Garhwal Trip Part-1 (Yamunotri Trip)

Most of you know I love to travel and going on nature treks, where I feel refreshed. I also tend to do one longer trip every year. This year I got the opportunity to travel towards Yamunotri temple; the Yamunotri temple is the one dham of the chotta Char Dham Yatra.
       
                                                                                  Devprayag- the confluence of the Alkaknanda and Bhagirathi Rivers. 


Couple of years earlier, I had traveled the same route but at that time I visited the Kedarnath and The Badrinath temple with a friend instead. The Kedarnath and Badrinath temples are two of the other dhams in the chotta char dham yatra, the final one being Gangotri. Since then, having left the journey of the char dham incomplete, we felt a deep wish inside us to travel to the remaining two dham (Yamunotri and Gangotri).

Rainy water fall on the trek to Yemunotri !

This year we decided to complete that journey though I wasn’t completely sure for a long time if I could actually manage the time. Nevertheless, I finally did get some time out for the trip, called up a few friends to join me for visiting the Gahrwal region which they readily agreed to.
Having settled on a convenient departure date, we created an outline plan based on our earlier experience. We were to drive down by car. This was a long journey especially driving by car in the mountains we knew it was going to be tough.

The confluence of the Bhagirathi and the Alaknanda rivers  (Devprayag)!

We left our city in the early morning on a Sunday because as per our plan we had to drive around 250 kms. We reached in Srinagar, our day destination, by dusk and we booked a room in TRH (Garhwal Mandal Vikas Nigam). Next morning was early too and continuation our travel towards Devprayag where we were about to see the confluence of the Bhagirathi and the Alkananda Rivers. It is from this confluence that the river is officially the holy Ganges River, as it is known very well worldwide.
After some time relaxing and hot breakfast we headed to New Tehri.

New Tehri
The old town of Tehri sat at the confluence of the Bhagirathi and Bhilangna rivers. The Tehri Dam is the tallest dam in India and one of the tallest in the world and it is attraction for everyone. We spent some time near the Dam and then chose a route that passed along with dam for about 10km towards Dharasu.

Tehri dam !

It is tough traveling in the hills during the in rainy season and we were traveling just towards the end of the season, it was expected that we would get stuck in the traffic due the rains. The heavy rains tend to wash out the roads or damage them with loads of pot holes. We however had to travel at that time since in another month or so, the temples are closed for the winter and the navigation becomes tough too due to heavy snowfall. Luckily though the road conditions were good except in a few places, where it was either narrow or broken down.

Yemuna river !

We reached at Janki Chatti in the evening, darkness following us just as we reached. We booked a room in hotel quickly as it was very cold there being at the foothills of the Himalayan ranges.
Early morning next day, we were up at 6am and starting off our climb. The main Yamunotri temple is accessible by a short hike of around 6 km through a narrow path.

Janki chatti !

Yamunotri Temple
The Yamunotri temple is at the first transition of the Yamuna river into a plain drift as it runs down from its source. The source itself is the Yamunotri Glacier at a height of 6,387 metres (20,955 ft) and the temple is assumed to be the seat of the Goddess Yamuna.

Trek to yamunotri temple !

The temple is at an altitude of 3,293 metres (10,804 ft) in the Garhwal Himalayas and the headquarters of the Uttarkashi district in the Garhwal Division of Uttarakhand, India. It is one of the four sites in India’s Chhota Char Dham pilgrimage. The sacred shrine of Yamunotri is the westernmost shrine in the Garhwal Himalayas, perched atop a flank of “Bandar Poonch” (tail of the monkey) Parvat.
The chief attraction at Yamunotri is the temple devoted to the Goddess Yamuna and the holy thermal springs at Janki Chatti (7 km. Away).
We reached The Yamunotri temple after trekking 6km and offered our prayers inside Yamunotri temple.

Yamunotri temple !

After having breakfast at out site temple we started descending down, now it was time for us to travel our next Destination.
How to reach Yamunotri
From Haridwar                 Distance (Km)    
Rishikesh                                           24
Narendranagar                                40
Chamba                                           85
Dharasu Band                               145
Brahnkhal                                     160
Barkot                                           200
Sayanachatti                                 240
Hanumanchatti                             247
Jankichatti                                    255
Where to stay
You can find out many accommodation there, like GMVN has own guest house there.
I would like to thank my one friend who edited this article for me.

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