Shimla - Chitkul - Kalpa (Kinner Kailash) on New Year Nite 09

[CeoBharat]

1647hours - 31st December 2008, Wednesday.

Kha hai tu? I call Saurabh.
Baas aaya, Ek Check jaama karwa du. – He replied.
We were about to leave our office as we have planned to celebrate New Year in Chitkul.



After a wait of 5 more minute, we both ran with our bikes toward our Home to get change from Office Engineers to Our hobby Bikers. We were behind our schedule then too get ready and purchased few Items from the Market and Filled our bikes tanks with fuel touched the Kalka Highway at 1900hours.

From here we can only see the big Zaams as most of the people were moving toward Shimla to celebrate the New Year. About 7 Km till Kalka, it was highly packed by all kind of vehicles, but getting the advantage of two wheels we take advantage of all the spaces left in between the two vehicle and we crossed all the hurdles and get a speed after crossing the Kalka as the speed of the cold air increases also the traffic level decreased. We were speeding toward out destiny; the first stoppage was the Shimla.

After ridding around 40Km I said to Saurabh yaar bike ko to khila diya but aapna khana peena kha hoga. So we planned to Stop at Kausauli at “Gyani da Dhaba” but it seems that our Bikes need more of travel then to stop that the Dhaba was closed. So without wasting our time or to stop we keep moving, but our bikes got brakes when again we saw the beauty of Solan on New Year. I want to capture that beauty in my Cam but was not able to collect it as we were very far and my Sony Cyber shot 8.1MP was not able to capture those pics in that light. So this is what I get. We were very excited to see the Clean Shy with Lovely Stars and a Shining Moon.



Then we move toward Shimla in between we saw two accidents of Cars that seems to be happen because of Drunken Driver as we have seen many Cars on the Highway standing on Sides and having Hard Drinks and dancing.


2145 hours - 31st December 2008, Wednesday.
We were planning to reach to Narkanda and to stay there in night but seeing the weather condition and the time we decided to stay in Shimla. As we landed in Shimla we searched for the rooms in the Hotels, First of all there were no rooms and if rooms were present it were so costly that the price has reached four times on the eve of New Year. We decided to first stopped at a Food Spot and have something for dinner.





Delicious homely type food was served by the lady and we say many Army Officers were talking about the Crowd at the mall Road near Ridge. As we were paying for the food I saw two youngsters were standing there, so just discussed with them about the availability of the rooms. They were also bikers and were excited to talk with us. First they refused us by saying that today we will do not get any rooms and we have to move ahead to Thoag to get the rooms. But in the mean while one of them offer his house to stay and later on forced us to stay with him. He wants to talk with us and discuss us on various trips, when he came to know that we have done various trips. So we spend 31st Night at his wooden Home after roaming Shimla. It was totally unplanned and surprising thing happen to us on 31st. But it was good.



0445 hours - 1st January 2009, Wednesday

“Sandeep Uuth” The first voice I heard in morning and he wakes me up and we were ready to move ahead from there. We wish Happy New Year Once again to this friend and reach where we parked our Bikes. We were shocked, when we say our seats were completely dry after being standing uncovered in such a cool weather.



We took the Shimla Bye Pass and started covering the way. We have a thought to reach Chitkul tonight after crossing all the barriers. We were in our full mood and enjoying the beauty of Mother Nature. The Sun has not been come up and the cold breeze was passing by. We were singing songs and enjoying each and every second of the rides. As we were crossing Kufri we say the first sight of the Mountain filled with Snow.








“Apna Dil to garden garden ho gaya tha”, Whenever I see such a view. I get refresh and a new Zeal of energy flow in me. Since then we start shooting various pics of the surrounding etc.

After travelling a few more Km, we see the tremendous beauty of the Nature; it seems mountains were trying to hide Sun. It was a reflecting Beauty. We stop our machines and sit on Road and were just lost in what all we were seeing.





We were just seeing the Sun Rising up, suddenly some naughty thoughts come in my mind and we started painting some shadow Paintings.







Firstly Saurabh told me to stop all these but later he started enjoying all of that too and help me in doing some Shadow Paintings too, after getting refreshed of all of these. We ride on our machines and put a halt at a place where we saw a Board “Satluj View – Kripya kuch Pal Bitaiye.”









We stopped there and see the beauty of Satluj River. A Single word that came out from our mouth was just “Waoooooooooooo”. We were just gracing the formation of River Satluj then we saw the time and said to each other.. Abee Chal…







Slowly and slowly we were covering Town by Town, seeing the waterfall, Different Patterns of Mountains, Moving side by side of river from Shaiz. With Lovely morning we were thinking to reach “Jeori” till 1200 hours. We were happy to found our self there at 1115 hours.



We stopped our machines in front of a Chinese Restaurant, which also serve North Indian Food. We have Chowmein and Chai there and see a Special type of “Chimta – to prepare Chappati”.



From here we were having two plans One to Go to Saharan and move ahead to Chitkul or second move straight way toward Chitkul. We moved to Saharan as we have heard that it has a very famous Temple and we decided that starting a New Year by worshiping will be a good option too. (Also there was someone who said me a day before to go to Mansa Devi (famous Devi mandir in Chandigarh) on 1st Jan, but was not in Chandigarh. So found it a better option.) And yes our decision of reaching Sarahan was not wrong. It seems to be a very respectable place in every sense and we were seeing that the Temple is very popular by seeing a lot of Crowd. We worshipped and see the Architecture work of the temple. It was awesome. Later we moved to the famous oldest fort of the king. Also there is a Bird Santury present there, but we were not able to see that because of the time constraint.







1400 hours







We again started from there and after crossing towns like Rampur, Zakri etc etc. we reached to Wangtoo. After seeing this I recall the way to Karchaam while I have been to Lahaul and Spiti in March 2007. It was full of dug and mud, Keechad and all. It was the toughest route of that time. We start crossing the way and I can feel the way was not so bad. It has improved a lot. We say many Tunnels were under constructions by Jaypee Group.











A lot of Trucks, Tanker, Cranes, Bull dowser were moving from here and there. As we reached the Karchaam Dam, We really saw the master piece of Civil Engineering. It was great to see all those. From here we catch the route of Sangla Valley. It was 18 Km Away.











As we were moving ahead the Climate was becoming more chilled and we were start feeling air pushing us on the other side. Still we try to reach there but seeing the climate condition we were forced to be stopped at Rakchaam.











We say a HP Tourism Guest House and decided to stay there only. In night much of things were not visible, so we have a few pics there and by some way or another entered in the rooms, We took so many Quilts, Heater was On, but Thand ne to to mano Jaan he le li thi. Bahut mushkil se sooye raat ko Kaal ke sapne lete hue.







For more Please wait for some time

Next part is attached on next page.

[Yogesh Sarkar]

Good going Bharat and Saurabh, beautiful photographs, can’t wait to read the next part.

Ps. for night time shots, you need to place the camera on a tripod or a stable place and use the long exposure mode (1-15seconds) to get the photograph.

[BHARAT]

Nice pics, entertaining log bharat,saurabh. waiting for next part.

[woodboats]

Many thanks!!
I really enjoyed that.
Cheers

[CeoBharat]

Hey Guys,

Thanks for appreciating my First Write Up. I will try my level best to send the continuing write up Soon and I know you will enjoy it a lot. Specially the Pics.

@Sarkar : Thanks for your suggestion. I will try to take it under next view. But I think timing can be set in MAnual Mode n I was missing that in my Latest Cam.

[KurtRules]

Arre waah that was quick ... welcome to BCMT Sandeep ... good going, eagerly waiting for the next part ...

And yes, give ur intro to everyone at the introduction section ...

Guys, Sandeep was one of the 4 who went to Sach Pass..

[chauhan_ait]

welcome sandeep...

loved the shadow dance , waiting for rest the log and pics...

-pankaj

[anupmathur]

Lovely photos and good play with shadows! That was a first here!

Enjoyed the log!

[CeoBharat]

Thanks a lot for such an overwhelming Welcome. I like the Spirit this group has.

Just a Request I like to called as Bharat more then that of Sandeep.

@Sarkar : Thanks bro for motivating us to move ahead with such thing. And thanks for the advice of keeping the night Snaps. But I think it work on Manual Setting but my latest cam does’t have it. Let me knw If I am wrong.
@Bharat: Like to see another person with my name. People call me Bharat n I love that.
@ Woodboats : Thanks for ur appraisal.
@Kurt : My friend n motivator. Thanks for showing me this Phase too. It all because of you I was motivated to write such things. I travelled a lot but never dot down. You help me in this. I am happy to have a friend like you.
@Chauhan @Anup Sir : Nice to hear you love Shadow Dance.

[Yogesh Sarkar]

What is the model of your camera?