Journey To The North

May 28^th. Bags packed. All set. Took a cab headed for Bandra Terminus. One impediment: Mumbai traffic and the scorching summer heat, where it feels like you would just melt, with sweat trickling down the body and the eww feeling with permeates through the cab. But then all of this would all be left behind as I think of what lay ahead. It was finally happening! I was finally going to the place that I heard so much about. The place that I was so persistent that it happened in spite of the adversities. Got my leaves approved a month in advance from work, worked out a foolproof plan to tell my parents what I was doing. So I took the plunge. And here I was, on my way to the place that I only dreamt of, with the one person in my life who makes things happen, no matter what.

Got off the cab, with our huge 17l haversacks and walked to platform No.5, that’s where our train would be stationed. Waiting for the other 2 friends to board the train. The Chandigarh – Super Fast. Lucky enough we got our tickets on tatkal and that too 3 Tier A/C. Phew! It’s just heavenly to feel the cool A/c after the Mumbai heat. Few more minutes and we would be off to our destination – Kasol. But it’s not that easy to get there. Kasol is located in Himachal Pradesh, in the Kullu district. To get there would be mean a strenuous 30 hrs journey by train and then 10hrs by bus. Unless we planned to take a flight, a faster luxurious journey, but obviously that would be more money, so we just stuck to the basics. the train that we took was barely a year old, so it was nice and clean, and a good luxurious ride for us.

Our train left at 12.05, the scheduled time from Bandra Terminus. Super fast – super a/c train was a relaxed journey. We had 30 hours to kill in the train till we reached – Chandigarh. The journey was great (as compared to the return), I chilled, had my power naps, and read my book – The Secret of the NAGAS, the book which I was still reading, since the past 3 months, this was a good opportunity as I was on a trip, no limits, no stress, no official calls from work, no deadlines, just me and my book and thoughts free from the hustle and bustle of city life. Just these small delights feel so good.  

The rest of the journey was pleasant. Had the local food that was sold in the train, which wasn’t so bad actually. 2 catholics , 1 gujju and 1 parsi. A lil diverse aint it and also hard core junkies. A birdie once told me that, “whenever you travel with a gujju, your never gonna stay hungry”. And damn right, juices, chewda, dry fruits etc. was on the house. My favorite was the salted cashews! Yum.. And then just to pass time, the four of us played the ‘Word game’. One realization was that when we played it, time just flew. That was the highlight of the journey to Chandigarh.

We reached Delhi at around 12.30 pm on 29th May . Normally I wouldn’t feel it, coz being confined to the a/c cabin, we don’t tend to realize how hot it could be outside. But standing there in the gangway, with the door open, it felt like the sun was blowing hot fumes of air right in your face. So it was best that we just sit in. The next stop after Delhi was Ambala Cantonment. Here there was a long halt as the train usually changes the engine and then splits and one goes to Amritsar and the other one to Chandigarh, pretty cool actually!  

We reached Chandigarh at 4.00pm. Once out of the train, we were pounced on by the travel agents, all asking us about how cheap they could take us to the place and so on. Luckily, a friend was there to help us with the details to a driver, and since she has traveled up north a couple of time, she said that she always went through him and he was pretty reliable. So there we were, with the short balding man wearing an orange and green ladies kurta.