We are watching the sun set over the Ganges River (mother ganga) in the town of Rishikesh. It has taken us awhile to get here as we were diverted north to Tehri and the mountains by a new friend Niyaz whom we met on the bus coming from Delhi. He invited us to accompany him to his hometown of Tehri to stay with his family and visit the 'mounts'. It was an amazing experience. Niyaz and his extended family of aunt, uncle, brothers, sisters, cousins, nephew and niece all live in a beautiful home in New Tehri, up in the foothills of the Himalaya.
The original town of Tehri (50,000 people) was flooded to make a huge dam on the Bhagirathi River. The lake that was created is 43 kilometers long and 850 meters deep and the dam is one of the largest in the world. The people that were displaced were moved up the mountain to 'New Tehri' which overlooks the beautiful lake that covers the entire old town.
The road we drove on was immortalized in the Ice Road Truckers (IRT) movie filmed in India where they hauled cement into the Tehri Dam...we drove the road twice and all I can say is that US truckers are pussies compared to their Indian counterparts that drive this road pedal to the metal with ancient Tata trucks. (Actually the Indian made, Indian tough Tata trucks are my new road heros!) And if the IRTs thought that the road they drove on was bad they would have fainted if they saw the road beyond the dam!
So we were toured around for a day by Niyaz, Shiraz, and MD Sameem, fed incredible Indian food and treated like very special guests. The next day we travelled by bus and share taxi (6hrs) to Garam Bhati, a small village further up into the mountains where the road ends and trails take over. It was just like being in Nepal. We stayed with MD Sameen's mom and gramma in a very rudimentary home. No heat except a wood fuelled cooking area on the ground, two rooms up and the cows live below. When we hiked up into the Himalaya foothills (a misnomer as these "hills"are thousands of feet high and near vertical as one can get without being a sheer rock wall) we followed the village women who with their brightly colored dresses head into the mountains everyday to collect firewood. Let me tell you...these sub100lb women are TOUGH...I could hardly lift up the bundles of firewood they collect with their small scythes (bundle into a roll and pad with grass then wrap a nylon rope around the bundle and across their shoulder like backpack straps!....can you even imagine hauling a hundred pound load with nylon straps digging into your shoulder for 2 hrs!!!
So we go on this hike and our good friends are talking about beers (bears) and lions of which they are deadly afraid...and when we came to a spot where they thought that they spotted a lion track we decided to turn back. The men (of which there are very few as most of the men (with the exception of the old men (elders) work in the cities and only come home once in a while) were amazed that us fellows and Lori climbed up the mountain...it is dangerous and steep...but the women do this every day of the week!!!
We had alot of fun and owe Niyaz, Shiraz and MD Sameen a big thank you for showing us a side of rural India that we would have never experienced on our own! The trip back was as much fun as the ride to the foothills as the roads are a disaster with avalanches everywhere! Every hillside is a mass of earthen scars caused by the monsoon season rains. The hand work stone road walls are a work of art and it is mind boggling to think that all the millions of walls/rocks were moved by hand!! After travelling through places like Indonesia and Nepal we are kind of used to the driving antics of India (that used to scare the crap out of us) and in fact they drive more sanely here than Indonesia. However every once in a while a driver thinks he is Mario Andretti and in these cases we have learned to just close your eyes and try to go to sleep as one fact of these mountain roads is that if you do leave the road it will be the last 'exit' of your life.
Anyways we made it to Rishikesh and this place is a sea of calm in the chaos of India!
The original town of Tehri (50,000 people) was flooded to make a huge dam on the Bhagirathi River. The lake that was created is 43 kilometers long and 850 meters deep and the dam is one of the largest in the world. The people that were displaced were moved up the mountain to 'New Tehri' which overlooks the beautiful lake that covers the entire old town.
The road we drove on was immortalized in the Ice Road Truckers (IRT) movie filmed in India where they hauled cement into the Tehri Dam...we drove the road twice and all I can say is that US truckers are pussies compared to their Indian counterparts that drive this road pedal to the metal with ancient Tata trucks. (Actually the Indian made, Indian tough Tata trucks are my new road heros!) And if the IRTs thought that the road they drove on was bad they would have fainted if they saw the road beyond the dam!
So we were toured around for a day by Niyaz, Shiraz, and MD Sameem, fed incredible Indian food and treated like very special guests. The next day we travelled by bus and share taxi (6hrs) to Garam Bhati, a small village further up into the mountains where the road ends and trails take over. It was just like being in Nepal. We stayed with MD Sameen's mom and gramma in a very rudimentary home. No heat except a wood fuelled cooking area on the ground, two rooms up and the cows live below. When we hiked up into the Himalaya foothills (a misnomer as these "hills"are thousands of feet high and near vertical as one can get without being a sheer rock wall) we followed the village women who with their brightly colored dresses head into the mountains everyday to collect firewood. Let me tell you...these sub100lb women are TOUGH...I could hardly lift up the bundles of firewood they collect with their small scythes (bundle into a roll and pad with grass then wrap a nylon rope around the bundle and across their shoulder like backpack straps!....can you even imagine hauling a hundred pound load with nylon straps digging into your shoulder for 2 hrs!!!
So we go on this hike and our good friends are talking about beers (bears) and lions of which they are deadly afraid...and when we came to a spot where they thought that they spotted a lion track we decided to turn back. The men (of which there are very few as most of the men (with the exception of the old men (elders) work in the cities and only come home once in a while) were amazed that us fellows and Lori climbed up the mountain...it is dangerous and steep...but the women do this every day of the week!!!
We had alot of fun and owe Niyaz, Shiraz and MD Sameen a big thank you for showing us a side of rural India that we would have never experienced on our own! The trip back was as much fun as the ride to the foothills as the roads are a disaster with avalanches everywhere! Every hillside is a mass of earthen scars caused by the monsoon season rains. The hand work stone road walls are a work of art and it is mind boggling to think that all the millions of walls/rocks were moved by hand!! After travelling through places like Indonesia and Nepal we are kind of used to the driving antics of India (that used to scare the crap out of us) and in fact they drive more sanely here than Indonesia. However every once in a while a driver thinks he is Mario Andretti and in these cases we have learned to just close your eyes and try to go to sleep as one fact of these mountain roads is that if you do leave the road it will be the last 'exit' of your life.
and these women are all carrying cell phones...true!
Anyways we made it to Rishikesh and this place is a sea of calm in the chaos of India!
