The Pandemic hit everyone below the belt be it financially or otherwise . People were stuck where they were for a seemingly infinite amount of time, hours felt like days and days like months. I came home for Holi and now was celebrating Diwali. Even when the lockdown was retracted we were still skeptical whether to go out or not , after a lot of convincing my parents agreed to let me go for another trek . Now, the the part where I select on which trek to go options were limited to few of the winter treks , I wanted to go to Kuari Passs and Pangarchulla but I got late by a few days and the batches got booked . Made the final decision of going on Kedarkantha Trek this year.
Kedarkantha is an easy trek in the Uttarkashi district in Uttrakhand state of India . The trek is 3-4 days long and begins from Sankri village. This peak offers a relatively easy and much sought after summit climb . According to the legend told by the locals , whenever the devotees try to build the temple of lord Shiva on the mountain the roof gets destroyed by the force of the nature so the temple is till its neck (Kanth) thus bearing the name Kedarkantha 'To the neck of Shiva'. The summit offers 180 degree of breathtaking views along with subzero temperatures and high winds .
The next days were full of preparation buying stuff, packing and managing gear , making checklists , checking things off the checklist, booking bus tickets . Major exercise was packing the rucksack in such a way that all the gear gets in without losing the balance.
The day started with all the the last minute preparations and ticking the final checklist . Around 8 checked the gear one last time because I did not want to miss anything and we left for ISBT at 8:30 pm . The bus time was 10:30 pm .
Kashmere Gate ISBT
Dehradun ISBT
Fortunately met a co trekker Romit at a tea stall who was going to Pangarchulla and his pickup was at 7 too . We had a few teas and omelets to survive the chilly 3 degree morning of Dehradun.
Time passes fast when you have a companion and soon it was 7 we wished for successful summits of each other and exchanged contact info and went to our vehicles .
I went to the Tempo Traveler and met with the rest of my group. Soon we loaded out our rucksacks and started the 10 hour journey to Sankri village in Govind National Park.
We took our first break a little after Mussoorie .We resumed our journey after breakfast . The roads were full of scenic views , long pine trees , high ice capped mountains , sinuous roads , waterfalls, meandering rivers, what more to ask .
We made our lunch stop at a village called Purola which was 60 odd kilometers from Sankri. I had their specialty red rice and rajma . The red rice are only grown in this village. We left from Purola and the driver told us there will be no network after this , we thought there would be network/internet connection atleast till the Sankri .
