Back to Noida via Kaladhungi road

Kaladhungi road

Once upon a time the name itself gave us a thrill of driving through that road - Nainital via Kaladhungi road. The road is steeper than common route via Haldwani. It had less vehicular traffic and was not maintained at all. More over we were wary of any puncture in the tyres of our bikes because of bad surface. There was not repair shop midway.

We were young bikers then 25 years back. We used to travel Kumaon-Garhwal-Himachal himalayas on our bikes - Kawasaki RTZ, Yamaha RX100 even on Scooter Bajaj Priya or Vespa LML. Those were the days in BHEL Haridwar. 

I last traveled through this road in 1999 April while going towards Nainital. It was narrow road, not maintained at all. We came across not a single vehicle from Kaladhungi till Khurpa Tal. That is separate story.

Innova, which damaged my Alto badly

We were ready by 6:30 in the morning, as the breakfast service would start at 7:30am , we decided to skip that. We had already cleared our bills last night. So without delay, we loaded our Alto and found that an Innova was parked just by our side. It rubbed badly the right side of our Alto and the paints were peeled out. It was very bad indeed. The driver must not a hill driver and did not know how to park in a small space. 

The bumper which rubbed

Morning started badly..Anyway. after complaining with the hotel guy and cursing the bad driving skill of Innova driver, we started.

Morning was so peaceful. The mall road was deserted barring few morning walkers.

Slowly we traveled the Mall road, by the side of Nainital Stadium at Talli Tal, via High Court Road towards Sukha Tal. The high Court Road is one way.

Near Sukha Tal - a dried lake, there is a KMVN Guest House. Initially the road is ascending and then the driving was downhill.

Downhill drive started here after around 9km from Nainital 

At 11 km from start point we came across a small lake on our left. It is Sariya Tal. It was well-maintained with a park for kids, and boating facilities.

Sariya Tal - 10 km from Nainital on Kaladhungi Road

Some food joints were also there but unfortunately all were closed that time. We kept on driving. After a hairpin bend, we saw a signboard "Sariya Tal Water Fall". It was actually the overflow drainage of the lake over a rocky face.

Another bend and some minutes more, we were at the top of Khurpa Tal. A picturesque lake in the middle of pine forest. 

Khurpa Tal on Nainital-Kaladhungi Road

Being on the secluded road and off route, it was rarely visited by earlier tourists. However, now-a-days, local travel agents made this lake a popular tourist spot. Seeing the construction around the lake, one can see that the real estate growth in this region - hotels, resorts and all.

After Khurpatal, till Kaladhungi, the road passes through dense evergreen forest, with very less vehicular traffic. It is ideal place for bird watching. This is the eastern fringe of Jim Corbett National Park. So occasional visit of wild life are also not unexpected. The drive is downhill and the surface is very good.

From Kaladhungi the drive was through plain land and usual daily traffic. We crossed Bajpur, Tanda, Moradabad on the way. We had a break at KFC near Gajaraula at around 10:30 am. We stopped here as the toilets were clean. After getting refreshed we had our breakfast and relaxed for a while. 

Break at KFC

Another 100 km drive was boring. We felt the pinch of pollution due to burning of sugarcane. Irregular traffic as usual by the overloaded tractors ruled the road.

We reached home at 1:00pm.

In the evening we started planning for our next trip options.......

  

Nainital - the queen of Kumaon Himalaya

Stay at Nainital on return journey

We could have relaxed for a while in the morning as we were in our return mode. We planned a break at Nainital for the ease of long drive from Binsar to Noida. 

But we did not want to miss another Sunrise at Binsar for which we came here after a long journey.  

We set alarm at quarter to six in the morning. We would have ample time to get refreshed and reach viewing platform. It was precisely 6:23 am, the Sun began to peak on the horizon and gradually illuminated the surrounding. 

Sunrise at Binsar

All the mountains, surroundings appeared to look the same, initially, until the sun had risen enough to highlight the first bit of white, snow-covered beauty of the Himalayas. The sight was alluring and awe-inspiring.

Many people were there on our rooftop. Everybody were awake before dawn to experience this magnificent sight.

Nandadevi at Sunrise from Binsar

Kumaon Himalaya from Binsar at the day break 

The valley below the mountain was tainted; no longer an abyss of black, nor did it appear blue. Instead it looked a metallic grey. 

Glistening peaks of Trishul - Maiktoli

The peaks were glistening as occasional spear of light pierced through the slate colored Sarju valley and danced over the surface.

Tea was served at the viewing platforms. The warmth of the sunrays bathed us, made us comfortable with glass of hot tea. People started sharing their experiences of beautiful sunrises at Munsiyari, from Choukori, from Kausani.

Binsar KMVN

We spent quite a good time in the fresh air under the warmth of morning Sun. Time passed by. Caretaker announced that hot water would be ready in few minutes. We broke our adda. 

Now it was time to pack up. After breakfast we would be moving to Nainital. Hotel was not booked. I glanced upon the route on a wall map.

The route was simple - Binsar - Bageswar road - Kaparkhan - Almora Bypass - Kwarab Bridge - Suyalbari - Bhowali - Nainital around 90-95 km run. With casual driving we could reach there by lunch time.

We had our buffet breakfast. Cleared our bill and for the last time came upon to the viewing platform. It was empty as people were busy in breakfast.

It was high time to do a 360 deg photography at the platform.

We started our journey around 9:30am. Slowly rolling down along the dirt dirt through the forest.

A troop of monkeys were following us. I was cautious as they were crossing the road from both side, as if we were in a crowded market. Something might have happened. They seemed aggressive and disturbed. Possibly, my earlier vehicle might have hit one.

They were disturbed.

We managed to cross the area unharmed without any incident. At the check post, we bade good bye to the chowkidar. 

Weather was sunny, clear blue sky above, far ahead the mist covered the hills in blue haze. We reached Almora via Kaparkhan and decided to follow bypass road. It is a longer route but wide and less traffic. After around 9 km from the bypass entry we reached the old highway. The road was smooth, driving downhill. After Khwarab bridge, the road moves along Kosi river. 

A causeway on a tributary to Kosi river Bhowali - Almora road.

It was almost level road, traffic was fast, so following the rule of hill driving, I was driving cautiously. 

After 8 km from Suyalbari, we stopped in a traffic jam. Some DL registered Taxi's as usual on the wrong lane going ahead. We were behind a bus. People were discussing about a landslide ahead of us. I came out and inquired and saw a cloud of dusts generated because of the landslide. A car had a narrow escape while crossing the area. Down below Kosi river was flowing as if nothing happened.

After half an hour, there was a commotions. Wrong side vehicles were searching for gaps in between to allow traffics from other side. Local volunteers were started helping the tourist. Gradually small vehicles were allowed through a narrow passage at their own risk. Occasionally stones were falling from above. Buses were not allowed through this narrow passage. 

Landslide on the road.

It was our turn to cross the zone. One volunteer guided us to move forward. And we crossed. Thank God. On the other side there was a long queue of vehicles in waiting.

Another 27 km after a beautiful drive we reached Bhowali market. A small lake town connecting almost all the Kumaon towns. It is a business hub. Situated at the height around 1400mtr in a valley with Bhimtal lake, it was ideal town for a sanatorium. 

Nearing Nainital we saw big buses of different travel agencies were parked along side the road. The road becomes narrow. We reached Nainital after 20 mins uphill drive. The lake emerged before our eyes. We parked our vehicle at Tallital Bus Stand. The famous Naini lake is in front of us.

Boats at the Tallital

A small sitting area is there by the side of the boating booth. Colourful boats were tied at the stand,  ready for customer to take a ride. 

Me & my daughter went for a hotel room. There are plenty of hotel along the Mall road. They are having very limited parking and almost full. We will spend only one night here, next day we would travel back to Noida. Other hotels are on the hill slope above the mall road. After you park your vehicle you have to climb up to your room. There is a public parking on the other side of the lake. Every time you enter the mall road you must pay the toll. We paid Rs 100/- for single entry.

The room rents are high, and being a peak season, rooms were also not available. Somehow we managed a room at Mansarovar hotel, which has one parking space free.

Mall road entry at Talli Tal side, Nainital

An old building, maintained with meager means, we had no choice but to get into that. A bed room with a sitting area having a single bed in it. At the backside there is a bath with a netted opening for ventilation. The room was at the elevation of 5th floor from the road. From the common balcony the lake is visible. The location is very good but the quality of the rooms.

We kept our bags and quickly prepared glasses of tea using my tea kit. Refreshed we came out for a boat ride and sightseeing.

Near the bus-stand, I was searching for a decent restaurant and decided to take the boat ride first and walked down the Mall road. At the bus stand, I tried to do a 360 deg photo of the location.

Nainital town & Hotels from Lake

At the boating counter, there were two three options - RS 150/- for the full boat - half trip. Rs 210/- for a full trip - actually return from a marked buoy. or Rs 210/- for one sided trip to the other end. 

We opted for the last one and desired to go on the other side and came back following the Mall road.

Hanuman Temple by Lake side

We donned life-jackets and stepped on the boat. We were excited and clicked random photographs of the town and surroundings. 

Nainital Library at the Mall road

It was a beautiful boat ride, we were so ecstatic that we forgot to see the time. We reached other side in no time.

Naina Devi temple - Malli Tal side

There is a Temple dedicated to Naina Devi.

The presiding deity of the temple is Maa Naina Devi represented by two Netras or eyes. Nainital is one of the 64 Shaktipeeths also known as religious sites of Hinduism.

Naina Devi Temple

After offering Puja to the presiding deity of Nainital, we came out to a market place. It is a Bhotia market as locals call it. There are lot of eateries, fast foods, Chinese products, shops for Woolen garments, bags and fashion accessories, similar to any temple town. 

We were hungry and it was a rush hour. We could manage three seats at the China Town fast food restaurant, people were standing outside waiting for their turn. Quickly we ordered chicken momo, veg. chowmein and chicken manchurian as these were quick to serve. 

Lunch ordered, paid, waiting for the serve

Because of the crowd and the rush, the food was served prepaid. Momos were large in size and spicy with chilly sauce, chowmein was prepared in Punjab style with lot of spices and Manchurian gravy was real spicy - as a whole we selectively had our lunch and decided walk till we digest all spices.

Naini lake from Malli Tal

It was three o'clock in the afternoon. The mall road side hill was brightened up in the setting sun. Glasses in windows were reflecting sun light occasionally like a flash.

There is a old cinema hall here - The Capitol renovated to a New Capitol. We walked along the lakeside quay till we reached the boating club. From here one can hire a sail boat, which we see in a signature photograph of Nainital.

Sail boats can be hired from the Boat Club

The mall road starts with a toll booth. Opposite traffics are separated with two roads at different levels.

Honey bees 

We strolled leisurely along the Mall road and did some window shopping. There is a shop selling locally made honey & jams. We gave it a try. There are variety of honeys and jams. Apricot jam was good and so was the sunflower honey. These are made at a food processing plant near Bhowali.

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Roadside there is a Plaque near the Grand Hotel. Going by the Google map one cannot imagine how the cars were parked on the approach road to the Hotel. We yearned for hi-tea and tried at roadside stall. It was okay but we needed our brand.

Parking on the approach road to Grand Hotel - Nainital

We reached the other side and yearned for hi-tea again. As usual, tea kit was there to help us, because it would be difficult to get a taste of Darjeeling tea liquor at a roadside stall. 

Twilight zone - Naini Lake

Relaxed for an hour after the hi-tea, we came out to the balcony. It was cold out-side, and twilight. 

Naina Devi Temple decorated with Diwali Lights on the far side of the lake

Shops, buildings were decorated with colorful Diwali light. We were travelling during the festival of lights.

Nainital duing Diwali festival

Down to Mall road, it was like a big Super Market. Lights all around, lake side road, reflection of lights in the placid lake water. 

No vehicular traffic were allowed on the upper road, Mall road Nainital

End to end, it is 1.5 km. Shops, restaurants, showrooms, hotels on one side along the upper road and lake on the other side.  The shops along the Mall Road selling trendy knitted hats and mufflers or the stalls selling steamed corn in a paper cup or momos or chaats give you a break whenever you need one. 

Barricade for vehicular traffic at Mall road.

We strolled along the road, till we were hungry for a good dinner. There were lots of Veg. restaurants with sign board "Pure Veg" in the line with Non-Veg restaurants. Most of the restaurants were crowded and full when we started looking for a good one. We could locate one having table available just for us. It was Embassy restaurant and non-vegetarian dishes are also available here. We ordered a full chicken tandoori and a plate of Chicken Biryani. Both are north Indian dishes. And they were delicious.

Mansarovar Hotel balcony

We came back to our hotel and the hardest thing we did was to climb up to our room at five storeys high. Too much after a full course dinner.

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Binsar, Kumaon - A sanctuary known for walks and bird watching around ...

Arriving Binsar

We had a good night sleep. I woke up early morning, peeked outside through the glass windows. It was still dark. After few minutes the Sun would rise. High time to prepare some hot water for darjeeling tea. 

I always carry a Tea Kit consisting of a small immersion of a glass size, two small containers for Darjeeling tea (TGFOP-my favourite brand) and sugar, a steel glass, a spoon and a coaster.

After setup, water started boiling in the glass in few minutes. Few pinches of tea leaves and covered with coaster. When all leaves were soaked and drowned, the tea was ready. The aroma of flavoured Darjeeling tea filled up the room. Two cups of tea was ready. Still it was dark outside.

Outside it was bit cold in balcony. We donned jackets, gloves & caps and then came down to the lawn in front of Dak Bungalows. Being Diwali time there was no moonlight, we had to use mobile torch. The Dak Bungalows stood like a haunted house in the dark.

Sun was about to rise.

Gradually the eastern side was glowing and the skyline of Himalaya was silhouetted against the glowing sky. It was worth visit.

Sunshine on the Himalaya made us happy...

The day breaks gradually in the valley down below. Back in the TRH the breakfast was ready. We came back to our room, took hot water bath, packed our belongings and loaded them in the boot. We were not sure about the hot water availability at Binsar KMVN as there is no power connection.

We relished buffet breakfast with stuffed parathas & curd - the staple food at western Himalaya. It was time to move on. I enquired about any alternate route to Almora at the reception. There is one through the forest road-no extra charges but only to register the details at the entry & the exit of the reserved forest.

We bade goodbye to Mukteshwar KMVN and made a stopover at IVRI gate to withdraw some cash. There was no card payment systems at KMVN TRHs. The same case should be there at Binsar. Hence some precaution.

In front of IVRI gate

After few minutes (a kilometer) we saw a Forest check post at our left and a sharp left turn to a non-regular road. The guard told me that after 8-9 km, I would get main road to Almora. There was no traffic at all in that road.  At the end of the Forest road, the guard recorder our exit. He was playing on road with the local kids. We reached Sitla.

We were on a good tarred road. Todays travel is around 85km. It was a relaxed driving with occasional stoppage for photography. We reached Khwarab bridge at 11:15am after 31km from KMVN.

Bridge at Khwarab

We took Almora route. After around 15 minutes of uphill driving the roadside sweet shops started to appear. Basically two main sweets are there - Bal mithai and Chocolate sweets. Both are "so sweet", one cannot have either whole at a time. A strict No-no for diabetes patients. Bal mithai is made of hard cocked "khowa" with a layer of sugar balls (similar to homeopathic sugar pellets). We bought some of both varieties. 

We reached Almora and entered the Mall road. It is one way as the road is narrow and through the market. One can take bypass road on the right side while entering Almora. That road goes to Pithoragarh as well. There is another bypass on the left if somebody wants to go to Kausani or Someshwar.

After the market we took the right diversion road towards Bageswar (around 5km after entry) while the main road goes towards Someshwar. 800mts, another diversion - both side goes to Bageswar; at Kapakhan both roads meet.  We took the right again and then left. The straight road meets with the Bypass road and also goes to Pithoragarh.

Dinapani Tourist Rest House KMVN

After right-right-left we reached few levels above Almora town and a few kilometer more we left outer periphery of Almora. On the way to Kaparkhan we crossed Kasardevi, Dinapani.

And few kilometer more (4 from Kapakhan) along the Bageswar road, we reached the entry check post of Binsar sanctuary. 

Check post at Binsar Sanctuary.

Here the visitor has to pay for the entry pass for the vehicle and passenger. Entry fees for driver is free.

Entry gate Binsar Sanctuary - Fees details.

Binsar - it was during Durga Puja of 1990 at Ranipur Haridwar. A team of bikers of BHEL - the Kawa team, returned from Kumaon trip. They shared that how hard it was to drive upto Binsar KMVN after a long drive from Munsiyari. The road was very steep and broken; No electricity at TRH (Tourist Rest House) et al.

Now this was in front of me. After 26 years. The road was narrow, broken at some points, not suitable for two lane traffic. So it requires a careful driving till we reach KMVN. Last 500mtrs were broken to the hilt. Low floor sedans would have a tough time negotiating the middle ridge of the road full of loose stones.

We reached KMVN during lunch time. Without delay we ordered the lunch and was told that buffet was already on. There was no electricity as heard earlier. The supply is from stand-by generator from 6pm to 9pm only. Here we would stay for 2 nights and prepared we were.

Binsar KMVN

We kept our bag in a room of the old building. From the windows, we could see Himalaya partially. There are candles on the stands here and there telling us the electric supply is for limited hours only. The old building is an annexe to the main building. On the roof, there is the viewing platform. Everybody has to come over it to view the Himalaya from sunrise to sunset.

Me at Lunch

The dining hall is quite a big to host the guests. Seeing the cars at the parking, it seemed that the Rest House was full. The buffet was good and enough with a variety of vegetarian (paneer/ cottage cheese curry) and non-veg (egg curry) and other dishes, salads, deserts etc. Hot fulkas (hand made tawa rotis) raised the appetite of ours.😃

Now we have enough time to explore the surroundings. There were lots of butterflies in the lawn, it looked beautiful, the sky was blue and the horizon was bit cloudy. 

We sat on the porch for few hours enjoying the ambience, the cloud formation over the Himalaya, and occasional peeping of the peaks beyond the clouds.

Cloud play over Himalaya

We came out of the campus, a trail beyond leads to Zero Point - the highest point of the Binsar Sanctuary and a dirt road goes to Sunset Point.

UN set point - 500mtrs

After tea, we strolled down for (S)unset point along the dirt road. At the end, there is a Forest Rest House built by the pre-independence Britishers.

Forest Rest house at the Land's End

The house might have been built a centuries ago, when Britishers explored the region. 

Setting Sun from the Forest Rest House Binsar

Being inside the sanctuary the road was also not maintained as there is a chance of accidental fires from the tar melting. Forest fires played havoc in Uttarakhand in recent years.

Sunset at Land's End

We followed the dirt road back to TRH. A dilapidated mile stones bears the signature of old road to Kaparkhan built by the then Public Works Department (PWD).

Kaparkhan 14 km milestone at the Land's End.

At the nightfall the forest was full of sounds. Scurrying squirrels searched for food under bristles of wispy moss. Monkeys were on their own business of howling at each other preparing for night sleep. We treaded cautiously holding my camera and the purse. The forest’s smell was fresh and organic. We could hear the orchestra of birdsong. It was soul soothing. We found the reasons of coming here out from a city life.

We came back to Rest House. Generator supply started at 6:00pm. We rested for a while, had some quick tea using my tea kit. 

We came out on the roof. Below the horizon beyond the Saryu valley the lights of the houses sparkled yellow with some fire works of Diwali festivals here and there. The sky was clear, the evening stars peeped down at us like silver asters, glinting and shimmering. The stars were coming out like lucid snowflakes of silver as they sprinkled the night sky above. 

Dinner was ready.. 

Buffet Dinner

It was cold, dark outside. We did not want to inhale candle flame with no ventilation of the room. So its better to go to sleep at the earliest - better before the lights off. So we went....

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