Kedarnath to Badrinath - Part 2

At 7:15 AM, I got the bus to Joshimath, Joshimath is 45Kms away from Badrinath and the journey is around 1 hr from there and I boarded the bus instead of waiting for direct bus. The route was scenic with the river passing on one side and the long trees on the other side of the road.

The bus was stopping almost at every major point and waiting to fill with the passengers and that took me almost 1 and half hr extra. The bus fare from Rudraprayag to Joshimath was Rs 170/-

After Chamoli, the route will be almost single lane road. Driving on roads is not only difficult but its challenging and very risky as there were landslides and we cant predict how the weather could be.

Enroute to Joshimath, we found few flowers on the trees which are violet in color and are very attractive. By the way, valley of flowers is just 20Kms from Joshimath.

The bus driver was super cool and was driving with ease in those valleys where one misplaced break or a slight acceleration at wrong point would cost the lives of so many people.

Joshimath is located at a height of 6150 ft and from here the Badrinath is just 45Km at an elevation of 10826 ft. In the gap of just 1 hr we will be going to a steep climb of 4000 ft. You can imagine how fast we are ascending in this small gap.

I took the shared jeep for Badrinath from Joshimath, the road to badrinath was extremely dangerous & at the same time it was so beautiful and there are few points where the vehicles has to stop till the vehicles coming from the other side cross us. There are lot of spots where there could be landslides and the small water streams are flowing on the road too. At 3:30 PM i reached Badrinath

Badrinath is a small town in Uttrakhand District on the banks of Alakananda river and the temple is located between the two mountains Nar and Narayan. It is said that Lord Vishnu sat in meditation at this place. During his meditation, vishnu was unaware of severe weather condition. Later Goddess Lakshmi protected him in the form of Badri tree from the scorching heat of sun. Pleased by the devotion of Lakshmi he named the place as Badrikashram

After reaching Bardrinath, I took a bed in dormitory in Yatri Nivas as all the rooms got booked and started to the Last Village of India “Mana”.

Mana is a small village where you can visit Bheem Pul, Origin of Saraswati River, Vyasa Guha and Ganesh Guha where the Vyasa had narrated Mahabharata to Lord Ganesha.

By the time I reached mana and viewed all these it was 5:30 PM already and there is a falls called Vasudhara Falls which is 4Kms from Mana and can be accessible only by walk. So I started walking towards the Vasudhara and it was getting dark and the people there told that by the time you go there it would get dark and you wont see anything. After some distance i started running so that i can go in the light and found that we can easily loose our energy if we run in those heights so again i started walking and few people were returning back, I asked them how much distance still i should cover? They told that even they didn’t saw the falls and coming back. Everyone who was returning told the same answer as it was far and getting dark even i decided to go back and visit the Badrinath Temple.

Once I’ve done Darshan, i saw the crowd was less and gone for darshan again and again, because Badrinath is not near to me and i don’t know when can i come here again. So i have done darshan 3 times. I was observing, everyone was in the sheer joy and were dancing, hugging, laughing and made the atmosphere inside the temple premises so vibrant with their joy. I’ve spent a good amount of time in the temple as it was peaceful and i can see people with lots of smiles in their faces

Later at 9:30 PM i came out of the temple and done some shopping, again the temperature was dropping as the time was passing. The temple was so beautiful in the night with lights.

Then i finished my dinner with maggie & i enquired about the buses to Haridwar for the next day morning and came back to Yatri Nivas slept.

The next day morning i woke up at 4:30 AM and packed everything and gone to the bus station and to my luck i was not aware that we have to book the ticket and reserve the seat a day before. So i got a seat near the driver on the side as ii don’t have reserved seat i had to adjust with other 2. and the bus started at 5:30 AM from Badrinath.

In the middle, the bus stopped at Hanuman Chatti (Lord Hanuman Temple), this is the place where Lord Hanuman came as a monkey and put his tail on the way of Bheema and questioned his strength to move his tail in Mahabharat.