excuse of a glacier.
The light was not really pic friendly, and the rain did not help either. A view downriver
The path to the glacier. We did not actually go all the way. It was raining very much
Near the bridge on the river
The river looked appealing for tripod and ND filter, inspite of the rain
As the clouds became darker, it was time to start walking down. The camera had survived drizzles, but torrential rain, I had my doubts, This was no K20D, this was the humble 350D, not weather sealed by any standards
For river shooting, we decided to go below the parking lot to the bridge, and saw hell in paradise
No its not the tourists littering. This is the Dhaba stall owners at the parking lot who put all their dump at this place below the bridge. Its like the local mountain garbage dump, probably one of the most scenic garbage dumps in the world. You can sure ban plastic, but can you ban Kurkure..? Or Maggi noodles?
It was over this bridge, and pointed away from the dump that I set up the cam. The light was very bad, but still, I managed a couple of shots.
I took quite a few more, but due to rain on the lens they were ruined.
After loitering around some more, we decided to exit the glacier area, go back to main road, and hit the river for some photography before it became too dark to do anything
There were couple of tracks leading down, and then the tracks ended, and it became a rocky slope. Well 4x4 time
On low ratio I slowly crawled down, and mentally made note of the path we would follow up after it darkened more.
To give the white elephant company, there were lots of sweaters
Tell you what, its fun being in a herd of sheep, and as you try to catch them, they run here and there. The sheperds were pretty amused by our antics. and I tried some sheep sounds. To my delight, after every call I got answer back, and soon they accepted me as one of their kind
See how blissfull they are after accepting me as a sheep only
The white elephant, watching over
Since it was getting dark, time to head back
But not before a couple of car pics. I tried two angles, and both shots came out decent I think
So what next?
Food of course. Luckily, here there was not much problem, and we had an early dinner. Our last meal had been a very late breakfast, and we were hungry.
We went back to our hotel, and decided to just chill out and relax. The staff was very friendly, and so were the locals. Sonmarg seemed like a swell place.
A place you want to keep coming back to!
Our Kashmir leg had started on a very positive note.. Yay
TO BE CONT.................