Rambling routes of Bugyal

                                        Every day is a winding road, I get a little bit closer

                                 Every day is a faded sign, I get a little bit closer feeling fine

-                                                                                                                                                                                                - Sheryl Crow

It was a long winding rocky trail between the two hills and I couldn’t decide that between the leaves under our feet and my thoughts, which was more slippery.

Sun, mist, rains, hailstones, rainbows, awestruck moments, hearty laughs, inspiring people, interesting conversations, rude discourses, drama and happy ending, the Dayara Bugyal trek in Uttarakhand was like a good old masala Hindi movie. But the gem of all views was at the camp at Dayara where you had a ridiculously clear view of the Gangotri massif, Jaonli peak, Draupadi ka Danda 2^nd peak to the east and the Bandarpoonch massif to the north. Fascinating!! 
Thank you Indiahikes!!

Further down from the camp at Dayara, where the finches and sparrows of known and unknown kinds were chirping their hearts away, little ferns grew on the branches of the rhododendrons and oaks; it was a world of their own.

One evening, when it was time for the birds to go home, I sat beside the trees watching thunderstorms gathering far away. Is someone on the Janonli peak now? They better run! A mighty storm is approaching. But before I could wrap my thoughts up, the clouds with the trails of lightnings and thunders disappeared from my view as if it was just a passing thought! The mountains spoil you with breath taking visuals and experiences every moment and you always crave for more.

And as usual, the conversations are amazingly refreshing as well! When you say hello to someone in the hills, never ever are you gonna get a frown for an answer. Even if someone is jaded walking for several hours looking for her lost cow. 

Cut to four days later, we were in Dehra and decided to go for a day trip to Mussourie. By the evening, tired walking up and down the historic lanes of the pretty town, we headed to Kalsang, a Tibetan food joint. And I promptly dunked my head into a comforting bowl of Thukpa to drown the disappointment of not meeting Mr. Ruskin Bond at the book shop that he visits occasionally. (Apparently, he had cancelled his visit that very day ☹ or maybe the shop owner had weaved his own story )

“If you are seeing this, your vacation has officially ended” – read a text from one of the fellow trekkers with a snap of cheerful faces, taken just before we bade goodbye to each other at the Barsu base camp.

The platter of words next, don’t actually have a prelude. Because, it’s an ensemble of expressions that had come to me and my words had dwindled to few, maybe to save themselves from an out pour. 

When words are few, when words are new                 

And the map of your thoughts is skewed

Take a walk, brush up your mind

You are never a step away from your find

  

In the hills, you are never a step away

Never a step away from your kind

The kind that knows you, feels you, is you

And yet in your thoughts twisted and twined

There are walls built in your head

There are walls built in you, as mighty as the mountains

Past the Bugyal oaks, along the sunny trails

The shades walk around but perceptions stay

Wrapped in a sea of indifferent faces                    

Plastic smiles or judging gazes

You go back home safely

Without a scratch on your skin or your heart            

And one night, under the starry milky way

The stealth of the dark unfurls to say,

Was there really a leopard in the valley

Or were you just afraid of each other?