Planning for the day (9.00 am)
Our lives at Tirthan are full of decisions. What to have for breakfast. What to wear after bath. Whether to go somewhere or chill in situ. And so on.
After we had dealt with the first two, we mulled over the third. It was a bright day and a riverside lazing session was always possible. But there is a huge seeable in this region which we were skipping till now. And that's the Great Himalayan National Park (GHNP, for short).
GHNP - what's that?
The GHNP has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage site, given the biodiversity it showcases. Spread across approximately 1,170 sq km (35 km x 35 km, if it were a square), the park encompasses pristine temperate forests, alpine meadows, rugged mountains and glacial streams. In fact, the white snow capped Himalayan ranges we saw from Jalori Pass, are part of the GHNP. Its rich wildlife includes the elusive snow leopard, Himalayan musk deer, and birds like the Himalayan monal and western tragopan. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Unlike many Himalayan tourist destinations, GHNP has no motorable roads or developed tourist settlements inside its core area. You gotta explore it on foot along forest trails, accompanied by local guides where required. So you can very well understand why we were studiously avoiding it till now.
The Tirthan Valley provides one of its principal access routes, sitting as it does along the southern edge. Popular trekking destinations include Rolla, Shilt and Rakhundi. Each of these treks might take anywhere from 4-7 days. Goras simply love it.
The state bus ride (11.30 am)
Now we did not want to trek, so we did the next best thing we could. We planned a trip to the GHNP Complex at Sai Ropa, which, apart from the Forest Range Office, and the Permit Issuing Office, was supposed to be a very nice natural habitat to spend an hour or so.
The only jinx today was that the 10.30 am bus had been cancelled, having been diverted to take the children of a govt school to some picnic. Our earliest bus would be at 11.30 am, which meant a late return and late lunch for us. You do the math. Nevertheless, we felt that the day was just right for an outside foray, and we were up on the road at 11.30 am, our arms ready to wave at a passing bus.
The bus was bang on time, and it also showed the smiling faces of the Shah couple at the window. They were also on a similar adventure to Sai Ropa. The bus ride was around 45 mins, but I tell you, if you want to get the thrills of travelling on a Himalayan road, you gotta ride on a State Bus, preferably on a left hand window seat, where most of the cliffs abut. The driver's judgement is superb, of course, as he is driving an 8-foot wide bus on a 9-foot wide road. Altos coming from the other side would tuck their tummies in and pass sideways. But what does one do when another State Bus comes up nose to nose in a stately fashion? If the journey length is around an hour, and so is the bus interval, this is bound to happen at least once due the trip (simple maths, right?). In our case, our bus reversed around 50m around bends before a possible spot could be found to let the other bus pass. Passengers on the left window seats would have chewed their nails off. I was more worried - I meant thoughtful - when the bus needed to do three attempts to negotiate a hairpin, with the front of the bus almost hanging off the outer edge of the curve. Hats off!
Sai Ropa visitor's centre (12.30 pm)
The built-up area is pretty big, with Research Halls, Community Centres, and of course, the Range Office. But what delighted us was a curated walk through the natural parkland, over flagstone walkways, that took us over the mountainside, through pristine pine forests, and small suspension bridges. Throughout the path they had dotted around models of animals and birds in their natural habitat, for an educative purpose. We mainly enjoyed the nature walk, of course.
The best thing about the one hour walk was that the pathway was more or less downhill from the entry gate to the exit gate. We emerged at road level once again at around 2.00pm, knowing that our return bus was at 2.30 pm. It was not an adventurous walk (enough adventure with the bus, dude!), but a very pleasant one, and we were glad that we came.
The sky shares its sorrow (5.30 pm)
We had a late lunch around 4.00 pm and relaxed in our room. Although there were the odd drops when we were about to sit down at our Flinstones table, causing us to run up to our covered verandah, plates in hand, the subsequent hour had been pretty quiet. But at 5.30 pm, did it pour, or did it?. The combination of the roar of the river and the tattoo of the deluge on the tin roof portions of our homestay was an impressive cacophony, as if nature had decided to take lessons in heavy metal rock, from a bad teacher.
Dinner was therefore in the room, which we did not mind. Temperature is predicted to be around 4°C at night. But we are now getting used to it.
Tomorrow we shift location to Pah Valley, near Kullu.
Photo credits: Panna Rashmi Ray
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