Unlike the 200 metre jeepable road now, when coming via Rishikesh, one had to traverse some 11 km on foot or horse ride to reach our native village Khand in Garhwal hills in Uttarakhand. The commuters preferred the earliest Devprayag-bound bus that ran 45 km along the Ganga River and deboarded at Singtali when with sunrise still in the offing, so they could cover the tiring pedestrian pathway in the freshness of the early hours.
This was in the '90s when motorable roads were few in Garhwal. With the nearest road averaging 10 km away from most villages, travel on foot, invariably with baggage was the norm. To me, the stroll to my village was a pleasure. The exhilaration at the thought of reaching my ancestral home, overlooking the holy River Ganga afar subsumed the fatigue of the journey afoot.
The journey begins with a 250-metre steep walk to reach one end of the hanging bridge below a cliff. The scene turns more picturesque towards the middle of the bridge when the turbulently flowing narrow, immaculate Ganga River below unravels a legion of a variegated spectrum of waves, and subdued rosy sunshine comes in from the Dhang Garh peak to the left. Besides peacocks, monkeys and snakes, the region is home to bears, tigers and other wild animals that cower inside jungles at dawn.
With the bridge crossed, the uphill 500-metre enervating steep climb merges atop with the broad Rishikesh-Badrinath pathway, now ramshackled though once agog with to and fro pilgrims. Amid this sylvan ambience stood an antique restaurant-cum-home of a small family from nearby Jhaid village. It was here that I had planned my breakfast.
“This half 500-metre steep track exhausts you more than the entire distance ahead. Now relax here a while”, said the welcoming shopkeeper binding the wooden logs. I was stunned by his vivid memory when he queried how I missed visiting my village last year.
It was gratifying when the man served me a parantha with an omelette, my favourite breakfast that would provide me with enough energy for the on-foot journey ahead. While he was still beating the eggs with a wooden whisk, his agile wife had already powdered the coarse lumps of salt using the grinding stone and was preparing parantha.
Though omelette served as a solid fuel for energy, equally valuable feed for my solo journey was the series of interesting interactions between the pilgrims from various parts of the country and a few foreigners. Greeting any visitor from the opposite side with ‘Jai Badri Vishal’, some barefoot, their normal query was the distance left to the next night halt. Alas, with motor road direct to the village now, those remembrances appear dreamlike.