After the immense success of Mount Triund Peak, Our spirit was high. We had collected so many photos and videos that now for 25 years no one can stop us from spreading stupidity on social media and now was the time to take it to sky high. As soon as we got down from Triund, both of us together said "Let’s climb Hanumangarh Peak".
This site is famous for best paragliding site in the world
Without wasting further time, we were once again standing on the Bir’s soil in the Kangra valley, paragliders hovering above and the tourists were roaming beneath it. We spent one night with Pratyush Thakur. We prepared all the things for tomorrow's extremely inaccessible track as per the plan.
The Hanumangarh Temple on Peak
It was 5 November 2018 when I last went to Hanumangarh, at that time I felt that I will not be able to come back here but I was there once again, I think I got the call from mountains. I was ready to walk again, to fly, to listen to the conversation of Hanumangarh peak and Dhauladhar mountain range. The next morning we got late to leave.
The track starts and in just first one km, I suffered a lot. The speed of ‘Thakur Saab’ is faster than the bullet train, it is a difficult task to tell whether Vishwas is walking or not.
Crossing Bari Village meadows
It is sunny, away from the sun, there are leeches wrapped in pine leaves. We have crossed the ‘Bari village’ and are moving towards the Shepherds hut. Two and a half km on the move it has been done and till now we have checked the shoes and clothes more than 5 times, we were totally in fear of leeches.
Checking the leeches
The shepherd hut is about 100 meters away from the main trail, drowned in its despair. Now everyone is climbing silently, slowly the fog has came, now we are only hearing each other's voice, "Take 100-200 INR but land me on the top", Pratyush was saying. To which the ex-sarpanch of Jhadsa village says, "If you want, take out my milk but give me a cup of tea". AMS at 2600 meters when such sentences come out from the mouth, to abuse is considered a felony.
The fog near to Shepard hut
‘Thakur Saab’ took the feel of "Free Solo" by climbing many small and big boulders; the rest of us had possessed with the soul of Alex. The hailstorm starts as soon as reaching 2750 meters, Thakur Saab brings rain jacket, while ‘Vishwas’ has extra power bank in form of a stocky stomach. Till the hail and rain was fine, but as soon as lightning started falling from above, we are in fear with lighting and the leeches.
Free Solo
The three are soaked in a dangerous way, but I have been trembling, we are probably 200 meters away from the top, even the three have spent everything. Saying, "From here till top we will go forward together", we take the iron again. The shoes has fully loaded with mud, the falling lightning after every 30 seconds has spread the fear of "smog of Delhi" in the hearts of all three.
Struggling Vishwas on trails under the rain
Facing all the challenges finally we are standing on the Hanumangarh peak, the height here is 3080 meters. The havoc of rains and hail still continues, with cold my soul is also shivering. There are other people here who are hidden under a boulder nearby. Now the only target is to reach Chhina pass, Chachu is there in the tea shop, but before that we have to run so that the body can get some heat. Only after stopping for 5 minutes, we start running down, we mean only me.
If it’s get clear then one could see, Thamsar Pass, Bada Village, Kothikode, Landha Kinnauri, Ghodalotnu, Bhagchmachar etc. are visible from here.
Finally we reached on Hanumangarh Peak Summit
A little descent comes down and a camp is completely empty. The next stop is the temple of Satbahani Mata who stands alone in the middle of the forest as it is guarding the mountains. A little inn comes from the temple and then on the Billings-Rajagunda road, the Chhina holdings which connect Bir to Chhota Bhangal.
The only view we saw while descending
Chachu meets in his small shop, tea-Maggie and parle-ji biscuits are being consumed, on which the burning fire is doubling this fun. Pratishush runs away and I & Vishwas are walking together but with fast steps. By now the rain has been quite light, we look at the go-nullah and seeing the light of the sun rising on the other side is like surrendering ourselves to newness.
Chachu serving Chai to us
In Billing, we drink tea and wait for lift, after spending an hour here, we finally reach Bir. So one more time the track of Hanumangarh is completed successfully.
The Satbahni Temple between the woods
Thakur walking on trails
The view from Billing of Dhauladhar mountain range and Kangra valley
The Hindi Version of blog is available here :
https://himalayanwomb.blogspot.com/2019/11/once-again-hanumangarh.html