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Chronicles of Himachal, Ch-5

The End is near
The alarm beeped with all kinds of musical tunes set to wake us up. We were lying on the bed half-dead. We begged for a few more minutes of sleep, but time is a cruel beast. "It's 6:50. We won't be able to catch our bus to Bairsaini." Ini announced. This was our last chance to trek in the mountains. If we miss it, our trip would have a void which we will regret for the rest of our lives. Listening to Ini and reminding myself of reveries that waited for us on the mountain top, I jumped out of the bed and like a squadron leader ordered everyone to wake up. "20 minutes is all that we have. It will take 10 minutes for us to reach the bus stop. Let's go. We can make it!" I said.
Breaking the orthodox hoax about ladies being more sensitive towards their looks, we left our camp within 10 minutes. Covered with blankets and caps, the 5 Eskimos were striding towards the bus stop. We were already behind schedule so I ran, leaving the 4 behind to stop the bus for all of us. We grabbed a cup of tea from a nearby stall while waiting for the bus which was running late. The bus came and we took off.
Our plan for the day was to trek towards the beautiful village of Tosh. Our starting point was Bairsaini. It was 4 Km uphill journey and then 4 Km down. We, with our enormous trekking bags over our shoulders were all set to scale the mountain.
The charming beauty of the hills can not be expounded merely by words. The only comment I'm capable of making is this- If God ought to settle on earth, he would most certainly choose this holy abode from amongst all the places, since it was comparable to heaven. Rainbows, doves, lakes with pure waters and hills surrounding all of this, is not a fairy tale. All of it is true.We know now.


We marched ahead and after 2 hours, we reached Tosh. We had breakfast from a small shop near the village. We drank water from the spring nearby. Dripping from a pipe, the crystal clear liquid was as cold as ice. Although it was not refined by machine, it was the purest water that I had ever tasted. We filled our bottles from the spring water to relish it for the voyage that lied ahead.


We spent an hour in Tosh looking at the poetic beauty. Now it was time to leave. We were happy and we were sad, for the great time we spent would soon come to an end. We went back to Barsaini and took a local bus to Bhunter. Our Volvo would pick us from Bhunter and drop us directly to Delhi, our home. We were early so we had to wait. I closed my eyes  to relax and step out of the fantasy of the hills. The numbing pain in my legs and shoulders, was a sweet reminder that our trip was not a dream.
The only thing we planned in this tour was our bus tickets which later on, proved to be useless (We had to take the long route to Himachal due to police incident.).  At this point I realized that most of the plans we make in our life, don't end the way we expect them to. Life is, after all a twisted road with boulders and slippery slopes, pretty much like the mountains that we  marched.
Things were about to end and we had a story to tell. The ending, we thought would not be as interesting as the begining. Perhaps, our destiny thought so to and thus had saved one last surprise for us, for what happened next never came in our wildest dreams.
The bus for Delhi came. As we entered up the stairs, we saw a pesky face. The nasty grin on it was familiar. At first I thought I saw that face in one of my nightmares, but then it struck like a lightening bolt. The driver was same as before. He was the reason behind our tragic fate and the unnecessary feat in four local buses in Punjab. We all shouted "Here we go again...".

Comments

  1. A trip without events can never be remembered as when events approach us we get angry at that time but that time passes away then it's the matter of laughter and joy... 😂😂😂

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