Nanda Devi is my favorite mountain whose height is 7816 meters. I have never been able to climb such a high mountain till date. My favorite mountain which I like to climb again and again is named “Hanumangarh Peak” whose height is 3080 meters. After summiting it more than 15 times, I now understand that this is the mountain that will always be my favourite. Hanumangarh Peak comes under Bada Bhangal Panchayat of Kangra District. To reach here, the traveler has to cross a 463 km long road from Delhi, which according to Google should take 09:32 hours but in reality it takes 12 hours.
After 12 hours I reached Beed, I am as familiar with this place as people are with their homes. The height of Beed is 1350 meters and this place is famous all over the world for trekking but also for paragliding. Paraglider pilots from all over the country and abroad come here and show their talent by flying in the air. I had also done paragliding once but with a pilot...my experience was not good because I have the problem of motion sickness and due to this I vomited while flying in the air.
In Bir I roam around the landing site and see the sacred Dhauladhar mountain range visible from here. The next day I get ready early and leave for my golden mountain whose name is 'Hanumangarh'. At 7 in the morning, I wear shoes and reach the point from where the walking route starts. The altitude here is 1350 meters and I have to go up to 3080 meters. The trek is uphill as soon as it starts, so much so that within the first 200 meters my heart rate reaches 180, which takes me 15 minutes to normalize.
The first stop is Bari village after which no other village will be found on the trek. I refill my water bottle and move on. It is sunny but the wind is also very cold. I am following the rule of reaching early and returning early. Since it is January there will be snow above and a lot of snow...I am mentally prepared for cold and snow. Moving forward I cross a Shepard. He is not in his hut right now…maybe he might have gone somewhere in the forest with his animals.
There is a tree on the way whose shape is like an elephant. I take photos of it as I walk and soon enter the snow area. Till now I have trekked 6 km and still have 2 km left to climb. There is snow here and I am having trouble walking in the snow. There is nothing except snow in the pine and cedar forests. There is so much snow on the trees that the sound of snow falling from the trees is heard every moment.
Since I have to stay at the top for the night, I have packed my rucksack. Now seeing so much snow makes me wish I had not brought so much salmon. I wish I had not planned to stay at the top of the mountain. While entering the snow, I have to struggle a lot with my heavy bag. Sometimes the heavy bag is pulling me back and sometimes pushing me to the side.
Well, with all my efforts I reach the top of Hanumangarh Peak in 3 hours and 24 minutes. There is nothing here except snow. 360 degree wide view is visible from here. If the weather is clear then a very beautiful view is visible from here. I took a tripod with me which helped me a lot in clicking my own photos. Taking a photo with the morning sun was a very rare moment. Kangra Valley is visible from the top of the mountain...there are mountains behind the mountains...and many villages and people live between each layer.
I reach the top and pitch my tent. I make tea on the stove I brought with me and drink it. And do a little rock climbing before sunset. After climbing, I collect wood from the surroundings. The night was very cold and the temperature was -5 degrees. I remained sitting till 8 o'clock in the night by the fire which I had lit a little distance from the tent. I could not click many photos because the battery of my phone and camera was very low.
Next morning I wake up at 7 o'clock and immediately pack the tent and start descending. It took me 3 hours to get down. As difficult as it was to climb, it was equally difficult to descend. My shoes were wet due to snow and my feet were feeling cold. But thankfully I came down safely. After going to the room, first of all I took a bath and then sat near the heater after eating hot food. So this was my trip to Hanumangarh Peak which was very fun.
I hope you liked this summit story. Sorry for less photos. See you in the next post where again I will tell you the story of one of my Himalayan trekking.
Disclaimer: This post is originally written in Hindi and I have used Google Translator to tranlate the Hindi text in English. All the photos have been clicked by me from Mobile and edited in Snapseed, Lightroom/photoshop. I have already published some photos of this post on my Hindi blog.
[//]:# (!pinmapple 32.08221 lat 76.75588 long Hanumangarh Peak Summit Expedition (3080m) d3scr)