Thursday, February 27, 2014

Winter Adventure to Kuari pass - Tali to Joshimath via Auli (Day 5)

December 18, 2013

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The summit day is over and now its time to wrap up. Today's schedule is to hike across the beautiful meadows of Gurson back to Auli, where a car will be waiting for to drive us back to GMVN rest house at Joshimath. I am already dreaming of getting a hot shower. Morning starts with usual call of bed tea followed by delicious breakfast. The lunch was packed and we will be having it en route the hike. We are told that today it will be an easy hike involving couple of steep ascent and then its mostly decent.

As usual we started at around 8.15 AM to climb up back to lower Tali and then taking a trail towards Auli. I preferred to walk alone and enjoy the amazing views of the famous Nanda Devi sanctuary. In fact, for me this trail had best scenic views till now.  At certain places the trail was very narrow with deep valley on one side and it felt as if one was walking at the edge of the mountains. This was a thrilling experience.

From Tali top

Small lake on Tali

Enjoying view

Meadows of Gurson

Last point after which we descend to Auli 




Soon the trail closed into the woods and finally we could see signs of human habitation, we quickly descended across Auli ski resort and by this time my knees were almost turned into jelly. There was an option to get down via a rope-way chair and few fellow trekkers did try that out. I continued on foot and it took about half an hour to descend to the place where the cars were waiting to drive us back to GMVN rest house at Joshimath. During the half hour drive to the rest house I reviewed the photos that I had taken and dozed off for a while.

The trek is over and I was already thinking of worldly pleasures like hot shower, proper washroom, cushioned bed, blanket,TV (India Vs SA match), cellphone etc...but deep inside I felt a bit sad thinking of what I have to leave behind.



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