Each one of you have must have travelled to at least a few of your favourite destinations. There must be that one heavenly place where you have gone to and experienced sheer magic.
I wish to share one such experience which blew my mind away.
I, along with a very chirpy and zealous group of amateur trekkers (ladies only) went on my first trekking adventure.
The place was a real time example of beauty and serenity. It was called the Valley of Flowers. The name itself had given us goosebumps.
Romance was in the mountain air!!!
We started our trip with flying emotions, expectations and zeal.
Valley of flowers, here we come!!!…
We had meticulously planned and customised the trip and also hired a guide who would accompany us to the base camp, throughout the trek and well, in general, take care of us boisterous lot.
At least, that was the intention.
We began the long and arduous trek of 12 km uphill to reach our hotel at the base. Yes, the base itself was quite high!!!
Our confident and insightful guide made sure that all our luggage was laden on donkeys and we just had to carry a light backpack with essentials. We were impressed. With him guiding us, this was going to be a cake walk…the cherry on the cake would be when we hit the base later.
He assured us for the umpteenth time that he had taken care of everything.
The first thing he had taken care of, or not, was when we realised that we were the only group who were standing at the starting point with no trekking poles/sticks. Every other person around us, big or small, fat or thin, young or old had a pole in his/her hand, some of them even had 2, ready to tread their way up.
We didn’t even know the purpose of those sticks. So much for inexperience!!!
But, nevertheless, our spirit has be lauded. We were not worried as we had our guiding light with us. Our GUIDE!!!
We turned towards him with hope shining in our eyes, for some enlightenment.
Alas!!! He was searching for his own personal enlightenment and looked away!!! He was as clueless as us!!!
Finally, some angels and co trekkers took pity on us and suggested that we buy some poles available in the shops a bit further and then get on with the trek before Sun down.
Sadly, our guide and we were now “poles apart”
Once we reached half away, we took a break. Here, we tasted the most scrumptious and lip smacking Maggi we ever had in our lives.
It must have been something to do with the mountain air. Even humble, good old Maggi tasted exquisite, a dish extraordinaire !!!
During our Maggi break we animatedly discussed everything, from the sparkling water falls, to pristine clear streams, snow capped, mesmerising mountains, to the never seen before flora and fauna we found Enroute.
We got a jolt soon after. A few of our crew members were tired and felt they could go no further.
Our guide came to our rescue again, or not. He suggested that we hire a few ponies to carry our tired friends. Thus began a frantic search for ponies.
The tired friends for whom the ponies were being searched, had to even pop some antacids and anti- anxiety pills to lessen the stress!!!
And NO!!!…Our guide didn’t join the search party. Unfazed by all the frenzy, he was still savouring his 3rd bowl of Maggi. He was having a ball!!!
Most of the ponies were already taken at the Start- point of the trek, so it was not easy to find a couple mid way to carry our worn out friends. After a few failed attempts we somehow managed to arrange them.
We needed only two of the sure-footed animals for our crew members, but as luck would have it, we got three.
Can you take a wild guess here, as to who grabbed the third pony???
Ah!!!…You smart ones!!!
Yes, our not so sure-footed guide. He was too tired he said, he had to reach the base at the earliest and see to it that everything was arranged and taken care of, he said.
And we said, yes…right…sure!!! We sure will trek on foot!!!
The ponies, with 2 of our friends and our friendly neighbourhood He-Man guide led the way up.
We must understand that the ponies have a mind of their own.
Unlike He-man…
Our He-man’s pony recognised that he was a VIP and needed to reach the top at supersonic speed. He had to after all make arrangements and take care of us lesser beings who were trekking slowly on our very own poor feet.
His pony had such a strong connect with our He-man…it was pure telepathy… Horespathy, if you will.
His Pony then decided to use all its horsepower and make a run for it, literally. This scared the living daylights of our He-man. He started yelling at the top of his lungs, screaming “Bhaiya “,“Bhaiya” (brother, brother)…calling out to the attender of his horse urging him to make his pony go slow or just stop.
The attender later told us that He-man must have called him “bhaiya, bhaiya” more number of times than his actual sister has ever called him in his entire life.
Three Cheers (in this case, infinite screams and shout outs) to Brotherhood, to Bhaiyahood!!!
We finally reached the base camp. The ponies deserved a pat on their backs or nose or wherever one pats a horse!!! A Job well done!!! They were then tied up, after which they started to munch on their snack, fresh hay.
Speaking of hay…Hey at this moment, the look I saw on our He-man’s face is something I can’t express in words. There was horse dung all over and then there was his face.
I will quietly let you imagine!!!
This experience made me wiser than ever and I became aware of the fact that d-guy whom we took along as our travel guide was a guy who himself needed guidance.
He was just a guy-d!!!
We really didn’t need any guide!!! We were capable of taking care of ourselves and also any guy-d with aplomb.
From then on, all our trails and treks have been without any guy-ds…
Because we are a group of Ladies who can be totally independent, leading and guiding our own ways through the roads less travelled!!!
We can conquer the world Comrades!!!
And we don’t even need swords to do that…or horses for that matter!!!
Bon Voyage!!!
