Hampta Circle-A musically winding trek
For the longest time, I've been thirsty to drink from the fresh springs and hungry to inhale the mountain air. Each time I'd convince myself - my kids are small, how will I manage with them alone? let me save up a little! When i exhausted my list of excuses, when I felt like my throat went dry and my lungs out of breath, I took the plunge! Ofcourse, wouldn't have been possible if Purvi, my darling older sister;) didn't meticulously plan the Himachal Pradesh trip. ,Sharing with y'all - My very first trek experience alongwith my two boys age 10 and 7 years.
“Chalo! Chalo! Hattu hattu mattu mattu! Oddu Oddu! “ we would call out to each other to keep moving forward. Across age groups, coming from different cultures, sharing varied stories with each other, we became one close knit family caring for each other on the 4 day Hampta circle trek.
The majestic deodar trees piercing through the sky, the rocky range of mountains staring at me as if putting life in right perspective. The green lush meadows with yellow white purple flowers, six hundred grazing sheeps, mountain goats braying brought out the child in me as I rolled down the slopes, chased them here and there.The first day, We climbed about 3 kms and camped in Baggi. Surrounded by dense deodar trees, on our way we saw a beautiful wooden Takshak Nag temple. On day 2, we ascended 4 kms to Sara Baghi, a picturesque view of valleys awaited us. As we sipped Garam chai with mouthful of popcorn, we couldn’t take our eyes off the sun shying away and hiding behind the mountains. Suddenly, the chill in the air became stronger. A climb of 6 kms on day 3, would land us up to 10000 feet high. From towering trees the scenery transformed to wide and long meadows. A friend who had been to Scotland said, “ this is just like Scotland! Why spend so much and go there!” From Sarotu/ Kharmandari, our lives came to a standstill with a 360 degree panoramic view of the sky. On day 4, we descended to Jobbri, I had my moments of joy in balancing on fallen tree trunks, climbing large chunk of rocks — Suhana safar aur yeh Mausam haseen...
Being one of the tail enders,Gaurav- our trek lead would tell us stories from his adventures to distract us from our exhaustion, which direction wind blows on mountains, musical bonfires, spotting shooting stars, playing ice breaker games, cracking jokes and make us laugh our guts out!—-Yuhi kat jayega safar Saath chale se..
Chandan, our local guide practically took care of both my boys age 8 and 11 years! Sunil, our other local guide would run back if we told him, "hey Sunil! I forgot my cap, my stick! " So friendly and cooperative! The guy with his horses made my kids do horse riding on the meadows, out of sheer joy! The kitchen staff treated us with garma garam chai with popcorn, dinner with deserts each day, hot breakfast all freshly cooked at an altitude of five to ten thousand feet !—- hakuna matata, we have no worries...
Lot of knowledge shared with a heart to help, to empower us.We learnt to install and uninstall a tent, roll back our sleeping bag, the tips on how to take rests while climbing, how to place our foot while on descend. Gaurav was very particular and made us do yoga morning and evening, which helped a great deal! Travelling from Jagat Sukh to Bhanara village, the small window of my eye captured the Peer Panjar range from west to the Dhaulagiri range in east. We spotted the Hanuman Tiba peak and few others!
The last one hour we walked so slowly, somewhere our feet didn’t want to leave this trail, our eyes wanted to soak in more of tranquility. Like I said to all of you, I repeat here, “ Let’s trek together soon again!” —- aaj jaane ki zidd na karo...
