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Going to Neverland
It had been more than a month since I travelled to hills. My last trip was Munsiyari-Dharchula in March first week with Manish and Rahul Tanwar, both being colleagues from different departments. An opportunity presented itself with a marriage invitation from a colleague belonging to Pauri. His marriage function venue was Kotdwar on Saturday, 14th April 2018. We thought of combining this function with a quick trip to Lansdowne. I had been to Lansdowne but that was in year 2009 that too was kind of nothing trip. Here is the link: Not the usual Lansdowne Log. It was an unusual one. We reached late in night and left early in the morning and saw nothing what the quaint little town had to offer. This time I thought to make up for it. Manish came up with a plan for weekend drive to somewhere in Himachal. I instead planted the idea of Lansdowne in his head. I did not tell him that I have been invited to a marriage function at Kotdwar which I intended to attend. He agreed. We extended the weekend by taking a leave on Friday. We started in the morning of 13th April 2018.
Roads were good and there was not much of a rush on the highway. We had our first break around 8.30 am near Khatauli for breakfast. From Khatauli, we took the diversion for Bijnor. We encountered a bad stretch of roads with huge potholes and road widening works for almost 10 kms. On top of it two trucks chose to break down at most strategic points to stop all the traffic flow. Police somehow manage to clear the jam. But this stretch set us back by 30-40 minutes. Roads thereafter were good and we carried on merrily barring the town roads where we had to slow down a little bit due to local traffic. We reached Lansdowne around 2.00 pm and went straight to GMVN Tip-n-top. We got a nice cottage facing the woods, ordered some lunch and rested. After a while I went for a walk and saw both the Churches – the Saint Mary’s and Saint John, however, both were closed. Came back after an hour’s walk and watched Doctor Strange dubbed in Hindi before ordering dinner. After dinner watched some dubbed South Indian action movies before calling the day off.
Dawn was beautiful with lovely clear sky. After breakfast we checked out. We went to Bhulla Lake and had some tea there. There was nothing else to do there. It was a disappointing man-made lake with no water. To add insult to injury, they were charging entrance fee of Rs.20 or so. We left for Tarkeshwar dham. It was a lovely drive of about 37-38 kms. In about 90 minutes we reached the parking for the temple. A small temple of Mahadev is nestled among the deodars and greenery. The entrance and exit pathways adorn bells all the way. After spending some peaceful time at the temple we left for Kotdwar to attend marriage of our colleague. After showing ourselves at the marriage function we decided to head back to Delhi and around mid-night we reached to safe confines of our home.
Roads were good and there was not much of a rush on the highway. We had our first break around 8.30 am near Khatauli for breakfast. From Khatauli, we took the diversion for Bijnor. We encountered a bad stretch of roads with huge potholes and road widening works for almost 10 kms. On top of it two trucks chose to break down at most strategic points to stop all the traffic flow. Police somehow manage to clear the jam. But this stretch set us back by 30-40 minutes. Roads thereafter were good and we carried on merrily barring the town roads where we had to slow down a little bit due to local traffic. We reached Lansdowne around 2.00 pm and went straight to GMVN Tip-n-top. We got a nice cottage facing the woods, ordered some lunch and rested. After a while I went for a walk and saw both the Churches – the Saint Mary’s and Saint John, however, both were closed. Came back after an hour’s walk and watched Doctor Strange dubbed in Hindi before ordering dinner. After dinner watched some dubbed South Indian action movies before calling the day off.
Dawn was beautiful with lovely clear sky. After breakfast we checked out. We went to Bhulla Lake and had some tea there. There was nothing else to do there. It was a disappointing man-made lake with no water. To add insult to injury, they were charging entrance fee of Rs.20 or so. We left for Tarkeshwar dham. It was a lovely drive of about 37-38 kms. In about 90 minutes we reached the parking for the temple. A small temple of Mahadev is nestled among the deodars and greenery. The entrance and exit pathways adorn bells all the way. After spending some peaceful time at the temple we left for Kotdwar to attend marriage of our colleague. After showing ourselves at the marriage function we decided to head back to Delhi and around mid-night we reached to safe confines of our home.
