Camping in Rain! Uphill Bike Ride in Snowfall! Shadow Visitors at Night! Paragliding! Yes all Of it!! Wondering which Place - Manali, Rohtang pass and the Solang valley. And boy what an adventure it was. This was our second trip together and a beautiful time well spent. I believe we did it as the planning, reservation and gathering the camping equipments all happened well in advance with the last minute delays.
This is an impeccable experience of a long weekend trip with a set of friends. So, here was Friday, we all left in Tempo traveller picking everyone. It was a night travel and we started playing dumb sheras.
Honestly, I am very bad at it, Was it my bad Guesses or my poor skills in enacting any movie? Not sure yet ! We won anyway with Jyoti being in my team and Shwetank and Gaurav doing a good job in guessing. Not to mention the other team was strong as well with the Guru, Ravi and his two chellas - Navnit and Deepak playing really well.
So after snacking, eating we all slept. For a big disappointment, we all got up in the morning to find that it was raining. After contemplating between reserving a nearby Hotel and camping; we decided to stay in the nearby Hotel instead due to heavy rain. Still we were hoping the rain to subside by the time we reach as other plans of going Rohtang pass becomes possible.
We decided that since we have reached, we will decide after reaching the campsite what next could be done. Finally, we reached and it was still raining heavily. After waiting in the Tempo traveller while Ravi and Shwetank boarded down the Traveller to check.
I dont exactly recall, who had this crazy idea first; But, gradually all decided to set up the camp in heavy rain. But little did we know that the quick setting up tent was about to become long. We all were drenched in Rain. However, we changed in dry clothes and managed to warm ourselves with Hot Beverages and food thereafter.
All tired after dinner, we retired to our tents inside our sleeping bags. We all had set up 2 tents (one big and one small), However all of us was crammed in one tent and started playing card games, gossiping and having fun.
It was time well spent inspite of the heavy rain outside. I did not realize when I fell asleep only to wake up to find some still talking when someone suddenly spotted a shadow of an animal outside in the tent wall. It scared me and everyone started guessing what it could be.
One said Could be Dog, but then it had a good height. Some guessed it to wild deer! Some guessed it as Horse! Well ! frankly after looking at it once, I was so scared that I decided to divert my mind on something being extremely quiet at the moment.
I think someone went out of the tent for a cigarette to realize that rain had almost stopped and it was Horses. After that we all slept in our own sleeping Bags, we all were tired with the long travel.
Morning in the campsite was so pleasant, no signs of cloud or rain and we could see the snow covered valley of Rohtang pass. Finally, we all had breakfast and decided to hire 5 bikes to goto Rohtang pass from Manali. We all paired up with leaving Deepak to travel alone and decided to swap in mid way.
So Now after renting the Bike we started going upwards, we kept pace with each other and waited if required. Just the feeling we got with good and clear weather that the rest of the trip will go as planned. We found out the bike Deepak was riding was having
problems climbing up the Hill. So now as we were seeing the snow area coming closer and closer, all of our troubles vanished. It was a nice drive, all we saw was snow all around. I was feeling cold, I think one more Jacket I should have packed. But, that did not stop me from enjoying.
It was fun, we drank tea on reaching. We clicked lots of pictures. We rolled down in the snow, we played in the snow. We made videos. It was a lot of fun. Finally, we decided to head back as we had to cover para gliding in Solang Valley.
We reached Solang Valley by evening just in time for Paragliding. We bought the tickets and had to take a cable car up the hill. When we reached there, I saw two guys running and jumping off the cliff, obviously with the parachute attached and the two of them were harnessed together!! Duh! :)
There was only sufficient time for us to do Paragliding there so we all started. While I was waiting for my turn, I saw Jyoti tying camera to record all her experiences. My turn came, I was a bit scared thinking, Am I really gonna jump off the cliff? What is wrong with me? I was getting scared and was too afraid to tell anyone so kept quiet.
While I was still thinking many things to find a way out mentally while being harnessed, it was time to run and jump. The instructor who was harnessed to me advised me to run as fast as I could and jump with no stopping and in no time we started running. My leg got a little twitch due to unevenness.
But, the instructor did not stop and kept running and I followed. In no time we were in air and I was flying and descending. It was an awesome experience. We got some of the pictures and hung out for a while.
Finally, we soon had to start to head back with so many memories. We stopped for Dinner and played games in the Tempo traveller; shared stories to reach back to Delhi.
This long weekend getaway had so much more to offer than what we had planned for ourselves.
The real attraction of camping is that come from new experiences and meeting new challenges and it is then you realize, that challenging things can also be fun.
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