Uttarakhand Sojourn : Walking in wilderness from Deoriatal to Chopta

It was day 3 of our trip and today we were walking from Deoriatal to Chopta, from one mountain to another passing through meadow of "Rohini Bugyal", passing through the dense forest laden with red and pink coloured Rhododendron trees.Our host family was up early in morning by 4am to ready our breakfast and making our packed lunch of Paratha. By 7am we were all set and ready for our 14 kms trek to Chopta, our guide from Sari village had reached previous night and was staying with our host family. It is advisable to start early at first sunlight as we later found that it is a long trail with lots of ascend and descend, also the rains with icy cold droplets can slow you down substantially.

Bidding goodbye to our host we started our trek at 7.30am passing next to Deoria tal and the watch tower. The trail starts from behind the forest lodge passing through Rhododendron flowerbed and forest cover. The peaks of Chaukhamba and Kedar dome were peeping out of the clouds and we could see them through the trees every now and then. It was a clear sky but with clouds around, there was chance of rains in later part of the day. Our guide had warned us before hand that it is better to reach our destination before it starts to rain in evening.

A walk of around 15 minutes in forest cover and we were now doing a gradual ascend on a ridge with valleys on both sides. Below on the left side was the Sari village and its picturesque fields while on the right was valley and mountain ridge which goes towards Madh-Maheshwar. 30 minutes of climbing the ridge we reached the highest point of the hilltop which had a flag post, the locals call it "Jhandi Dhar". Some local women folks from the village come here to collect dry woods and its a daily affair for them.

The view from Jhandi Dhar was amazing, an unobstructed 360 degree view, deep valleys, green forest with red and pink Rhododendron flowers and snow clad peak of Chandrashila. This was our first resting point and a much needed one after a heavy climb, The trail from here takes a sharp descend. Laden with dried leaves, The trail at some places was too steep descend and slippery. The descending trail lasted for 30 minutes before we reached a flat ground - a narrow strip of land with deep valleys on the right and a generous cover of forest trees on the left. This forest seems to be an ideal place to do birding.

After a short walk, Another gradual ascend and descend takes us on another ridge, Here there were three routes with one on the right takes you back to Sari village while the central one is the one which takes you to Rohini Bugyal. There was another route to the left which as per our guide goes all the way to Ukhimath village. It was interesting to note that forest cover keeps changing as we moved further from Deoriatal. Somewhere in middle of our trek the forest became much denser with tall oak trees. After the 2nd ridge and complete traverse we were now walking on much flatter forest ground. We were followed by another trek group and few solo trekkers when we started in morning but by now they had moved much ahead of us and our group was the only one left in the wilderness.

The trail passes through some really dense forest where entire forest is covered with moss covered trees. On the way we also came across small shrines made out of stones and orange or yellow flags above it. These shrines are probably built by locals and they act of importat landmarks indicating that you are on right path.

While few in our group had moved steadily ahead, hypnotised by the beauty of the forest that we didn't even realise that there was a big time gap between us and slow walkers in the group. And then it hit us that our guide has our packed lunch and we were not carrying any food. By this time we were on grassland of Rohini Bugyal. It had started to drizzle by now. The rain drops were icy cold and made our hands go numb. Thank fully we had kept our rain poncho with us which saved us from getting hypothermia. 

It was after quite a while that our guide appeared from the woods with rest of our group members. It was almost 1.30pm by now. To our disbelief our guide informed us that we were just about half way mark and had another 4 hours journey if we walk at the same pace. It was like What the fuck !! for we had almost assumed that we would be close to our destination. There is something we had missed till now which was pointed by our guide, a black mountain on our left !! This was Kala Pathar mountain and there is a small glacial lake at the base of it known as Basuri Tal. Legend has it that this is same lake where Pandavas had hid their weapons.

After our lunch break we decided to move ahead while few others in our group followed our guide at their own pace. We were now entering another leg of dense forest cover which was part of Kedarnath sanctuary. Some private groups have more recently setup a campsite at Sayalmi very close to Rohini Bugyal and they break the journey in two days rather than finishing it in one day. A short walk of around 30 minutes, we could hear a rumbling sound of water and flowing stream, we were close to a water source somewhere close. Walking further we had to descend to small rivulet created by a waterfall nearby. This was the first source of water we had come across. Though we so wanted to enjoy the stream, remove our shoes and soak our legs in the icy cold water but with rain clouds hovering above and continues light drizzle had spoiled all our fun. Top it our hands were getting numb after getting wet from rains hence we decided it was in our best interest to just continue walking before it starts to rain heavily or get dark.

From the rivulet we had to ascend a small section of forest before we reached a forest ground. Chandrashila snow clad peak was so close that we felt we were just close to our destination but it was not to be !! We continued our walk on meadow which I later came to know was known as Bhrujgali. There were few empty shepperd huts on the way but we didn't find any soul around. 

There was small tathbandi or a stone wall in middle of the forest, we were now not sure if we were on right path, with no network on our phone and not sure how far we were from our guide and rest of our group members, we took our chance and just followed the stone wall, Sometimes on the way frustration was seeking in with how much more walk before we would see our destination, continues drizzle had made our shoes, socks and trousers wet.

After almost an hour and half of walk from the rivulet we reached a hair pin bend of tar road and oh boy we were so excited to see it. We had finally reached our destination was our thought as we sat on the side of the road waiting for our guide and rest of the members to join us. Our guide soon reached us informing that few of the group members were way behind and may take some time to reach. The road going up was going towards Chopta and further will go all the way to Badrinath while our home stay was at Baniyakund so we had to go down on the road for further 3 kms. Hearing that we had more 3 kms walk just demotivated us !! for we had no more strength to walk but we didnt have any choice. 

As we moved downhill we could see some campsites which was probably our destination. As we walked slowly a vehicle going down towards our destination offered to drop us to our campsite and we just hoped in it. Finally after a gruelling walk of 10hours we had finally reached our homestay cum campsite. This was going to be our home for next two days. We had kept next day as our rest day which was I felt the best decision after a 14 kms / 10 hours walk. 

Few of our members took their own sweet time to reach and the last person walked in the home stay at 8pm which was probably over 12 hour walk but as they say all is well if it ends well. So here we were now sitting in cozy home stay covered in layers of clothing and enjoying the hot food served by our host of homestay. This was going to be our abode for next two days. Meanwhile it had started to rain outside and it rained continuously next day as well, By next morning the temperature had dipped so drastically probably in minus that we just stayed inside our homestay covered in every piece of warm clothes that we had. Today when I look back all I can say is ....Oh that was so much fun !!!!

Chopta stay: There are many few stay options in Chopta but expensive, Tungnath trail starts from main Chopta centre. Baniyakund at 4kms downhill from Chopta has many campsite and stay options while Duggalbitta which is another 2kms from Baniyakund also has stay options. There are shared cabs which ply on the road towards Chopta and back. charge Rs 30-50 per person to travel one way.