Badrinath and Kedarnath holy trip

I am planning to visit Haridwar - Gourikund - Kedarnath - Chopta - Badrinath - Rudraprayag (via Joshimath/Auli) - Haridwar in mid week of June 2008.

Please let me know you experiences.

Peak pilgrim rush, shortage of accomodation and other facilities, roads chocked with vehicles, occasional rains.

It was a memorable trip for me. Great weather.... soon i will write more details about the holy trip.
Check photos.

i look forward to your report.
if you do not have time for long reports, please tell places you stopped/visited and number of days.

I had also a nice trekking experience around there - I mean I trekked Kuanri Pass(Pls. dont laugh - actually my trek was Auli - Tali - Kuanri Pass - Bangarchuli peak & BAck - Delisera (the best place of the whole trek)- Tapoban. Our guide was Dinesh Bhat, a nice and straight forward boy.

Dharansi pass was not open. So we had to make this alternate trek. Still we went to Dolma village, stayed with Rudra Singh Batola, a local guide, quite respected for his knowledge of the himalayan forest of this part.

Will upload some photographs and write the whole experience later in a separate thread.

I am sorry the name of the village is Tolma, not Dolma. And I was there from 31st may to 12 June.

Tbhati

Just had a look at the photos from your trip to Kedarnath, Badrinth and other places. The pictures are great you have captured the places really well. Brilliant photography!

I am planning a trip to Kedarnath and Badrinath via Rishikesh taking in Gaurikund Temple and hot springs in 2008. I would be very grateful if you could tell me the date of your trip ie which month did you visit Kedarnath and Badrinath. From your pictures it looks like the weather was good not too cold or raining.

Thanks so much

I went last year September and the trip was simply awesome...

It was Delhi-Kedarnath-Ukimath-Deoriyatal-Chopta-Badrinath-Rudraprayag-Delhi.

The weather was good and best part it was off season with less crowd.

Have written about it in details in one of my threads.

We are back from our trip...
It was simply awesome.
A brief outline of the trip is given below:

Hardwar-Sultanpur-Kedarnath
Trek and stay in Kedarnath
Stay in Ukimath
Trek to Deoriyatal
Stay in Chopta
2 days stay in Badrinath
Darshan and Charanpaduka trek
Badrinath-Rudraprayag-Hardwar

Overall the trip went on very well and the biggest experience was my daughter enjoyed the whole trip and was comfortable with heights. We did the best we could do with a small kid.

Kedarnath trek was a beautiful experience with the beauty of waterfalls all through the route.We had an excellent darshan and wonderful view of the snowcapped peaks.My daughter was in a kandi,my wife took a pony midway and i trekked.

Next we stayed in Ukimath GMVN and i went for the Deoriyatal trek.I can never forget the first glance of the chakhambi peak and it’s reflection on the tal.It was simply mindblowing.

Next we went to Chopta and stayed in a hut. The beauty of Chopta got to be seen to believe and calling it mini-switzerland is an understatement.Unfortunately the next day as I got ready at 4:30 in the morning for my Tungnath & Chandrashila trek I found the entire valley engulfed under fog with zero visibility.Everybody including the locals suggested against my going for the trek and thus I had to give it a miss.
BTW in Chopta I had one of the most delicious dinner of my life in the Rajendra Singh Bhandari’s(the hut owner) dhaba.I think it’s the best place to stay in Chopta and his phone no is 01364-268287/234.

From Chopta we straightaway went to Badrinath..We had an excellent darshan and then I did the Charanpaduka trek.It was again a wonderful trek where you reach very close to Neelkanth.The place has some Sadhus living in gufas.Overall a very pleasant experience.
We went to Mana in the evening to do the short walks to Bhimpul.
Again heavy rainfall and fog prevented me to go to Vasudhara falls next morning.

Way back we stayed in Rudraprayag GMVN which is virtually on the prayag.

Just to give an idea on Cost front for other’s benefit.

Scorpio for 8 days – Rs 13000 (approx)
Pony in Kedarnath –Rs1000
Pittu-Rs500
Per day boarding ,lodging & food(we tried staying in the best places with the kid)-Rs1300
Shatabdi tickets (Del to Hardwar)-Rs350 per ticket

Some photographs from the trip is given below:

http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailsh...1/t_=107285821

Thanks again to all for the suggestions

To K Cborty

Thank you for replying to my post and letting me know when you did your trip to kedarnath, Badrinath and Gaurikund. I am still hoping to do this trek and probably will try last week of September or first week in October 2008. I am trying to find someone to go with me to share the cost and the journey.

hi!

I am also planning to do this in september end / october first week. But i would be doing Chopta-Tunganath-Deoriya Tal-Kedarnath. Trying to rope in another friend but doubtful. If your plan is final then we can discuss the possibilities...