Wild Himalayan Treks #3 - Trekking up to Kareri Lake at 2934 metres - A story of overconfidence and learning -part.1

Hi,

You might have heard about Shimla, Manali, and Dharmshala -three most popular hill stations in Himachal Pradesh. Reaching these towns via the serpentine hilly roads is definitely an adventure in itself, but the real fun lies in trekking the steepy mountains to reach a secluded serene place, where you feel graced by the presence of some kind of divine peace in yourself.

You start to believe in yourself, in your presence in the world. The nature tells you that you are alive, you are true, and one with the nature. You feel accepted in the world, you feel loved. This one is a story of such a trekking experience, which I gained in the last months of 2015. I was still in my college days at NIT Hamirpur, so I was accompanied by a bunch of batchmates. They wanted me to go with them, because I already had been on such few treks in Himachal Pradesh. Kareri trek was new for me.

We did our small research and found that the trek lies near to Dharmshala town. The place is treated as the base camp by the trekkers embarking to pass through the Minkiani pass to cross the mountain to reach Chamba on the other side of Dhauladhar range.
We packed our tents and bags, put in some necessary things such as the first aid kit, warm cloths and dry fruits. Deepak was the most enthusiastic among us, he had been on such tough treks in Uttarakhand. Avdesh played basketball, and Roshan was somewhat a doubt to us, but he was not fat. So we kind of believed in each other.

It was Roshan's birthday, and Deepak gave him this idea of celebrating it on a wild trek. Let's see how it goes.

Reaching Kareri Village.

"What if we find bear up there in the dark?", it was not only Avdesh who was worried about it, because first the villagers at Kareri and then later Ranu Ram (Gaddi- shepherd) would tell us about the wild animals on this trek.
After reaching Dharmshala, one has to reach Ghera, a place only at half an hour. From Ghera to Kareri the road is non metalled and buses are very much limited, so better if you take your own vehicle. At the time we went, the road was damaged so we took a foot journey to hike up to Kareri village, that lies at the end of the road.

from L-R - Avdesh, Me, Deepak and Roshan. Thanks to self timer in my camera

The road is damaged after Ghera, so we walked on this steep road to reach the higher elevation of the Kareri village. One can have the view of the Deodar jungles on the other hill on which the small town of Mcleodganj is rested. Here is click towards that hill. Roshan wore off his T-shirt because we were sweating heavily, trees were less and at far reaches from road, it was a tough journey till we reach Kareri village. Tougher was yet to come.

Kareri is a small village with not more than 5-10 homes built with mixed materials like RCC, wood and steel. They can provide you homestay service if you want to stay, and it would be close to $10 per person, including food. We had tea, and rented two more sleeping bags from this house, so in total we got four.

It was already 4:00 PM, but we thought a 9 kilometres trek would not be a big deal for us and planned to reach the lake at 7:00 PM. The man in the house suggested us to stay overnight and start in the early morning, but we won't listen. Finally he said good bye, yet with a very useful parting piece of guidance. He told us about a camping location in mid of the trek, because he was sure that we won't make more than that. I wish I could have clicked him to post here.

Kareri Village to Camping site :

So against everyone's suggestions we started along this wild trek. We had witnessed a exhausted young man at the village with sweaty clothes. It was his return climb, and advised us the same. Given to his fatty body, we ignored him as well.

I was the one blabbering the most among the four. I said I would reach the top in next two and half hours, given I was alone. In next one kilometers the broad views of the nearby mountains ceded to the dense jungles of the Deaodar and oak. We were on a narrow path which was covered with oak leaves. See in the image below, where Deepak gives a pose.

Guess what!! we lost the right path, and after another one kilometer, we bumped into another village, which was not be in our plan as suggested by the man in village. This one was even smaller with just 3-5 houses, but very beautiful. There was no road, but only the Deodar jungles all around the house and small terraced farmland around those houses. It was on on side of the deep valley that became steep when we looked towards the top of its origin. Take a look in the next two photos.

Thankfully we had this small chat with a young man who peeped out of the balcony of a wooden home. He told us that we could progress along this same trek and it would make only a difference of about one kilometer longer. The trek got wilder after that. Sometimes it would diverge in two, and we would make our best guess and it is not hard when you are a person of mountains.
After 1-2 kilometers a road emerged out of nowhere, and thankfully it was one from our plan. After resting for a while at the bridge, the trek got steeper and and jungle became more denser.

Sometimes we would spot very large boulders of the rock suspended on the slopes, ready to come down but restricted by trees or their own depth below the ground. Some of them would make fine shelters with caving they provided under the overhang, and we would cheer up to see another possible shelter in case we lose our path, or in case we don't find a plain camping ground.

At many times the trek switched the sides along the mountain brook that bisected the valley, but ran almost parallel with it. There were no bridges to across it, and it would be more dangerous to jump from one boulder to the other in the rainy season.

The backpacks made it a bit more tougher, and after every 20-30 minutes we would lie down on the slopes to gain some air. Water bottles are a must, because the stream is non approachable from the trek, except at 2-3 crossings.

It turned out that we only reached the midway till eight o'clock at night. We had no internet or map, so our wild guesses went way wrong. We thought we were close to the lake, and we went climbing even in the dark. Fortunately we spotted a fire burning amidst the rocks at few hundred metres above.

This would turn out to be a help from God. A Gaddi(shephard) named Ranu Ram welcomed us to a caved shelter beneath a big rock. It was already dark and we were tired. He offered to make the food for us, but we wouldn't want to use his stock of food at these heights of Himalayas where he would live with his herd of goats and sheep till the snow makes him step down.

Instead, we asked him about the camping ground that was mentioned by the man at Kareri village. It was only at 5 minutes climb, and that is where we carried our exhausted asses to lay down for the night. It was very close to that mountain brook, and reasonably so.

No one knew how to pitch a camp, but there is always a first time. Three of them worked with tents and I found these half-burned logs of wood, which might be left by earlier campers. Successfully the wood was lighted and after eating the biscuits, fruits and some other stuff we would go to sleep.

We could see nothing of the area, whole beauty was curtained dark. The stream is named as 'Niyund stream' and it flowed quite angrily, the sound we would hear till our minds shut off to sleep. We would see it only in the morning, that how enchanting the whole place was. At night it rained, and it sounded horrible.

Ranu-Ram's dog had come with us, hoping for some new food from us. His way of walking and sitting at the place next to our tent gave us a bit more of courage to face the fear of the wild animals. Roushan had his birthday to be started at twelve at night, but no one was at that energy level to wait. Hoping to see a beautiful sunshine and an exotic scenery my thoughts were engulfed by a deep slumber.

...to be continued in part 2, please click here.