Hitchhiker’s Guide to Gangotri – 2

On the journey to Gangotri I got to know 3 people from Haryana , Punjab and Kerala . We went through a scenic 4 hour long journey to Gangotri . We got a glimpse of Himalayan snow mountains on the way.

We had a short break at Harsil which is famous for its apples ,deodar and oak trees. I bought some apples there which are inexpensive and very tasty as well, as ,they are freshly plucked from the trees there.

After an hour long journey from there, we reached Gangotri around 5 p.m. We had a magnificent view of the Himalayas from there.I had a feel of the flowing icy cold water there  but had not dared to take bath, while the two of my friends took the bath there. The pics I captured really won’t do the justification of the beauty, especially the Himalayan mountains glowing like gold in the sun light.

After that, we had darshan together in the temple.

The river is called Bhagirathi at Gangotri and acquires the name Ganga  from Devprayag onwards where it meets the Alaknanda.From Gangotri, we can take a 19kms trek to reach the Gaumukh, set in the Gangotri Glacier, where the river is originated.The trekking is allowed only in the early morning as there won’t be enough time to come back to Gangotri by night.Also, there are some tents available for renting at Gaumukh, which needs to be booked before.

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As we didn’t have any transport back, we decided to stay there for the night.As it’s off-season there are very less people and most of the rooms are vacant, so we got the room easily and economically as well. After dinner , we booked the bus ticket back to Uttarkashi and retired for the day.

So, we spent the night in Gangotri,  at a height of 3,100 metres (10,200 ft) and with 25% lower oxygen compared to plains,  with temperature  -3° . It’s a first time experience for me of all those conditions , due to which I was having a little bit of headache and less sleep. So, most of the night we spent in chatting with the guys as we decided to stick together for the days to come in our journey.

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