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10:47 AM | Posted by Shishir Agrawal

      Uttrakhand the newly formed state of India, the birth place of chipko movement...one of the best place to visit in India during summers...The state is divided into two main regions Kumaon & Garhwal with most of the area covered by forest n major area is mountains...We planned our trip while our exams and the plan was very simple 'departure by 11th return by 17th' thats it...due to pressure on worlds largest & busiest rail network in the world we were unable to get direct tickets to Haridwar we bought via tickets ie we went to the capital of India. Due to exams and the add on 'heat' we wanted to reach there asap and chill in the mountains Vipul, Advani n i googled some nuggets about the state but nothing helped us while we were on, seriously the best way is to ask the local.
      Due to global warming Uttrakhand is not the place it used to be, the glaciers are melting at a rapid pace and the temperature is going high so what we thought of freezing ourselves was a dream unfulfilled during the tour.

We took a bus from Delhi ISBT to Haridwar and due to the intense heat the AC was non effective, the roads of U.P. have more craters than moon, it was a bumpy ride but we enjoyed that also, on reaching to Haridwar (6 hours late then what we anticipated) we crocodiled at couches of our hotel for a while then we surfed the holy city, my Grand mother lives in this city so i visit very often and i love to see the ghats and the view is so picturesque, the floating lights on the river and the maha aarti makes me feel wow, but for the first time i skipped that beautiful scene, be browsed the market in the evening and then headed towards Hrishikesh which is 30-40 kms from haridwar, i was exited  for the river rafting as ive heard a lot about it lately, we did 18kms rafting from shivpuri to the ram jhoola, with the company of some people from the president house the raft ride was the best experience  i had till date, to make it more adventurous we jumped out of raft in the middle of river, with mountains both the side and the muddy water made it difficult to assess  the depth

the rapids made the ride worth trying again in near future, tired in the process we maneuvered our way to Dehradoon, a city of same size of my own and the locals told us that we need 2 days to visit different places here because they all are situated at different directions, we chosed the best out of it 'Shahastra dhara' the place of Sacred Sulfur Springs which are said to have healing powers, no wonder why i saw people bathing in abundance, the rope way there took us to a mountain top resort where we enjoyed mountain climbing & rappelling, i must say that we people were center of attraction due to our flamboyant attitude, and people vacated seats adjoining ours while we were traveling in bus/trains. At the time when we were wearing the alien mask n dancing road side, people were laughing at our stupidity.


Next destination was Masoori, we did one good thing that we heired a car for the local site-seeing instead of being a freelances, we were thinking that we will be at mercy of our driver but it turned to be a real fun coz of our driver, he was a class act, the only mistake he committed was takeing us to campty fall in the rush hour, but i must tell you if you visit the place do take a bath in the fall, it was such a nice experience to bath in the chilled water and having maggi n tea post that. The queue of cars took time to clear and we moved forth to Dhanaulti was the best place we visited, the park was super kool we did zipping and the tight rope walk, just opposite to the park was a tin shed selling hand made concentrated juices, i inquired about them from the shop boy and it turned out to be of a reputed n award winning doctor who runs a NPO kinda thing, awarded by the CM for developing a herbal diabetes treatment,  we bought vrance's squash. the place was full of apple trees and while in in the vehicle i was amazed that how beautiful a place can be, the temperature was  coolest what we found in our whole trip, and the driver left us near the mall road of Masoori- the queen of mountains.


  We managed to get a room in the tourist crowded city in full season, hungery due to day trip we 
decided to check the mall road, and we were amazed to see the chick density ;p i got to know why this road is called maal road, sara maal to yahi tha, we did all aur major shopping from here, in the morning we visited the road again and the Tibaatian market was nice we bargained a lot and i learned the art, otherwise am bit shy to bargain, Masoori is the place i want to buy a small hut or something and spend a month every year when am retired, very peaceful yet lively and temperature wise moderate. we left the city with heavy bags, kinda end to our tour we waited for our train at Haridwar station for 6 hours n for time pass we did all type of non sense, which will make me laugh endlessly for eternity. The trip was a success and i enjoyed like never before, planning a eastern ghat(near Goa) trip. 


Dr. Bhagat Singh 0137-6226-248,0137-0226-254 (Diabetes medicine)
Sahastra dhara resort - 9760014048, 9997799661
Massori Flying Fox - 9412973448, 9634945369
Massori Para Gliding - 9897042680 
Our driver from Dehradoon - Deepak Rawat - Maruti Van - 9557151025
http://clickepic.blogspot.com/2010/06/western-uttrakhand.html

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