This will be a short travelogue of our visit to Mukteshwar and Nainitaal in 1st week of December. The trip was for 4 days only and we kept it limited only to these 2 places. I still have about half of the Spiti travelogue pending and hoping to complete it by next month, if lucky.
I wasn’t even sure about being able to go till the last minute and booked the train tickets to Kathgodam only a day before. Our first plan was to visit Binsar and then to consider other options. Then it changed to 2 days in Muktehshwar and Binsar each. We called some properties in Mukteshwar and Binsar and asked a few questions to get some idea about the places. We caught the early morning Shatabadi train to Kathgodam. The train ride was uneventful except for some idiots throwing stones at the train near Moradabad. Seeing the kind of population living near railway station, it’s not a surprise to see that the vandals have little else to do except breeding like pigs, vandalism and rioting. Passengers raised some ruckus which forced some railways and police officers to check out and regster complaint at next station. Rest of the railway stations after that were very clean and in some ways, even beautiful. The area outside Haldwani railway station on other hand wasjust a huge slum area with too many mosques with too many loudspeakers blaring noise.
Kathgodam station was pretty neat and clean. As expected, there were a few taxi drivers on the gate asking if we needed taxis but nothing really annoying like in many other big tourist spots. The guest house we had called up previously had arranged for a taxi to take us there. We had a quick lunch and got in to the car. Roads were freshly laid but in few places there were signs of extremely shoddy work. It took us slightly more than 2 hours to reach Sitla, a small village near Mukteshwar where our guest house Roshan Villa was situated. The property is situated on top of the ridge and offers good view of the peaks of some famous Himalayan mountain peaks like Nanda Devi, Trishul Parvat and a few others. For some reason, people really like seeing the mountains from a distance and most locals and even tourists consider it to be an attraction. I could see Vaishno Devi hills from my house In Jammu and Shivalik hills nearby and prefer to be on the mountain rather than seeing it from a distance. Probably that’s why it’s not a big deal for me now. But most people I met including the guides and property owners tried to present it as a major selling point. Sitla used to be a small quaint village by the looks of it, but it’s getting spoiled just like most of Uttaranchal as outsiders buy up land, more hotels and guest houses are being built and the old time charm of the place is fast fading away. We barely saw 3 houses of old design and 1 of them looked like it was about to be demolished. The land on hill which was mostly farm or orchard land was being cut in to plots and was on sale. Rows f modern concrete houses, guest houses, hotels etc. were being built or were built already. Overall it is a nice place, but it wouldn’t stay this way for more than 2-3 years. It will turn in to another crowded concrete jungle like Nainitaal in a few years if construction is not controlled.
That being said, it is a nice place and thanfully wifey liked the property and immediately declared that she wanted to spend atleast 2 nights here which was perfectly fine for me. After a bit of rest, we walked out to take a walk outside. After the crowds and noise of Delhi, it felt nice to spend some time walking in clean, fresh air of the mountains. Lots of birds, interesting insects and a beautiful sunset. We had an early dinner as we were quite hungry but couldn’t sleep early. So spent some time reading and watching TV befor managing to sleep at the usual time of well past midnight.
Next morning, the taxi reached guest house as we were finsihing our breakfast. Destination was famous Mukteshwar temple. It was a drive of about 45 minutes through forest and pretty beautiful sights as signs of human habitation were few and far in between. When we reached the temple, 2 young men came up and offered to be our guides. It didn’t cost that much and I thought that they will be probably able to tell us a bit more about places of interest nearby, so hired one. He took us to a small paved path instead of stairs to temple. The path led to a steep ledge on backside of temple. There is a hole in one of the rocks which locals believe helps women concieve if they pass through it. Supposedly a sacred place, the rocks were covered with usual kind of graffity by literate idiots. But the view of the valley below were pretty good. Temple by itself was nothing special. Just the usual kind of hill top temple which was probably a nice place a few years back, now a place with ugly construction and babas, pujaris of all types. Saw one baba in a building near main temple sitting in a executive chair. So much for life of simplicity and penance as a sanyasi. Saving grace for temples like this is that the preists don’t behave like dacoits in temples of Mathura, Haridwar kind of places. They just leave you alone and don’t try starting a conversation or sales pitch unless you talk to them first.
Before leaving, our guide Dinesh told us about a few interesting spots including a short hike through jungle and a waterfall. He also told us about sightings of leopard in area which raised our interest. We took his number and promised to call him in case we wanted to visit those places. We walked for a while down the road and found a path leading to small Methodist church. I had read about people admiring the place, so walked down to see. It was a small ordiniary building and was closed at that time. Nothing really special or interesting about it. Reached the market, had lunch and asked driver to drop us back. On the way, he offered to take us to another place like Mukteshwar (can’t remember the name now) and then drop at Nainitaal in evening. But we liked the idea of staying in Mukteshwar to hike through jungle, possibly spot a leopard and see the waterfall. So before dinner, we called up Dinesh to arrange the trip. We had a very heavy lunch of multiple plates of Rajma chawal in Mukteshwar and ate a lot after reaching our guest house. Even after this, both of us felt hungry after a while. This exceptional appetite stayed with both of us all through the duration of trip.
Dinesh reached our guest house half an hour before the scheduled time and sat outside patiently waiting for us as we got ready. We walked on the road with a few shortcuts every now and then before entering the jungle. On the way saw an old abandoned house with some dried fruit trees. He claimed that the family was scared away by ghosts and many people saw ghosts at different times. The house seems like it was used by the village drunkards quite often. The path through jungle was a wide trail which was used by villagers as a shortcut. Unfortunately or maybe fortunately, we didn’t see any leopard, though we saw 2 brown deers who bolted at the sight of us. I couldn’t even think of raising the camera to take a picture. Seeing them disappear so fast down the slope with trees and shrubs all over was an amazing sight. After walking on the trail for about one hour, we reached Mukteshwar and met a friend of Dinesh who informed us that a para-gliding team was offering the activity nearby. The day being our wedding anniversary, wifey was feeling a lot more adventurous than me and immediately said yes
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After signing a disclaimer form and payment, we walked to the jump location. It was a sheer drop of 700-800 meters. As they were strapping up the gear, I asked the instructor who was going to jump with me about spare parachute. He laughed and said that if we ever needed one, we will crash long before we manage to get it opened. Awesome !
After strapping up, we waited for suitable wind. Standing a few feet from the cliff, I wondered if I had it in me to run up to edge and jump. Asked the instructor, how was I supposed to run with both of us strapped together and he said that the wind will lift up the parachute . We wouldn’t need to run at all. But the wind took it’s own sweet time and I started wondering if I felt afraid or not. I felt a lot more butterflies in stomach in Spiti near ropeway of Chicham village, but that’s a story for another day.
As I was standing there contemplating all this, the wind came up in suitable direction and we were immediately lifted and above the ledge. Everything seems small from a height, but a lot more smaller when there is no ground between the feet. We flew/glided/whatever it’s called for 8-9 minutes before we came close to landing spot in between some fields. Just then, a sudden gust of wind lifted us a bit and instead of landing on clear ground, we went rhough middle of a row of apple trees. Nobody was hurt though except for minor scratches here and there.
A man was tilling his land using a bullocks where we landed. Saw this thing after a long time. 3 excited children came up running and started helping us untangle the mess of tangles strings and fabric.
Wifey had to wait too before they had suitable wind. As their parachute came closer, we could hear her shouting excitedly. After packing up the parachutes, our instructors led us through the fields to road where a Jeep picked us and dropped us up the mountain. Dinesh and his friend were waiting for us there and we walked a small distance to a restaurant to have some snacks. They arranged a taxi to take us to the waterfall. Their proposal of hiring a bicycle was interesting but we didn’t have enough time and wifey didn’t like that either. The car dropped us at the start of trail which was being widened till some distance. I hope that the work didn’t progress much and the trail retained it’s original character. Don’t want yet another place to get “developed”.
We walked for 15-20 minutes alongside a small stream, crossed a few huge rocks to reach a waterfall about 9-10 meters high. I was expecting something generic, but this was way better than that. It looked a lot better in real life than it does in these pictures. It was too cold to do anything with water, so I consoled myself with wetting my hands, but wifey took off her shoes to stand for a while in ice-cold water. According to guides, there is a lot more water during rainy season and a lot of generic idiotic tourists during monsoons and peak season which get drunk, litter and makea nuisance of themselves. We saw a few styrofoam plates and plastic junk on the way anyway. Indian tourists will never learn to behave themselves.
We stayed there for a few minutes and started walking back as it was getting dark. Had to take a long route back as the shorter one passing through jungle is closed off after sunset. Dinesh had talked about another similar hiking trail and offered to take us there next day, but we eventually decided to visit Nainitaal.
We booked an old heritage property kind of property in Nainital the night before but had some confusion as it had recently changed ownership and names. Anyhow reached Nainitaal without any thing strange. After driving alongside the lake, first thing that welcomed us was the loud noise coming from the huge mosque with a tower solely built for housing 4-5 loudspeakers. What kind of person thinks that blasting so called prayer through such loudspeakers annoying everyone else is a good idea !! Thankfully our hotel was up the hill at quite a bit distance away away from this noise atleast.
After some rest and snacks, we walked to the town below and walked alongside the lake looking for a place to eat. Contrary to what I was expecting, the town was pretty clean with dustbins and well maintained publiic toilets every few meters. Later on found out that the authorities burn all the rubbish just a few km from the town in mountains. Still better than junk everywhere, I guess. A small stream which flows in towards taxi stand’s direction from the hill nearby was thankfully not converted to a sweage dump but still had plastic waste every 2-3 feet.
After lunch, we had a boat ride like all tourists do.Wasn’t bad and I actually enjoyed it as the weather got colder and a mist descended all around. Couldn’t see any fish though. Walked back to the hotel for dinner and sleep. Caught the same train back to end the journey.