Land of Gods | Uttarakhand’18 | Day 11 | Binsar-Patal Bhuvneshwar-Thal

I had too many photos shot during my stay at Binsar River Valley camp. And, somehow I missed it posting on my previous day blog when I had reached the Binsar River Valley Camp.

OK, fast forward to next morning now.

By the time I had got up , the sun had come up nicely and I gazed at the sun sitting at the window of my room. It felt really refreshing.

It was cold the night before but the camp had ensured I had sufficient rugs so that I wont feel cold.

I went outside of my room to stretch and saw that the others had already woken up and were sitting around the fire, the same place where we had sat last night.

We had our morning tea by the fire and just sat there for few time. The front portion of me was getting heated by the warmth of the fire while the back was being heated by the sun.

I, again went inside my room to get all the stuff sorted and get myself ready. I had planned to checkout before noon. I packed everything and kept all my luggage outside the room and scanned it thoroughly so as to ensure that I wasn’t missing anything.

By that time, the breakfast was ready and the menu was the same thing which we had for dinner last night. Bread omelette! I finished it quite fast as by this time I was really hungry. In Winters, you tend to eat a lot and you often feel hungry.

After the breakfast, I took time to explore more around the camp. Yesterday, I did not get much time as it had became dark soon. ‘Abhi’ the son’s owner was there to explain me all the things in and around the place. More details will surface when a proper Vlog will be released later on my YouTube channel.

There was so much at the place to see and listen too that I had clearly not anticipated at the first moment. Time just flew by and by the time I realized it was already noon.

After that came the hardest part of the journey, moving all the luggage to the top on the main road. Bringing them down was considered to be little easy but now, moving the luggage from room up to the bike was going to be an uphill task (Pun Intended). It took us an hour to setup the luggage on the bike and make it ready for the next destination.

As per my plan I was heading towards Pithoragarh. Till now, all the stays were booked or pre-planned but, from now onwards, I would have to look for a place to stay upon reaching the destination.

As per google maps, I would have to do 5 hrs of driving and with that after bidding adieu to the owners and the kid I set off to my next destination.

I had a friend to meet at Gangolihat and hence I had taken this route towards Pithoragarh. We had met on Instagram and he knew that I was on an Uttarakhand trip and so wanted to meet me. Also, I too wanted to offer him my “Tour of Uttarakhand” sticker to him.

The roads were really smooth and I was covering kms under my tyre with ease. The roads were supported by the beautiful scenery around and I just loved being at the place and riding my bike. I felt so complete like, this was all that I wanted in life.

Before, entering Gangolihat, I stopped for a quick lunch break but it was more of snacking than a lunch, I would call it.

The roads to Pithoragarh from this side was under construction and was in really bad shape. I received this info when I spoke to my friend and they insisted on me to change the route and go around.

There is this beautiful place called “Patal Bhuvneshwar” which I had shortlisted when I was planning my Uttarakhand trip but, due to time constraints, I had dropped it. And, here I was at Gangolihat a mere 9kms from the place. My friend too was pushing me to change my plan and insisted on visiting “Patal Bhuvneshwar” before moving ahead from another direction.

The time was around 4pm and so my friend requested to visit the place ASAP before it gets dark. And so, we moved off.

“Patal Bhuvneshwar” is a very sacred place in Uttarakhand and is a must visit. This was my review after I came back from exploring it. I will leave up to you to experience first hand or google it than to talk about it here. Whatever you see inside, (The place is inside a mountain which can only be accessed by going down a natural tunnel which barely fits you body width. Only single person can go down the natural tunnel at any given time. It really feels scary for the people who pass through first time. The place is almost 150 ft below from the place you enter.) will only leave you spell bound and you will be mesmerized.

This was my route plan after I parted with my friend. The time was 05:30 pm and I still had 60 km more to go. I knew for sure that I would be riding in dark most part of time. I was just scared of the Leopards. In night, you don’t really know what would happen, considering I was alone.

I reached Thal around 8am, and got a hotel, whose owner was a relative of my friend. My friend had already phoned him and told details about me. I phoned my friend when I reached the reception and the deal was done for 500 rs for the night. It was a good hotel with big rooms and attached bathroom. It was a restaurant cum hotel and after getting freshened up I had an immediate dinner. I had ate not much during the day and was really hungry.

The view outside the window was great and the skies were full of stars. I planned to do a time-lapse and decided to mount my camera near the window from inside of my room and shoot the stars while I went for dinner.

This was a new place for me as earlier I had planned to reached Pithoragarh today. But, due to foreseen road conditions and the advise from my friend, I had to change the route and with whatever time I had left, I decided to reach ‘Thal’.

Tomorrow, I would be driving to ‘Askote’ which was as per original plan. Planning to start early to cover the distance, I slept immediately. By the time I slept, the time lapse was done. I had recorded the footage I required.