Joshimat – rain, mud and catastrophe

25.09.2022

 

 

The weather is really a bit difficult and when it rained all night and in the morning too and even the dogs outside the room door looked gloomily into the wetness, it was not so great with our own mood either. Actually, we wanted to continue towards a small trek, but that made no sense. Neither motorcycling nor trekking is fun in the rain. And so we also looked out in frustration and decided to definitely stay another day. Maybe a walk or something.

 

Then the rain became less, Binodh had heard about a small temple along another road and we set off towards Tapovan.

 

 

 

However, we were stopped before reaching our destination – mountain slope had come down and was blocking the road. There we saw 3 other westerners – a rare sight here. It seemed to take longer and didn’t look good anyway, so we turned around and started an alternative road.

 

 

Exactly here there had been a catastrophe on 07 February 2021. A piece the size of 15 x 5 football fields broke out of the Nanda Devi mountain range and thundered down, burying houses and people. Read more on Wikipedia here.

 

Our alternative route took us first to the small village of Ringi, nicely situated on the mountainside.

 

 

We started a little tour in the drizzle and found the village very beautiful. There were lots of vegetables growing, there were pretty houses and it looked so pleasantly idyllic. Here are a few pictures of it:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In a small kiosk we had tea and Maggi noodles (those 2 minute noodles, extremely popular in India and available everywhere) and conversation with the workers who were hauling stones for a house opposite. They were from Nepal.

 

 

The information about the distance to the temple and the condition of the roads varied – but the result was clear: we did not make it there.

 

 

The road got muddier and muddier, I got off more often, there were OK sections in between, but at some point it was clear that there was no point and we turned around again.

 

 

 

 

 

We stopped at Gauri Kund, a temple with hot springs. The bathing place for women did not look attractive. The priest told Binodh some truths about him – how could he possibly know that?

 

 

 

So the day wasn’t quite what we had hoped for, but it wasn’t really stupid either. After all, the fog from the previous day had spat us out again!

For the following day, of course, we were hoping for sun again. Or at least dryness. Whether we were able to enjoy it – that will be in the next blog post!